Sexual dimorphism: Naked Harbin Ethnography book with CreateSpace and Amazon ... and planning for WUaS in 8k languages, ACADEMIC/LIBRARIES' version? BEGINNING the Academic Press at WUaS (planned in all 7,943 languages with machine translation eventually)

Hi Donald, Charles and F/friends, 

Greetings from AFSC / SF FM and the WUaS hive meeting space How are you? I hope this finds you well.

David, did you mention the Chapman Stick musical instrument maker near Stanford to me some years ago - https://twitter.com/WorldUnivAndSch/status/769991587350872064 and https://twitter.com/WorldUnivAndSch/status/769997267474472966? I heard him yesterday and enjoyed this - http://scott-macleod.blogspot.com/2016/08/golden-trevally-mind-expanding-genies.html.

Since you're (kind of) F/friendly publishers, I thought you might be interested in the following -

Having already passed CreateSpace's internal review, I just submitted my "Naked Harbin Ethnography" manuscript with its Universal ISBN in the Academic Press at World University and School IMPRINT to CreateSpace, and have heard back about this final review within 24 hours that it's good to go - and soon my book should be available on paper from my web site - http://www.scottmacleod.com/ActualVirtualHarbinBook.html - and - http://amazon.com/author/scottmacleodworlduniversity !

Since I chose the Universal ISBN many months ago to BEGIN the Academic Press at WUaS (planned in all 7,943 languages with machine translation eventually), and CreateSpace/Amazon doesn't allow this Universal ISBN to go through their "Libraries & Academic Institutions" distribution channel, I can apparently create a workaround for this with an ACADEMIC/LIBRARIES' version by getting a FREE ISBN from CS which will allow me to distribute my book through their "Libraries & Academic Institutions" channel in this ACADEMIC/LIBRARIES' version - to be seen. (Textually, this would mean apparently I would have to change the Universal ISBN in the first print edition to the free CreateSpace ISBN for them to distribute this version through their Libraries channel - and libraries wouldn't have the Academic Press WUaS ISBN in their database records). With the Universal ISBN for Academic Press WUaS re CreateSpace/Amazon, I can distribute my book through

1) Amazon.com

Make your book available to millions of customers on Amazon.com, as well as Amazon.ca.

2) Amazon Europe

Make your book available on Amazon's European websites including Amazon.co.uk, Amazon.de, Amazon.fr, Amazon.it, and Amazon.es.

3) CreateSpace eStore

Your eStore is an online sales detail page where we fulfill all eStore orders and handle the customer service, too.

... and 3 others of their channels ... for which one further opts in ...

4) Bookstores and Online Retailers

By enabling this channel, you can make your book available to thousands of major online and offline bookstores and retailers, and expand the size of the potential audience for your books.

5) CreateSpace Direct

By enabling this channel, you can make your books available to certified resellers such as independent bookstores and book resellers. The CreateSpace Direct program allows eligible resellers to buy books at wholesale prices directly from CreateSpace.

... but not 6) Libraries & Academic Institutions

By enabling this channel, you can make your book available to public libraries, elementary and secondary school libraries, and libraries at other academic institutions.

... So, to get a free ISBN from CS and create a second book version for this 6) Libraries & Academic Institutions ... ?

Here's an only slightly dated summary video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sN7QmaBcl08  and a marketing video - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aOT4Wnuv3E8.

Again, I've now gone through my Harbin book's proofs 3 times per CreateSpace's suggestion, and found some changes. Otherwise, I've gone through most of CreateSpace's checklist process, and am ready to order a Proof copy on paper. Per the above, I still need to think through getting another ISBN with CreateSpace, (a third one I think, which would be free) for their distribution to libraries and academic institutions, - yet possibly losing control of the book since it will be their CreateSpace ISBN (and not the initial Universal ISBN I purchased to make my book broadly accessible), and also they get their ISBN into libraries (and not my book's initial Universal ISBN into libraries) - where libraries and academic institutions are big potential buyers (and they have budgets for buying books).  In addition, each of their other 5 distribution channels has a different royalties' structure, which implications I have to understand (and learn from). It's great that their software is so selling oriented, but how to be strategic with these?

Here are some questions I'm wondering about:

Would it be better to postpone the additional CS's free ISBN for my WUaS's planned 1) bookstore and 2) libraries and 3) planned academic press, so WUaS can develop our own libraries and academic institutions list (and deal with them directly?) Waiting would seem to make sense here possibly. My book is targeting undergraduate, graduate students and faculty (as well as people with an interest in the 1960s /1970s) however, so libraries and academic institutions makes sense ... especially if some faculty will seek their students to read this book in January 2017 - per these syllabi - http://scott-macleod.blogspot.com/2015/07/syzygium-harbin-hot-springs-book.html.

I could also contact the Lake County library in Middletown near Harbin (and a public librarian friend named Sioux in PA) without getting (a new free ISBN) about CreateSpace's libraries' distribution channel and see if they can purchase my Harbin book at a fee structure they're comfortable with through one of CreateSpace/Amazon's 5 other channels. I would thus see how this ecosystem of distribution channels and book economics works out.

I'd like to keep some distribution control re sales to libraries for translation, academic press, my WUaS's bookstore, and our relationship with our own planned libraries and other libraries - planned in all 7,943 languages - but I'd also like my Harbin book to sell well in 2016 - the year in which it's published.

I'm now going to charge $64.95 for my Harbin book (having engaged CreateSpace's software for this, and not the $59,95 that the book in which my previous academic chapter goes for), and likely use their Kindle "complex conversion kit" which costs $139 as well. I would need to sell 3 copies of my Harbin book for the Kindle, if I charge this much on the Kindle, to recoup my costs here. I can think of 1 or two friends who have a Kindle, and who might purchase my book with its 180 pictures .. Is it worth it? My book is interactive, and buddingly interactive as Google Street View develops, for example, too. (Could I even develop my Harbin book into a kind of meditative warm water therapy resource eventually?:)

How too to develop a) an Xmas season and b) academic marketing plan (per these 5 or so academic syllabi - http://scott-macleod.blogspot.com/2015/07/syzygium-harbin-hot-springs-book.html - engaging Tom Boellstorff's "Coming of Age in SL" with which I come into conversation), that I then extrapolate to WUaS's academic press and bookstore market plans (again potentially in all 8k languages)?

Charles, do you know of distribution channel structures through your resources, and can you see an economic opportunity here for Inner Light Books or Friendly publishing in one way or another, - and vis-a-vis other distribution channels?

Now to figure out distribution on-the-ground!

Friendly cheers,
Scott

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Hi David and Charles, 

Well, I just called CreateSpace, after uploading the post-CreateSpace/Amazon-Proof version with further amendments, to find out whether they could get me a printed version in time for the UC Berkeley Tourism Studies' Working Group planning meeting on Friday at 4pm. And yes, if it passes their final review again (which happened already once) and with a residential address (I'll probably use one in south Berkeley), and with expedited shipping, this should be possible. Wow!!! ... To get paper version of "Naked Harbin Ethnography" in hand will indeed be a landmark!

While the proof version on paper will cost me as author ~25.75, and the royalties per book in all three currencies will be about 13 (dollar, pound and euro), I still haven't found out how much I have to pay to get copies myself so that I can sell them at signings I organize, for example, and fear that it will be more than ~25.75. CreateSpace/Amazon books are all print on demand - amazing and great!

If you'd like to get a sense of pricing at CreateSpace / Amazon, please let me know, and I can share the spreadsheet listing the dollars, pounds and euros and costs in each of their related CreateSpace/Amazon channels. Do you deal with all three currencies occasionally, Charles, at Inner Light Books? 

And here's their video on royalties: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1GmHwjt_EUc - and their video on marketing - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aOT4Wnuv3E8 - which I didn't include in my earlier email.

It's possible, again, that after the first printed "proof" version, that I as author may not be able to pay the ~25.75 cost price to get more copies of my book, and that I would have to indeed pay more. Hmmm ... Marx's Das Kapital recently sold for $90,000 dollars - http://scott-macleod.blogspot.com/2016/05/high-alpine-flowers-western-friend.html - and although I doubt that I'll stock up on my "Naked Harbin Ethnography" and store them for 150 years as their prices appreciate, it might be a good idea. :) 

Hopefully, however, making my book accessible on paper will help me settle the tenure track MIT Media Lab junior faculty position to begin January 1, 2017 (and potentially from out here for a few years) :) Per Harvard professor of education Karen Brennan, with a Media Lab Ph.D. whom I saw at a Scratch Rollout in the Exploratorium in May, if it looks like a duck, walks like a duck ... https://twitter.com/TFiveFifty/status/768527828895797248 .... and thus develop my Harbin research further, as well as World University and School!

Hopefully duckily,

Scott

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Hi David and Charles (and Nelson),

Further publishing-to-paper progress here: I just ordered two paper versions to Proof - great word - for 25.63 each and 18.97 for priority shipping to receive this by Thursday (to an address in Berkeley) - costing $75.10 (with tax!). (I hope this paper version with help settle my MIT faculty position to begin on January 1, 2017). And, although I'll probably buy the "Complex Kindle Conversion Kit" for $139, and may only charge something like $20 per copy on that proprietary platform, I'll wait to do so until after I proof my Harbin book's paper version!

Friendly regards, Scott

- Scott MacLeod - Founder & President 
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexual_dimorphism

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