Dear Robert
Great posting. Aren't we back to an old issue - publication versus
distribution?
At least with blogging and the internet, the poet is out there. In a sense
thereby, sales are a secondary affair. However, a printed booklet, chapbook,
leaflet or big Bloodaxe collection requires sales - either to friends,
poets, academics, enthusiasts, communities, libraries, universities.
It is a very difficult equation.
I'm into blogging at the same time I'm into performance - and into poetry
via the internet. A friend rescued an Adana letterpress from a skip for me
the other week. So reminded me of the 1970s. I love it and am fast looking
for type to do printing old style. And yes, I can typeset. Yet it's just
another piece of the jigsaw.
DIY is really it. A friend has just spent £200 for a website to 'host' her
work. To me this is madness. She could use the money to produce her own
work - then 'blog' it to create publicity.
I don't see one or the other is entirely it. However, our group's Inprint
Poetry Vending Machine is very exciting. Our prototype is an old fag
machine - now vending poems! It is a publishing venture and much more. For a
couple of quid you don't know what poem or poet will be in the box - and
you'll not know who the accompanying artist is. The purchaser is buying the
'surprise.'
Of course it could end up being kitch. It won't become so because of the
increasing creative frictions within the group. Out of Norwich this year
we're heading for the Edinburgh Festival and London for National Poetry Day
in 2006 - and for a European connection thereby.
All combinations of low tech, high tech, books, blogs, etc are brilliant.
Poets always 'pay out' for their work. But 'paying' others to produce ones
work is not in anyone's interest but the provider.
Best wishes, Rupert Mallin
> Hi everybody,
>
> I just came across lulu.com, a print on demand publishing affair run
> by one of the guys who used to be at the head of Red Hat Linux (which
> gives the venture instant respect in my eyes, even if it means nothing
> to others). The service seems very reasonable and there don't seem to
> be any immediate catches.
>
> It occurs to me that if printing on demand with Lulu (or whoever else)
> turns out to be as easy as it looks then it presents itself as an
> alternative to publishing things directly on the web. I wonder what
> peoples thoughts on the relative benefits of each are?
>
> Is the idea of printing deadtree volumes of poetry for small audiences
> made obsolete by the option of publishing on the web? Obviously, the
> two can easily be made to complement each other, but would the printed
> book be anything more than a vanity?
>
> If you, as a poet, were to decide you wanted to publish a volume of
> your work, would you rather put together a nice website or print a
> nice book? (Let's assume, for the moment, that we can't answer
> "both".)
>
> bob
>
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