What's the deal with Blurb!?
Blurb, the online DIY book-publishing company, is presenting Photography Book Now. An impressive photography-book competition with a grand prize of $25,000.
OK, a $25,000 Grand Prize! Nice! Very nice! That would not only pay off my debt from the last year, but it would insure that I could return to the road and finalize the project, edit, and print, with no worries.
But the best part about it isn't the award. It's getting your work in front of the likes of Charlotte Cotton, Darius Himes, Leslie A. Martin.... a VERY nice list, check it out in full here.
The catch!
So, after getting stoked about a rough edit of Boonville falling in the laps of these people, I went to check out the dreaded fine print. And let me tell you, the shit stinks. I love the idea. And I would love for these people to see the work. Not to mention I was extremely motivated to put a rough edit of Boonville together in book form. But then I found the below:
Oh, shit. More fine print:
WTF! Major bummer. I'm gonna spend around $500 to make three book maquettes -- the first three of the project -- and I don't even have the option to have them returned?
This competition really is amazing, and has the ability to inspire many of us to get off our asses and put something together. It has a killer grand prize and an amazing judge list, but it all gets smashed because... well, why? Why not offer the option to send a SASE for returns if you don't want the books to be sold online? Or why not give the option to not sell online? What's the point?
Am I wrong? Did I misread something? I hope so. Maybe the people at blurb simply don't see a problem with it? But next to contacting the judges (which I wouldn't do), I can't find a way to contact Photography Book Now to ask them what's the deal. Anybody?
OK, a $25,000 Grand Prize! Nice! Very nice! That would not only pay off my debt from the last year, but it would insure that I could return to the road and finalize the project, edit, and print, with no worries.
But the best part about it isn't the award. It's getting your work in front of the likes of Charlotte Cotton, Darius Himes, Leslie A. Martin.... a VERY nice list, check it out in full here.
The catch!
So, after getting stoked about a rough edit of Boonville falling in the laps of these people, I went to check out the dreaded fine print. And let me tell you, the shit stinks. I love the idea. And I would love for these people to see the work. Not to mention I was extremely motivated to put a rough edit of Boonville together in book form. But then I found the below:
By entering a Submission through the web entry form at www.photographybooknow.com, Contestant agrees that the Submission entered may be showcased in Blurb's online bookstore, making previews available to the public and making the book available for purchase, as subject to Sponsor's Terms of Use, to which Contestant agrees.OK, I obviously don't want my first edit available for sale with no edition set. The good news: There is way around this. You can submit a hard-copy book made by you or another online self-publishing house:
Hard-copy Submissions must be self-published books printed using a commercial quality printing and binding mechanism... Submissions can alternatively be made by mailing a completed, hard copy entry form... as well as three (3) physical copies of each book entered.GREAT!
Oh, shit. More fine print:
All Submissions become the sole property of Sponsor and will not be acknowledged or returned.Blurb, you just crushed me!
WTF! Major bummer. I'm gonna spend around $500 to make three book maquettes -- the first three of the project -- and I don't even have the option to have them returned?
This competition really is amazing, and has the ability to inspire many of us to get off our asses and put something together. It has a killer grand prize and an amazing judge list, but it all gets smashed because... well, why? Why not offer the option to send a SASE for returns if you don't want the books to be sold online? Or why not give the option to not sell online? What's the point?
Am I wrong? Did I misread something? I hope so. Maybe the people at blurb simply don't see a problem with it? But next to contacting the judges (which I wouldn't do), I can't find a way to contact Photography Book Now to ask them what's the deal. Anybody?
posted by Timothy Briner at
12:20 PM
8 Comments:
I think the advantages outweigh the disadvantages. I'm going to pay the $35 and submit electronically. It's a cheap price to have Charlotte Cotton and Darius Himes see my work. Okay, so the book will be available in an imperfect form. I doubt very many people will take the time to dig through the hundreds and hundreds of books on Blurb and then look at the preview of my book.
Thanks, Dale.
I have to say that part of me agrees. To have them see the work may outweigh the advantages. Maybe it;s worth it. $35 is next to nothing, and you are guaranteed to have them all see something (granted, I'm sure they will be overwhelmed with the amount of work).
But yeah, I'm not sure anymore -- I am thinking about it. But I just can't seem to get passed my rough draft being available for purchase online. And I have no idea for how long.
"... or from allowing Sponsor to use royalty-free, the Submission worldwide in all media in perpetuity."
This is a troubling section. This means they can publish your work any way they want forever without giving you a dime. Taking away your control of your work. I'm surprised the judges who seem to be mostly respected photo world people are behind this.
You should look at this award:
http://cds.aas.duke.edu/grants/index.html
They get to set their own rules- and don't forget, they do this sort of thing for publicity as much as anything else. It's not unusual for photo competitions to want to have the right to show the work they select as winning- and they don't want to have to pay the photographers for the right to do so. Nor is it unusual for contest submission materials not to be returned. Folks who self publish books (which are the only people eligible to enter this contest- another warning flag) generally publish more than just a few copies, so submitting three which won't be returned doesn't seem very harsh- or expensive, when the cost of publication is spread over a few hundred or maybe a few thousand copies.
I don't see anything particularly unusual as far as contests go here.
To change tack for a moment, isn't Jen Bekman and her "Hey Hot Shot" know for kind-of taking advantage of photographers? I seem to have heard just as much criticism of their practices as high praise.
Personally I'd be dubious about this contest for a variety of reasons, regardless of the fact that some of the panel of judges are cool folks, in front of whom I'd love to get my work. But they can do what they want to. Why complain that they haven't tailored the rules of this contest around what you want them to be, rather than what's advantageous to them?
In general, I can do without the bullshit which is normally attached to contests like this.
But there are amazing opportunities out there. HHS, and Jen Bekman have recently offered a $500 prize for the winners, which is a huge improvment.
This one just falls a little short for me. The advantages are huge, but the fact that I have to sell my book online, and if I chose to print my own (which does cost a shit-load) I can't have them returned, and to top it off -- as Anonymous #1 pointed out -- they can use any image for their benifit at any time. That Trifecta just doesn't work for me.
And that is why I am complaining. Maybe next year they will reconsider? Because, if the point is for all the artists to benefit (because when you have an entry fee, all should benefit in one way or another), and not just the ones who win the top prizes, then maybe they will reconsider. Cause the real award is being motivated by this contest to put together a book, and get a number of artists inspired. Not just the big prize. And that is why this contest could have been so amazing. And in some respects, is.
I should be so lucky that, of all the work submitted, mine will get singled out and used for promotional purposes. Me, who no-one has ever heard of before. That kind of exposure sounds good to me.
I wish I would have known about this contest sooner. I've just release 2 new photography books that should be listed on Amazon.com by mid July. I was wondering if you'd be interested in talking a peek at them. There's a bookstore link on my website about them, including the ISBN.
One is on Digital Animal Photography and the other is Photography of the California Central Coast.
I've been thinking about a lot of these same issues. I decided to go ahead with it, just with a small version of my book. If I'm giving them less than 40 images, I'm not really as worried. Sure people could buy that version, but I have a much larger chance of getting a larger version published with that cash behind me and that much publicity.
It's a strange game, and part of me doesn't like playing it at all, but it's such a hit or miss with these things. I just got in the ADAA and god knows I can use a thousand bucks (or three) right now.
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