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Tim A brief reply. I think that some of these issues are generic, rather than associated with any particular publisher. 1) I reviewed an Edward Elgar "Handbook" (Development Policy Management) for Development Policy Review a couple of years ago, at which point it had come out in paperback (priced £25). The paperback version is accessible to students (and staff). However, the paperback version came out about 2 years after the hardback version (£125). I purchased a copy of the hardback because I wanted to refer to it for preparation of lectures on a regular basis - and so got a 50% discount as an Edward Elgar "Editor/Author". In the meantime the material had become dated (hopefully this will not happen so much with your encyclopedia). My question is in two parts: a) Why publish an expensive hardback which is totally inaccessible to students except from libraries, with a long delay until the paperback comes out? b) Why publish a hardback at all - why not just go almost exclusively for paperbacks with a price structure which balances revenue generation and accessibility? 2) I recently co-edited a collection of papers in honour of Ian Livingstone. We were pleased to get Ashgate to agree to publish, and the commissioning editor was very helpful when it came in longer than we had originally expected. Publishers are reluctant to take on this type of collection, because they worry about the limited market size. The Livingstone "festschrift" was only published in hardback - but a solely paperback book would not have lost the sales which have been made, and would have encouraged more sales (because some of the chapters are really quite central to current and sustained issues). So I'd go for the generic approach rather than focus on a particular publisher. Cheers Mike Quoting "Forsyth,TJ" <[log in to unmask]>: > Dear All, > > Has anyone has similar experiences?... is there is a trend? ...if so, can we > do something collective about this..? > > I wonder if anyone has experienced bad treatment from publishers recently? > Every now and then I hear anecdotal stories about publishers who fail to > deliver on promises, or refuse to publish books except in expensive hardback, > or fail to market books in effective ways... etc... > > I ask because I have had a bad experience with Routledge and think this needs > alerting to people. I edited a major work, the Encyclopedia of International > Development. But there have been persistent problems in getting contributors > to be paid as per their contract. Some of them have had to wait between 2-4 > years for payment; their emails have not been responded to. Months ago, I > contacted a senior director at Routledge with one complaint, and (despite a > concerned email in response) even this contributor has still not been paid. > > I wonder if other people have had similar problems? > > Moreover, are there other trends? eg I was told that the Encyclopedia would > be out in paperback when I agreed to do it. Now I am told it may not be in > paperback. For a reference work on Development, this seems seriously > short-sighted. > > Of course, I know publishing is a business, and business conditions are > changing with internet etc... but I hear so many stories about publishers not > delivering, I wonder if these changes are actually resulting in an unhelpful > change of culture. > > There may also be good performers as well as bad. Does anyone else have good > or bad experiences with publishers? I must admit, after my experience with > the Encyclopedia, if anyone asks me, I would say ''Don't use Routledge!'' > > > Best regards > > Tim Forsyth > Development Studies Institute > London School of Economics and Political Science > -- ---------------------- Dr Michael Tribe Bradford Centre for International Development University of Bradford Bradford BD7 1DP United Kingdom Tel: (0)1274 233978 Fax: (0)1274 235280 E-mail: [log in to unmask] WWW: http://www.brad.ac.uk/acad/bcid/homepage.html ------------------------------------------------------------ This mail sent through IMP: http://webmail.brad.ac.uk To report misuse from this email address forward the message and full headers to [log in to unmask] ------------------------------------------------------------