2006 Midwest Book Awards - Call for Entries

2006 Midwest Book Awards- Call for Entries Reminder – Deadline February 1, 2007

You still have time to enter the 17th Annual Midwest Book Awards sponsored by the Midwest Independent Publishers Association (MIPA). This competition for excellence in independent or non-profit publishing recognizes creativity in content and execution, overall book quality, and the book’s unique contribution to its subject area.

AWARDS- First, Merit and Honorable Mention winners are awarded in each category. Award winners receive certificates and may purchase foil seals for use in their marketing efforts. This year, for the first time, authors of award-winning books will also receive certificates. First-place winners are featured on the MIPA web site, in a special edition of the MIPA Newsletter, at the 2007 Midwest Booksellers Association (MBA) trade show, and other MIPA associated events. In addition, you are invited to attend the Midwest Book Awards Ceremony at the prestigious Minnesota Humanities Commission, 987 East Ivy Avenue, St. Paul, Minnesota, on Wednesday, May 9, 2007, 6:30 – 8:30 p.m.

ELIGIBILITY: All entries MUST carry a 2006 copyright. Independent and/or non-profit publishers, and self-publishers located in the 12-state Midwest region are eligible: IL, IN, IA, KS, MI, MN, MO, NE, ND, OH, SD & WI. Entry Fees must accompany your book submission. Entry deadline is February 1, 2007.

For fee information, book entry categories, entry form, and further details, please visit http://www.mipa.org/

Please contact me if you have any questions. I look forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely,

Marly Cornell
Chair, 2006 MIPA Midwest Book Awards
animarly@aol.com

It's Coming...

Several months ago US News and World Report, in its cover article about publishing, mentioned a machine that will revolutionize publishing. It's already in a few libraries but will start appearing in bookstores in 2007.

The Espresso Book Machine can print up to 20 books per hour. You can learn more about it from Jason Epstein, one of the co-founders of On Demand Books, which makes the machine, this Sunday on Book TV (C-SPAN 2). In a talk that was part of the Fourth Annual International Conference on the Book hosted by Emerson College in Boston, Mr. Epstein talks about what this machine will mean to publishers, authors, even editors and publicists.

Jason Epstein is the founder of Anchor Books and has been credited with introducing quality paperbacks to the American market. He is also a co-founder of the New York Review of Books and the author of "Book Business:
Publishing Past, Present, and Future."

What: Print on Demand: A Revolution in the Making
When: 7:45 AM Eastern; 6:45 Central and Noon, Eastern; 11 AM Central

To learn more, visit booktv.org and/or ondemandbooks.com.

What is this going to mean to publishing? Feel free to send your comments to mipa [dot] blog [at] gmail [dot] com and we may include them in a future post.

What IS an independent publisher?

There are so many different categories of publishers that it can be a bit confusing, so I thought I'd try to add a bit of clarification. Or muddy the waters even more. You be the judge.

In the March 2003 issue of the PMA Independent, PMA's Director Jan Nathan wrote an article called Who's A Publisher? In that article, she wrote in part:

"In today’s publishing community, many people who have written a book have paid for its production and been informed that they are its publisher. Paying for a product definitely does not make one a publisher. Owning the product’s ISBN (International Standard Book Number) definitely does make one a publisher. But there’s more to it than that."

Answering her article in the April 2003 issue, publisher and long-time publishing guru Pat Bell (also a MIPA member) continued the exploration with Who's Really a Publisher? Her conclusion was:

"In short, the consensus seems to be that someone who has set up a publishing company and established an identity as a publisher is in fact a publisher, as Jan pointed out, but an author who is simply paying for publication without learning and executing publishing skills is just walking away with a published book."

Nearly a year later, in January 2004, Jan Nathan revisited the topic in A 10-Step Program for Becoming a Publisher and with significant contributions from Pat Bell, pointed to several aspects of publishing as key indicators of whether or not one is really a publisher or not:

• Acquisition
• Financial
• Planning
• Author/manuscript development
• Publishers’ author obligations
• Production
• Standards
• Vendor interaction
• Product development
• Administration

Definitions

There is general agreement on the following definitions:

Self-publisher: a publisher who publishes only his or her own books and does not publish the works of others. Self-publishers must own the ISBNs assigned to their books.

Independent publisher: a publisher who publishes the books of others and pays royalties. Independent publishers may or may not also publish their own books. They may use either offset or digital printing.

Subsidy publisher: a publisher who publishes the books of others for a fee and/or with an agreement that the author will purchase a certain number of books. The fee paid by the author may cover only some or all of the production and printing costs. Note: some subsidy publishers have high standards of manuscript preparation, design, production, printing, and distribution, and work closely with their authors to create a high-quality book. Other subsidy publishers do not. Subisdy publishers are also sometimes referred to as POD publishers (not to be confused with POD printing - a printing technology) or vanity publishers. Small subsidy publishers are still considered independent publishers.

Non-profit or university publisher: a publisher whose backing and/or funding is provided by a non-profit organization or univeristy.

There are some less well-defined areas. The term micro-publisher is generally used to describe an independent publisher who either publishes a smaller number of books per year (some say fewer than 25 books per year) or generates less than some amount of revenue per year. Ingram Book Company, for example, has defined a micropublisher as one who generates less than $15,000 in net sales over a two-year period. Other sources say the definition is less than $20,000 through Ingram over two years. In the 2007 Writer's Market (Brewer, Robert, Joanna Masterson (2006). Writer's Digest Books, p. 337), the definition is a publisher who publishes an average of fewer than 10 books a year.

In contrast, a small publisher is generally defined as a publisher who produces 25 or more books per year, or generates more revenue than a micro-publisher. Both are still considered independent publishers.

Gray Area

There is some gray area surrounding who is not an independent publisher as well. Publishers who are part of large conglomerates or multinational corporations are often not considered independent publishers (Herman, Jeff. Jeff Herman's Guide To Book Publishers, Editors & Literary Agents, 2007: Who they are! What they want! How to win them over!: 17th Edition. Stockbridge, MA: Three Dog Press, 131-132, 367-372.). Publishers who are run by boards of directors or who answer to shareholders rather than being run by an individual, partnership, or small corporation or LLC are also in this gray area.

To add to the confusion, many of the large subsidy publishers are marketing themselves as self-publishing companies, inviting their authors to believe that if they have their books published with these subsidy publishers, they become self-publishers. Publishing industry experts agree that this is not true. The owner of the ISBN - the subsidy publisher - is the publisher of record, not the author.

As technologies change and publishing becomes more viable to the average person, there are valid concerns about the decline in standards for published books. Enough badly edited (or not edited at all), badly designed (or not designed at all), badly packaged books have been published that booksellers, distributors, wholesalers, and others in the industry are justifiably wary about independent publishers and the books we produce. It is our goal that through professional associations, education, networking, and a commitment to high standards of quality, whether a self, micro, small, subsidy, non-profit, academic, or other publisher, we can demonstrate to the book industry and to the reading public that independent publishing represents a vibrant and valuable contribution to publishing.

MIPA Announces New Blog

At our September 2006 meeting, we discussed how technology has contributed to the independent publishing industry. In particular, we explored podcasting, e-books, and blogging. In that vein, we've decided to launch our own blog.

The MIPA blog will help keep our members and everyone interested in independent publishing current on issues that apply to independent publishers in general and Upper Midwest publishers in particular.

Should you have news, announcements, or other information you think would be appropriate for this blog, please send an e-mail to mipa [dot] blog [at] gmail [dot] com.

Enjoy!