How to publish ANYTHING (Books, DVD, CD)

The need for “Self Expression” sometimes overwhelms us. Getting published on the other hand, is next to impossible without having name recognition or a crafty literary agent.  

I got into the publishing business by accident. I wrote stock market courses and later my work turned into “books”. I have tried to find a mainstrem publisher but after briefly talking with one, I was on my own. 

This publishing issue reminds me of my former teacher and the paradigm they used to never lend occult books to novices. The idea was that they should have some urge and motivation to read what was at hand. Buying a book is usually not a big ticket item, and if the book was just lent or given was free it might lessen the impact that is desired on the novice.  The other idea was to republish old out of print books. As Kipling said “there is nothing new under the Sun”. Most ideas and concepts are already published somewhere. The best works are known, buy perhaps they are out of print or too expensive….this is how I started my Publishing career…

In this brave new world of printing technology and Internet shopping the print of demand business model for the publishing and music industry has become the standard.
The biggest risk of publishing used to be the actual printing out 1000+ copies of books or CD’s and getting stuck with the inventory with no buyers in sight.
The print on demand model all but alleviated this risk factor of the publishing business.
This essay is meant to encapsulate all the important facets of publishing a book, music or a DVD. 
I use a three step model for my publishing business that you may or may not want to follow.

Step ONE – leaning the ropes with lulu.com

The early self-publishers paradise was lulu. It is a very user friendly web site whose owner’s belief in customer service (they actually used to have a live customer support person online to assist with any technical or publishing issue). Now due to competition like CreateSpace entering in to the picture lulu’s eminence and I suspect income stream has been suffering. 
Still lulu is very easy to use and you can still get help if needed.

Pros using lulu.com
• You can learn about publishing and setting up a book for free. The site supports book sizes and formats Createspace.com would not.
• There are no setup fees, mandatory proof copy or any external or hidden charges. You can publish a book for free. Distribution and other publishing venues will cost money like ISBN number or mandatory proof copy.
Cons using lulu.com
• Cost of printing a book is about the highest in the print on demand business model.
• Amazon will play games with publishers like lulu and unfairly label them as “vanity publishers”, which, in my opinion lulu would not qualify. However the bad rep the so called “vanity presses” earned through the years unfairly harmed lulu in context of Amazon listing.

If you are familiar with the business, enjoy typesetting a book, designing your covers and layouts. Know the best fonts to use etc you can by all means skip using lulu.com.
I use lulu mainly for sentimental reasons and as a repository for my digital files. If anything happens to my hard disk or computer. All files are in cyberspace with lulu ready to access and use as a virtual backup.

Step TWO getting listed on Amazon with an Amazon subsidiary.

Createspace.com

The best things about createspace.com are the presumed contraction (or elimination) of the vanity press and other unscrupulous operators swimming in the murky waters of the publishing business. I cannot imagine anyone using ANY vanity press that will just rip you off when you can use lulu.com or createspace.com.

Print on demand DVD publishing was the original venue of createspace.com before Amazon bought the company. 
The biggest PLUS for createspace.com is the elimination of the need for a ISBN, that now individually costs around $150 per ISBN. Bowker the registrar and evil monopoly for ISBN maintenance, issuance and record keeping just recently raise the price for a 10-batch to $400.

Step THREE become a real publisher and account holder with Lightningsouce.com

Setting up an account with the nice folks of lightningsource.com is not as easy as steppes 1 and 2. Faxing paperwork for everything is a must. However the final result of this relationship will be the participant transformation to become a real publisher.

Publishing your own stuff would not warrant this venue. The secret for this step is the availability ($free for all$) the approximately a quarter million public domain books that are free for all to be edited, illustrated or published within the legal limits of the US Copyright Law. 
There are very few businesses that allow you to find a product for free.
The ideas for public domain books are numerous;
1) You can hire someone to read the book and make an audio version
2) Have an illustrator for the book, hence create a newer edition with some twist.
3) Compile famous people’s letters and correspondences (old newspaper articles) into a book.