The wonder that is Lulu.com

I've been pondering the wonders of on-demand printing/publishing for a few weeks, now. I'm hard at work on a new book Bring Me the Head of Opal Mehta, which ties together the plagiarism scandal around Kaavya Viswanathan and American IT offshore outsourcing to India.

There are more parallels than you'd imagine -- you'll have to buy the book to find out more .;)

Anyway, I've been hard at work on what could turn out to be a watershed work for a lot of folks. It's the kind of book that a lot of people I know would love to write, but a) they don't have the time or b) they don't want to lose their jobs. Well, I'm in a "positive" position with my job scene, so the pressure is off me. So, I can write this book.

One of the real discouragers of this kind of work, is that the market and industry can move so quickly, that you're out of date before you know it. There are books about outsourcing listed on Amazon.com which are 10 years old, and there are ample comments from folks about how the books' observations on outsourcing are mainframe-specific and don't cover the current situation.

Those books should be yanked. But if the publishers still have 1,800 old copies lying around in storage, they have to do something with them, don't they? Well, yes. Which is why they're still listed on the online bookseller sites. Or Half.com.

This is a waste on several levels -- first of all, it's a waste of space in storage. Second, it's a waste of time for the publisher(s) to keep tabs on them. Third, it's a waste for browsers and book buyers to have to parse through old info, if they figure out it's old info, till it's too late. Fourth, it's a waste for people who read the book and find out after they've bought the book.

Wastes of time, energy, money, space, resources all around.

There should be expiration dates on these kinds of "intellectual collateral" to spare us all. And the books should be send to recycling.

As for me and my PEAPOD Mix, I have no such issues. Also Thought2Form Productions, LLC, my publishing/production company does not have to carry extra inventory and find a place to store it.

Lulu.com handles all the printing and fulfillment of orders. I don't have to get into calculating how many books I can afford to print in a first run, a second run, etc. There is no run -- there's only print on demand. I don't have to get into stocking books and filling out delivery labels and paying for postage and expensing it all out. Lulu takes care of all of that. When Thought2Form gets really big -- and I believe it will -- I'm still going to stay with Lulu, because the model works. It works for writers, for publishers, for readers. And it teaches one patience, 'cause it takes about a week for a book to be printed, period, and then it takes a few days longer to get shipped. But the printing quality is good and the fulfillment process is absolutely painless for me and my humble staff.

Lulu.com is a wonder. It deserves every accolade I can think of. They've earned it!