TeleRead: Bring the E-Books Home

Namelos opens for business – new POD ebook and POD publisher

By Paul Biba

I received an email from Stephen Roxburgh, the President and Publisher of namelos (why do people think its cute to drop the capital in their company or site name? Perhaps they just want to make all the articles about them look as if they are full of typos.) We wish them success and here is their “What is namelos?” from their site:

First and foremost, namelos is a publisher of books for children and young adults. You can see our publishing credentials on the “About us” page, but, short form, we have been editing and publishing books for over thirty years. At namelos we will continue to do what we have done in the past: we will find, develop, and publish the best books for young readers. In this respect, we are traditional.

In all other respects, we are not traditional.

We will be format independent, publishing digital editions of our books as soon as they are ready, printing copies on demand to fill orders. In summary, our intention is to provide high quality content and let the market dictate format. We are out of the manufacturing, shipping, and storage business. Our books will not be returnable (unless defective or damaged).

Our authors and illustrators will be partners in a profit sharing contract. We will recover direct costs (exclusive of overhead) from gross revenues and split the balance 50/50.

Initially we will not publish full-color illustrated books because print-on-demand quality for full-color work is not yet where it needs to be for our business model. Therefore, we will enter into an agreement to develop picture books and place them with publishing partners. We will retain 15-25% of the revenues from such licenses.

Our marketing will be a combination of traditional and non-traditional. We will print copies for reviewers and anyone else who prefers paper to screens. We will also use social networking and viral marketing techniques, exploiting all of the new tools available on the Internet.

We do not accept unsolicited submissions but we do offer evaluations and editorial guidance through our publishing services division for a fee. All projects that we evaluate will automatically be considered for publication.

namelos is a new business model in an old business. Many of our practices are innovative. Some will be controversial. Our intention is to be as transparent in our operations as possible. To that end, and in service to the publishing community, we will post weekly a summary of how things are going. We are eager to engage in public dialogue with people in the field and we invite you to contact us.

Thank you for your interest in our venture and, please, stay tuned.

Stephen Roxburgh
President & Publisher
namelos llc

You can also find a Publishers Weekly article about them here.

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