The Digital Reader

Earlier this week Penguin announced that their author & writer community Book Country now had a self-publishing program that any aspiring author could use.

I wouldn’t, though; it’s simply not a good deal.

I”m not the first to write about this; many bloggers have complained, including Joe Konrath, Katie Salidas, David Gaughran, and Linda Welch.  But I dislike it so that I kept this post on my to do list even after the story had been hashed out.

I’m taking time on my Saturday to complain about this; that’s how pissed we all are.

It might seem inflammatory to say that Penguin  is fleecing authors, but I think it’s true. Just look at the details of the program; I can find cheaper options that work just as well.

First, there’s an initial fee of either$300 or $550.

The higher rate includes a conversion fee, and the extra $250 is unreasonable.  It’s far higher than the going market rate.

For most books it won’t cost you more than $150 to get the 3 standard ebook source formats (Epub, Kindle, Smashwords).  You can also get conversion services for much less, assuming you shop around. Now, the BC price includes CreateSpace, so the comparison with standard ebook conversion isn’t a good fit. But adding that one format (PDF, I think) doesn’t add $100 to the price.

The lower fee is just a charge to distribute your ebook to the major ebookstores. Hah. It’s ridiculously overpriced. Not only is it very easy to upload your ebooks to Amazon, B&N, and Smashwords, you can also find other services that will do it for you and charge much less.

Bookbaby will do a basic conversion of your ebook and distribute to the major US ebookstores: Kindle, Nook, and iBooks. What’s even better is that they only charge $100, which makes them a considerably better deal. BTW, they aso offer a number of other services and worth a look when shopping your ebook around.

I’m still not done with the fees

Penguin will not only charge you for the initial service, they will also be taking a commission of anything you earn. Get this: Penguin wants 30% of your ebook sales. In comparison, Bookbaby charges a 0% commission (after that initial fee). Also, other sites that charge a commission on sales don’t charge an initial fee.

Yes, Penguin is double dipping, and that is beyond the pale.

Now, that Penguin commission is 30% of the 70% that B&N or Amazon would pay you. Paying the ebookstores their cut is only fair; they have a business to run. But Penguin isn’t doing doing any marketing or promotion, like you’d expect from a publisher; all they’re doing is the accounting and that is entirely automated.

And again, there’s no need to pay a second commission; it’s not difficult to upload the ebooks yourself.

I have to wonder what the senior folks at Penguin were thinking when they conceived of this plan? No, I’m serious. This program is so overpriced that it shows a marked lack of market research, and that really makes me wonder about how well they understand their own industry.

On the other hand, it might also show that they don’t think authors can do that same research while shopping for ebook services. Did they really think that they’d get away with it?

P.S. There’s been a great deal of uproar over this, so I don’t expect the program to stay around for long.  But I certainly wouldn’t mess with it while it’s here.