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jducoeurI've been a customer of CafePress for various things over the past couple of years -- I'm used to them being the easy way for folks to sell mousepads, t-shirts and stuff like that.
What I didn't know is that they now deal with both CDs and books. Format your stuff according to their specifications, send them the masters, and *poof*: it's available for sale. They aren't free, of course -- they're trying to make a profit, so it's rather more expensive than doing it yourself. But the process appears to be pretty easy, and if you're just trying to make something available (rather than really making money off of it), the prices are reasonable. ($5-9 for CDs depending on the frou-frou; about $13 for a 200-page book.) Their user agreement seems to be fair, and doesn't contain any really onerous intellectual-property provisions -- they get the right to use your stuff to advertise sales *of* your stuff, but that's pretty much it.
The current editor of The Letter of Dance is considering using it to publish the collected volumes from here on out, and I have to say that it makes sense. If this had been available when I was running it, I'd probably have done the same -- it allows the editor to focus on the content, and offload the production, sales and support (which is most of the work, and by far the least rewarding part of the task) elsewhere easily. If I ever get The Ace's Boke (a project I really must do a bit more of) to the point where it's worth collecting and publishing, I'll have to keep this option in mind...
What I didn't know is that they now deal with both CDs and books. Format your stuff according to their specifications, send them the masters, and *poof*: it's available for sale. They aren't free, of course -- they're trying to make a profit, so it's rather more expensive than doing it yourself. But the process appears to be pretty easy, and if you're just trying to make something available (rather than really making money off of it), the prices are reasonable. ($5-9 for CDs depending on the frou-frou; about $13 for a 200-page book.) Their user agreement seems to be fair, and doesn't contain any really onerous intellectual-property provisions -- they get the right to use your stuff to advertise sales *of* your stuff, but that's pretty much it.
The current editor of The Letter of Dance is considering using it to publish the collected volumes from here on out, and I have to say that it makes sense. If this had been available when I was running it, I'd probably have done the same -- it allows the editor to focus on the content, and offload the production, sales and support (which is most of the work, and by far the least rewarding part of the task) elsewhere easily. If I ever get The Ace's Boke (a project I really must do a bit more of) to the point where it's worth collecting and publishing, I'll have to keep this option in mind...
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Date: 2004-03-03 07:59 pm (UTC)Please, please, please before using that option, talk to me, Justin! It's not like you don't know someone who does print-on-demand for a living and has been doing it since long before it became popular for anyone and their sister to try it (and do it badly). I am here for advice and recommendations. Really.