January 18, 2010
FastPencil
A brilliantly simple way to collaborate and publish books in various formats:
You shouldn’t have to ask anyone’s permission to write and publish your own book! We have removed the hurdles inherent in traditional book publishing by combining amazing advances in print on demand technology with a sophisticated online workflow system.
While powerful technology makes it possible for anyone to publish a high-quality book, our collaboration capabilities make FastPencil the easiest, fastest, and most exciting way to write and publish. Regardless of the type of book they’re writing, most writers need feedback as they create. When authors have ready access to friends and collaborators, the writing and editing process is faster and easier.
At any point in the writing process you can connect with like-minded people, share knowledge, chat, gather feedback from reviewers and editors, and collaborate with other authors, all without leaving FastPencil.
While companies like FastPencil need to exist, particularly for the less tech/design savvy, I would also love to see a WordPress/Drupal version: self-hosted, open source, and modular that pipes into a Lulu API (which they don’t have, what’s the deal with that?). Until we start to move towards more open source publishing, real innovation will lag.
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Andrew–what do you think of CreateSpace (which BookSurge is becoming)? I know it’s owned and run by Amazon, and books produced there are automatically made available at Amazon, and B &N, and with a number of jobbers…. Does FastPencil do that sort of thing? (I’m sure I should have followed the link before asking–but what the hell, you know lots about all related to this.)
FastPencil does that as well. I can’t vouch for the services it provides since I have seen them used, but you can self-publish electronically in all formats AND print books in small runs. It looks to be a community of more tech people right now, but that doesn’t mean the service could be of use to literature sorts as well.
What’s more, I think publishing e-books is cheap.