# Pronoun announce they are shutting down! [MERGED]



## A Fading Street (Sep 25, 2016)

Don't know if I missed another thread but I just got the email. Shame.

http://support.pronoun.com/knowledge_base/topics/pronoun-shutdown-faq


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## Sam B (Mar 28, 2017)

I just got it too. 

I actually thought they had a plan. Too bad.


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## MonkeyScribe (Jan 27, 2011)

Ouch. I feel bad for people who have a lot of work tied up with them. Some major headaches await.


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## ClaudiaStone (Jan 11, 2017)

Just got this email  

Two years ago Pronoun set out to create a one-of-a-kind publishing tool that truly put authors first. We believed that the power of data could be harnessed for smarter book publishing, leveling the playing field for indie authors. 

We are proud of the product we built, but even more so, we’re grateful for the community of authors that made it grow. Your feedback shaped Pronoun’s development, and together we changed the way authors connect with readers. 

Unfortunately, Pronoun’s story ends here. 

While many challenges in indie publishing remain unsolved, Macmillan is unable to continue Pronoun’s operation in its current form. Every option was considered before making the very difficult decision to end the business. 

As of today, it is no longer possible to create a new account or publish a new book. Pronoun will be winding down its distribution, with an anticipated end date of January 15, 2018. Authors will still be able to log into their accounts and manage distributed books until that time. 

For the next two months, our goal is to support your publishing needs through the holiday season and enable you to transition your books to other services. For more detail on how this will affect your books and payments, please refer to our FAQ. 

Thank you for the time and attention you’ve contributed to this experience. It has been a privilege to publish together, and we look forward to meeting again. #keepwriting

Sincerely,

Macmillan Publishers


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## Allyson J. (Nov 26, 2014)

Just saw the email.


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## Rick Gualtieri (Oct 31, 2011)

Well, that was unexpected. Sad to see them go. Even sadder for those who have a lot tied up with them.


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## A Fading Street (Sep 25, 2016)

MonkeyScribe said:


> Ouch. I feel bad for people who have a lot of work tied up with them. Some major headaches await.


Lots of books going back into KU as well at a guess


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## Guest (Nov 6, 2017)

Wow...that was quick :-(  Glad I ended up using D2D for Overdrive instead of Pronoun.  Ended up just using Pronoun for Bibliothecha, but still sucks.  Was planning to use them for new works to go to Google Play because sick of Google's interface.  :-/


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## Monique (Jul 31, 2010)

I wondered how long it would last. Answer - not long. Sorry for people who will have to scramble now.


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## Not any more (Mar 19, 2012)

Oh, my. Chaos.


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## Ellie L (Aug 6, 2016)

NOTHING TO SEE HERE


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## VirginiaMcClain (Sep 24, 2014)

Oh man. I just got the e-mail too. This is a bummer. I have to say though, I was nervous about them ever since MacMillan acquired them. It seemed to me like another chance for the Big 5 to shut down an avenue for indies. Does anyone else think that's likely what happened or am I being overly suspicious?


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## Dale Ivan Smith (Oct 13, 2015)

Saw this as well. Disappointing. I used them to get into Google Play. I go direct everywhere else. I feel for folks who went all in with them.


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## Colin (Aug 6, 2011)

Rick Gualtieri said:


> Well, that was unexpected. Sad to see them go. Even sadder for those who have a lot tied up with them.


Ditto. Not been involved with Pronoun, but it's tough on those who have been.


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## GeneDoucette (Oct 14, 2014)

I always thought McMillan's angle was to collect data. I didn't think they would be so cutthroat in getting out. i figured they'd introduce fees instead.


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## Amanda M. Lee (Jun 3, 2014)

VirginiaMcClain said:


> Oh man. I just got the e-mail too. This is a bummer. I have to say though, I was nervous about them ever since MacMillan acquired them. It seemed to me like another chance for the Big 5 to shut down an avenue for indies. Does anyone else think that's likely what happened or am I being overly suspicious?


I think what happened is they were paying out more than they were taking in, especially on .99 titles, and they finally realized they weren't going to make it on that. I thought they would try to monetize another way but clearly I was wrong.


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## 41419 (Apr 4, 2011)

I guess for anyone with Amazon-distroed stuff at Pronoun you might want to consider bringing it back before the holiday season because all your momentum will get snipped on January 15. I guess that goes for other outlets too.


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## Robert A Michael (Apr 30, 2012)

Got the email. Gotta say, I wasn't that surprised. It just didn't sound sustainable as a business model for long-term. Something had to change. There will be a vacuum and someone will fill the void. In the meantime, there's always D2D and Smashwords.

It makes me wonder if part of the demise was the Amazon part of the equation. I suspected from the start that the way they were paying full royalties on books under $2.99 was through their partnership portal with Macmillan. When they saw KDP titles slipping out and back in at $0.99 under Macmillan's banner, Amazon busted them. That's just a theory. It wouldn't be the first time Amazon overturned someone's apple cart.


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## Not any more (Mar 19, 2012)

GeneDoucette said:


> I always thought McMillan's angle was to collect data. I didn't think they would be so cutthroat in getting out. i figured they'd introduce fees instead.


Reading between the lines in their epilogue, a suspicious mind might think McMillan bought Pronoun just to kill it.


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## T E Scott Writer (Jul 27, 2016)

Ah crap. I used it for my freebie because it was so easy to do a wide permafree with them. Feel bad for the people that have all their books with them.


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## 77071 (May 15, 2014)

Assholes.


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## AliceS (Dec 28, 2014)

Well I guess I can take them off my to do list.


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## 91831 (Jul 18, 2016)

Sigh.  Now I gotta find somewhere else to do Google through (that I don't need a translator for!).


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## VirginiaMcClain (Sep 24, 2014)

brkingsolver said:


> Reading between the lines in their epilogue, a suspicious mind might think McMillan bought Pronoun just to kill it.


Ha! That's what I said.


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## Gone Girl (Mar 7, 2015)

We miss you, Harvey Chute.


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## Amanda M. Lee (Jun 3, 2014)

brkingsolver said:


> Reading between the lines in their epilogue, a suspicious mind might think McMillan bought Pronoun just to kill it.


Why, though? What benefit could they possibly have? People will just move their stuff to other distributors.


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## Rick Gualtieri (Oct 31, 2011)

Amanda M. Lee said:


> Why, though? What benefit could they possibly have? People will just move their stuff to other distributors.


Yeah, I think it's far more likely they didn't want to put the effort or investment in turning it around. Wouldn't be the first time a company has bought another, realized it wasn't their thing, then shut it down rather than risk losing more.


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## Victoria LK (Jan 31, 2014)

Wow! Glad I hadn't start to move my books over there! Now what to do....


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## skylarker1 (Aug 21, 2016)

For those who predicted this, you were right. I went to log into my Pronoun account today and found this message:

"Two years ago Pronoun set out to create a one-of-a-kind publishing tool that truly put authors first. We believed that the power of data could be harnessed for smarter book publishing, leveling the playing field for indie authors.

"We are proud of the product we built, but even more so, we’re grateful for the community of authors that made it grow. Your feedback shaped Pronoun’s development, and together we changed the way authors connect with readers.

"Unfortunately, Pronoun’s story ends here.

"While many challenges in indie publishing remain unsolved, Macmillan is unable to continue Pronoun’s operation in its current form. Every option was considered before making the very difficult decision to end the business.

"As of today, it is no longer possible to create a new account or publish a new book. Pronoun will be winding down its distribution, with an anticipated end date of January 15, 2018.

"For the next two months, our goal is to support your publishing needs through the holiday season and enable you to transition your books to other services. For more detail on how this will affect your books and payments, please refer to our FAQ.

"Thank you for the time and attention you’ve contributed to this experience. It has been a privilege to publish together, and we look forward to meeting again. #keepwriting"


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## Bob Stewart (Mar 19, 2014)

I had some books in there, down to just two now. The site always had the feel of something created by contractors and not really understood by people who worked there, like B&N Nook Press. The opposite of D2D.

And it was never really clear what their model was. They were sort of competing with KDP, their categories, etc, were all geared toward Amazon's. But obviously could never replace KU, AMS, promos, etc.

I think one thing is certain:  if anyone manages to compete with Amazon for indie titles, it WON'T be one of the big 5 publishers.


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## hopecartercan (Jun 19, 2015)

I opened an account at Pronoun last month, hoping to get some of my shorter novellas outta KDP Unlimited and sale them for $0.99... BUMMER!


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## GoneToWriterSanctum (Sep 13, 2014)

I don't consent


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## Pandorra (Aug 22, 2017)

It was part of my long term plans but I hadn't done much with it yet.. I guess it makes deciding easier but I feel bad for those invested in it!


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## C.A. Huggins (Jul 8, 2014)

That sucks. A few months ago I moved all of my books there. Lol

Is there any other aggregator with the same or similar favorable royalty rates


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## Travelian (Jun 1, 2017)

D'oh! I planned on going direct with most channels so not a big hit.

It's too bad. For those of us who can't get into Google, Pronoun seemed like the best option outside of Streetlib and Publishdrive. I was looking forward to using them for Overdrive too.

Wish D2D would add Google to the fold in the near future.


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## Marti talbott (Apr 19, 2011)

VirginiaMcClain said:


> Oh man. I just got the e-mail too. This is a bummer. I have to say though, I was nervous about them ever since MacMillan acquired them. It seemed to me like another chance for the Big 5 to shut down an avenue for indies. Does anyone else think that's likely what happened or am I being overly suspicious?


So the way to wealth is to start a platform for Indies that McMillan will pay big bucks for, and then shut down? It's not like it hasn't happened before. Anyway, glad I stayed with D2D.


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## Guest (Nov 6, 2017)

T. M. Bilderback said:


> Do any other distributors deal with Bibliotheca?


Smashwords is the only other one I know of.


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## Chris Weston (Jan 16, 2015)

The unsustainability of Pronoun was a reason I never put books with them. Smashwords, Draft 2 Digital, and Streetlib have a path, Pronoun never did. It was only a matter of time before this happened. I actually thought they would switch to a percent cut like the rest, but I imagine with all the data they collected that it wasn't worth it at the end of the day.


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## skylarker1 (Aug 21, 2016)

hopecartercan said:


> I opened an account at Pronoun last month, hoping to get some of my shorter novellas outta KDP Unlimited and sale them for $0.99... BUMMER!


It was good while it lasted. I just launched a new title on discount at $0.99, and made $115 for 165 sales, rather than the $57.75 it would have earned at Amazon's rate.

Sigh. I'll move all my titles to Amazon of course, but may keep some wide through other venues.

Dang. The book (Thanksgiving) has been doing pretty well - a couple days in the Top 100 of its three sub-categories. Now I have to make a decision about when would be the best time to migrate the book back to KDP - it will be disruptive, taking it off the market for a couple days at the very least.

EDITED TO ADD: I'm getting grumpier as it sinks in how much work it will be if I want to publish everything wide again. When an author already has her books published on iTunes, Google, Kobo and B&N, through Pronoun - why can't the info for those books be modified to put them under the author's name instead of having them taken down, and the author having to go through the whole process of re-publishing them?


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Just merged three threads on this topic. Sorry for any confusion!

ETA: Hmm. *Tried* to merge. Let me attempt again!


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## Guest (Nov 6, 2017)

I was with them a for a month, or less. I moved my books off when I realised that staying with them created problems with Amazon book histories for readers. Their approach was faulty and whilst I wished them well their demise was further along than I realised. Better now, than later when authors had too much money invested in their services. I didn't get an email - are people going to be paid their royalties? Mine is only $38, but I'm sure there are authors with bigger numbers.


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## Queen Mab (Sep 9, 2011)

These sudden changes to the book biz are quite traumatic...and I wasn't even in Pronoun. Just don't like seeing the options narrow


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## caarsen (Aug 28, 2015)

I'm sorry to see them go. I loved getting those e-mails congratulating me on hitting a top 100 list with encouragement. And suggesting other categories and where I would rate with them. Or letting me know I got a new review.

It's too bad, but I guess that's the nature of any business.


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## Amyshojai (May 3, 2010)

Blast blast blast! I'd just uploaded several of my books to Pronoun to get into Google Play. Oh well...  I'm told D2D is pursuing a deal with Google Play, and StreetLib.com also offers that. Anyone use StreetLib? I'm already working with D2D for others, and going direct with KDP.


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## C. Gold (Jun 12, 2017)

I haven't gone wide yet, but was planning to use Pronoun at some point. Guess not now. It's always a shame to see options diminish.


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## Amyshojai (May 3, 2010)

Hope this works now...

https://youtu.be/qOD5OcjkD9A


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## AlexaGrave (Jun 11, 2015)

I just saw the email too and knew there'd be a thread on Kboards about it!

Ugh.

All of my titles are there, only for Google Play, though.

Now I need to find another way into Google Play. Nuts.


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## Shelley K (Sep 19, 2011)

I suspect they didn't start a fee structure to keep it going because the intention from the start was to data mine from indie authors. Done now.


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## My Dog&#039;s Servant (Jun 2, 2013)

GeneDoucette said:


> I always thought McMillan's angle was to collect data. I didn't think they would be so cutthroat in getting out. i figured they'd introduce fees instead.


That's what I figured, too.

Good luck to all those affected. Nothing like a few extra headaches heading into the holidays.


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## Sailor Stone (Feb 23, 2015)

Shelley K said:


> I suspect they didn't start a fee structure to keep it going because the intention from the start was to data mine from indie authors. Done now.


This^^^
I am learning that the only people in the publishing industry that can be trusted by indie writers are the writers on these boards. There are several here that can do some big ITOLDYASOs but I doubt they will. Not their style. Pronoun/MacMillan just took advantage of many many people. I try to give people the benefit of the doubt but I can't find anything BUT doubt in this case. I'll call this a data-rape and leave it at that.


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## 75845 (Jan 1, 1970)

In terms of Pronounce it is Macmillan, not McMillan, as in the British prime minister who was a son of the publisher's founder.


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## The Bass Bagwhan (Mar 9, 2014)

Amanda M. Lee said:


> Why, though? What benefit could they possibly have? People will just move their stuff to other distributors.


It's a bit odd. I still have books with Macmillan's Oz digital publisher and its operations changed over time from an enthusiastic team taking on a brave new new word of ebooks to, like, one subeditor in the basement. So much so I'd like to get my titles back based on the concept it has strayed so far from the original promise of marketing, representation, etc. I was even annoyed at it still running this publishing house yet embracing Pronoun, which seemed to be a conflict. But the hassle will probably be too much and I'll have to wait for those contracts to expire.

All I'm saying is that Macmillan has had plenty of experience with the ebook market and knows all the obstacles. Pronoun was possibly an experiment that it was always going to jettison once all the lessons were learned. It could have restructured, revamped the business model, etc and given authors the choice to continue with them, but Macmillan has just cut the rope.

It might just be a "difficult business decision" that's been on the whiteboard since day one. Not to harm the indie industry, but because Macmillan simply doesn't need Pronoun anymore and never had long-term ambitions for it.


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## GoneToWriterSanctum (Sep 13, 2014)

I don't consent


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## TripEllington (Apr 11, 2016)

Extremely disappointed with this news. Luckily, I don't have too many titles to migrate.


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## Matti Lena (Apr 18, 2016)

Wow!  Didn't see this coming. I looked at the Pronoun website just last week to see if I'd like to hop on board. Then, I scrolled down to the bottom of the page, saw the MacMillan logo, and decided against joining because I just don't trust MacMillan. Now, I'm glad I didn't pursue it any further. What a waste of time it would have been. I'm so sorry for all of you who were heavily dependent on them. I wish you well in migrating to alternatives.


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## Amanda M. Lee (Jun 3, 2014)

I agree that they never set up a feasible payment structure, which seems to indicate they were in it for the short haul. I'm just spitballing because I'm waiting for a book to go live, but what if they suddenly open up shop under a different name and actually have a fee structure? What if Pronoun was an experiment but Adjective is going to be something a little different? Maybe they data mined, got what they wanted, and are going to introduce something new in a year or something?


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## unkownwriter (Jun 22, 2011)

Sorry for everyone who is going to have to deal with moving books, but I'm not surprised. I couldn't see how the thing was viable to begin with, and being associated with a big publisher made me suspicious of motives.


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## Sam B (Mar 28, 2017)

Amanda M. Lee said:


> I agree that they never set up a feasible payment structure, which seems to indicate they were in it for the short haul. I'm just spitballing because I'm waiting for a book to go live, but what if they suddenly open up shop under a different name and actually have a fee structure? What if Pronoun was an experiment but Adjective is going to be something a little different? Maybe they data mined, got what they wanted, and are going to introduce something new in a year or something?


That's an exceptionally optimistic point of view! Almost never see optimism going around these days. I'll hope that's the case, but I think I won't hold my breath.

I was leaning toward D2D anyway, so this just firms that opinion, I guess.


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## Gentleman Zombie (May 30, 2011)

The generous 70% royalty for .99 cent books was great. Not too mention how easy Pronoun made setting up a permafree. Both worked out well for me. What really bugs me is seeing one more option for indies fade away. :/


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## Amanda M. Lee (Jun 3, 2014)

Sam B said:


> That's an exceptionally optimistic point of view! Almost never see optimism going around these days. I'll hope that's the case, but I think I won't hold my breath.
> 
> I was leaning toward D2D anyway, so this just firms that opinion, I guess.


Actually, I wasn't being optimistic. I was being cynical. I'm sure the "new" platform, if there is one, will have much lower royalties.


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## D. Zollicoffer (May 14, 2014)

Stuck with D2D after seeing Pronoun's business model. No way was that sustainable.


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## Patty Jansen (Apr 5, 2011)

I have another angle on this.

I've seen this with Smashwords and D2D. Both used to distribute to KDP.

Neither of them do, anymore (OK, I think Smashwords might still do some titles but if this still happens, it's heavily curated).

KDP doesn't like this. At all.

Think about it. They stomp on some scammers and cancel their accounts. The scammers simply move to the distributor.

I half-suspect that KDP was starting to make some noises that way, and that Pronoun decided that if they couldn't do KDP, they judged it not worth continuing with.


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## Not any more (Mar 19, 2012)

Amanda M. Lee said:


> Why, though? What benefit could they possibly have? People will just move their stuff to other distributors.


We all know the trad pubs are trying to kill ebooks, or make them a niche. Twenty years ago, Microsoft, Oracle, etc., went on a spending spree buying up competitive software, often software better than what the big boys sold, and then killing it. Blatantly anti-competitive, but they got away with it. For a time, Microsoft bought companies, made the new software free until they integrated it with their own offerings, then suddenly started charging for it. SQL Server, FoxPro, and SharePoint were all part of that strategy. I have no doubt that Macmillan has people analyzing the Pronoun data now, figuring out how to use it. I would doubt that analysis is aimed at helping indie authors. More likely trying to develop a strategy to defend against Amazon.


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## 31842 (Jan 11, 2011)

Shoot.  They were great while they lasted.  So helpful with keywords and categories, lovely customer service, and I really appreciated being able to put my permafrees in there with no price matching hoops to jump through.  That said, rankings and visibility are going to be rooooough on Amazon in the coming weeks.  All those thousands of titles hitting the hot new release lists at one time?  Ooof.


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## Anna Drake (Sep 22, 2014)

KateDanley said:


> Shoot. They was great while they lasted. So helpful with keywords and categories, lovely customer service, and I really appreciated being able to put my permafrees in there with no price matching hoops to jump through. That said, rankings and visibility are going to be rooooough on Amazon in the coming weeks. All those thousands of titles hitting the hot new release lists at one time? Ooof.


I agree. The staff at Pronoun were great to work with. and I loved the DATA they shared with me! 
I'm not sure about the publishing glut, though. When I return my books to KDP, I'll just be republishing books I'd unpublished. Will that meant they'll consider my book a new one? I seriously doubt it.


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## Elizabeth Ann West (Jul 11, 2011)

Patty Jansen said:


> I have another angle on this.
> 
> I've seen this with Smashwords and D2D. Both used to distribute to KDP.
> 
> ...


That's what I figured too. I've seen this before in terms of speed. I clicked unpublish my books on Amazon they were down in less than 5 minutes. Not even KDP is that fast.

I think Amazon yanked distribution, and without Amazon, data is moot. And Amazon is EXTREMELY protective of its data.

And I've heard from others higher up that Amazon wasn't happy about what MacMillan was doing... though I guess we all know now that other publishers don't get told 35% on titles over $9.99.

That's what I'm upset about losing. I had big plans for boxed sets....not anymore.

I only had 2 books there, I was careful because while I understood what they were doing, I knew the party was going to come to an end as soon as people started getting their accounts shuttered at KDP and announcing "NO PROBLEM" and their books were up in a heartbeat through Pronoun.... and people I know took books not going through KDP to Pronoun . . . and just last month Pronoun staff were at conferences like nothing was wrong. There was no indication this was a cash issue, like I said, we're all supposedly still getting paid and we know when publishers go belly up we're the last to get paid.


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## C. Gockel (Jan 28, 2014)

I'm so sorry to anyone who has to move their books over the holidays. I hope you all get some "new book juice" from Amazon, though.

I was going to use Pronoun for titles as I went wide with them in order to make a 99-cent series starter more profitable, so I'm really sorry this is happening. Also, permafree was so painful last time, I was hopeful for an easier solution.

Oh, well ... good luck everyone.


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## 31842 (Jan 11, 2011)

Anna Drake said:


> I agree. The staff at Pronoun were great to work with. and I loved the DATA they shared with me!
> I'm not sure about the publishing glut, though. When I return my books to KDP, I'll just be republishing books I'd unpublished. Will that meant they'll consider my book a new one? I seriously doubt it.


If you published them before on KDP, indeed, you'll just be republishing. But there were a loooooot of authors who were publishing books for the first time directly through Pronoun and those books will be counted as new.


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## Anna Drake (Sep 22, 2014)

KateDanley said:


> Shoot. They were great while they lasted. So helpful with keywords and categories, lovely customer service, and I really appreciated being able to put my permafrees in there with no price matching hoops to jump through. That said, rankings and visibility are going to be rooooough on Amazon in the coming weeks. All those thousands of titles hitting the hot new release lists at one time? Ooof.


I agree. The staff was great to work with, and I loved the DATA they sent me! I'm not sure about a publishing glut though. I will republish books I'd umpublished. Will Amazon count those as new books? I seriously doubt it.


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## Lynn McNamee (Jan 8, 2009)

I always thought Macmillan had a special contract with Amazon, and that's how they gave the great royalty rates because they distributed those books under their existing contract. I know the big publishers don't use KDP to publish their books, and they all have different Amazon contracts, which pay different rates. This also explains the better royalty rates through the other channels, like Overdrive.

I'm also guessing that Macmillan enjoys even better royalty rates in their Amazon contract than those paid through Pronoun because they were most likely making a profit off the books distributed through Pronoun.

So my theory is that Amazon pushed back, either saying those books aren't covered by that contract or that future contracts would change, and not in a good way, if Pronoun continued to distribute indies and small presses.

If my guesses are correct, then Amazon's move would make sense, since it would be losing money on those Pronoun books by paying out a higher royalty than if they went through KDP.

I don't think Macmillan had any devious intentions toward indies/small presses. I do think they planned to use Pronoun to leverage their future Amazon contracts. If they controlled more books, they would have more leverage. But that either backfired on them, or they just didn't get enough before Amazon woke up and brought down the hammer.


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## Not any more (Mar 19, 2012)

Lynn McNamee said:


> I don't think Macmillan had any devious intentions toward indies/small presses. I do think they planned to use Pronoun to leverage their future Amazon contracts. If they controlled more books, they would have more leverage. But that either backfired on them, or they just didn't get enough before Amazon woke up and brought down the hammer.


I agree with this. I doubt that Macmillan gave any thought at all to indies. This is all about Macmillan and Amazon.


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## Anna Drake (Sep 22, 2014)

KateDanley said:


> If you published them before on KDP, indeed, you'll just be republishing. But there were a loooooot of authors who were publishing books for the first time directly through Pronoun and those books will be counted as new.


True. I've seen several Amazon/KDP ads on facebook encouraging new authors to publish through them. I thought it stunning. Since when did KDP have to advertise for authors? I have no explanation. I will miss being able to price my book to free whenever I please. That was a real boon with Pronoun.


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## A. S. Warwick (Jan 14, 2011)

That was a somewhat annoying email to get.

I have my short fiction up through them, mostly for the ease of making it free and for the $0.99 offer.

Going to be a bit of a pain to have to go and do all the reformatting to upload them to Amazon all over again.  Just hope that the process doesn't lose any reviews already accumulated.


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## TonyU (Dec 14, 2014)

I just opened my account and put two books with Pronoun Saturday so I'm pretty sure this is my fault. Sorry.


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## Lynn McNamee (Jan 8, 2009)

Anna Drake said:


> I will miss being able to price my book to free whenever I please. That was a real boon with Pronoun.


This is yet another part of my theory. Macmillan can most likely list a book free anytime it likes and without being exclusive.

The big publishers have the leverage with their big-name authors, so their contracts already allow this sort of thing.

All Pronoun did was give us the same benefits.


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## Not any more (Mar 19, 2012)

TonyU said:


> I just opened my account and put two books with Pronoun Saturday so I'm pretty sure this is my fault. Sorry.


Just as long as we have someone to blame.


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## Lynn McNamee (Jan 8, 2009)

CheriB said:


> ... the shiny too-good-to-be-sustainable offer.


I don't think it was too good to be sustainable at all. I think Amazon gives much better rates and benefits to big publishers.

Think of it this way: Tom Cruise gets a much better contract, with better pay and more, for being in a movie than Joe Schmo, newbie actor, does. And Macmillan controls a lot of Tom Cruise equivalents in the book world.

But that's yet another reason for Amazon to squash Mamillan's little venture. Amazon doesn't want indies/small presses to know that those big publishers enjoy those things. They can't have the Joe Schmos trying to get the Tom Cruise contracts.


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## AltMe (May 18, 2015)

My question is how do we keep our books in Google Play?


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## Lynn McNamee (Jan 8, 2009)

TimothyEllis said:


> My question is how do we keep our books in Google Play?


I think I'm missing a piece of this puzzle.

Why can't you just sign up for a Google publishing account and publish your books to Google?

Note: I only used Pronoun for their library distribution. For the rest, I use Draft2Digital, KDP, and Google.


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## Patty Jansen (Apr 5, 2011)

Lynn McNamee said:


> I think I'm missing a piece of this puzzle.
> 
> Why can't you just sign up for a Google publishing account and publish your books to Google?
> 
> Note: I only used Pronoun for their library distribution. For the rest, I use Draft2Digital, KDP, and Google.


You're missing a substantial piece of the puzzle. In order to keep scammers at bay, Google Play shut for new accounts two years ago.

They open for very short periods of time, and apparently you can also try emailing them explaining who you are and show them your books.

But otherwise, there is Streetlib.


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## Forgettable (Oct 16, 2015)

.


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## Lynn McNamee (Jan 8, 2009)

Patty Jansen said:


> You're missing a substantial piece of the puzzle. In order to keep scammers at bay, Google Play shut for new accounts two years ago.


Oh, that's sad. I didn't know.

Thanks for the information.


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## Lynn McNamee (Jan 8, 2009)

LMareeApps said:


> D2Ds response...
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_tTrQD6HtDI&feature=youtu.be
> 
> There's a bit of a nudge nudge wink wink suggestion that maybe D2D will have direct to Amazon... but it's pitched as vague 'subscribe to our mailing list and watch your inbox tomorrow' and 'this is very good timing' comments.


Well, that guy just confirmed my theory. Thanks for sharing!


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## SaltObelisk (May 24, 2017)

Of course, this had to happen on the EXACT SAME DAY as my dad's funeral... oh man.   All of my pen name's books were on Pronoun.

I removed a book from Pronoun once. I think it took about 3 days for it to disappear from all the stores. Would it be safe to put it on Kindle Unlimited if it appears to be gone from all the stores, or should I wait awhile longer?

This sucks so much.


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## AltMe (May 18, 2015)

Patty Jansen said:


> You're missing a substantial piece of the puzzle. In order to keep scammers at bay, Google Play shut for new accounts two years ago.
> They open for very short periods of time, and apparently you can also try emailing them explaining who you are and show them your books.
> But otherwise, there is Streetlib.


I just emailed them asking how my books can remain in their store, given they are not accepting new authors. Be interesting to see how they respond. Pronoun going down is going to leave a lot of people like me hanging.


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## Abalone (Jan 31, 2014)

Rick Gualtieri said:


> Yeah, I think it's far more likely they didn't want to put the effort or investment in turning it around. Wouldn't be the first time a company has bought another, realized it wasn't their thing, then shut it down rather than risk losing more.


The irony being that they're a publisher and should know a thing or two. Lol


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## Rose Andrews (Jun 1, 2017)

Oh, good grief. I almost went through Pronoun but chose D2D instead when I went wide a couple weeks ago. I was actually considering for future releases, too. Yikes. What bad news. It just seems like such a short lived business.


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## Abalone (Jan 31, 2014)

Sam B said:


> That's an exceptionally optimistic point of view! Almost never see optimism going around these days. I'll hope that's the case, but I think I won't hold my breath.
> 
> I was leaning toward D2D anyway, so this just firms that opinion, I guess.


It's the holidays. Most of us drown our optimism in a bottle of merlot. Or juice boxes for those not old enough or who don't drink.


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## Joseph Malik (Jul 12, 2016)

Dale Ivan Smith said:


> Saw this as well. Disappointing. I used them to get into Google Play. I go direct everywhere else. I feel for folks who went all in with them.


This. Fortunately, my big moneymakers have been outside of Pronoun. Bummed about GP and iBooks, though. Tertiary revenue streams are nothing to sneeze at.


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## Travelian (Jun 1, 2017)

Besides Streetlib, there's also Publishdrive to get into Google.


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## Penang (Jun 28, 2011)

Any idea on the change over process? Should we unpublish on Pronoun before hitting submit on D2D or get our books live through D2D then pull them from Pronoun?


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## Goulburn (May 21, 2014)

I'm disappointed. I have all my ebooks access several pen names with them. I was so happy with the .99cent price and getting a fair return for it. I have until January to change, so there is no significant disruption there. I also like Draft2Digital and marinated an account there so returning to D2D will be easy. 

My big decisions will be. Do I drop Amazon (I'm not kidding) and focus on building a better private ebook distribution model for myself? That way I can retain my .99cont pricing for a reasonable profit margin. 

Do I use this forced change to retry KU?

Do I stick with a similar set up that I have now and sell through both Draft2Digital and Amazon, only bump my book prices to stay on the profit margin I currently get at Pronoun. 

My maths for pricing is that I sell five times more books at .99c than I do at $2.99 or $3.99. With Pronoun's pricing I was ahead at the .99cent price, and so were my readers. At the Amazon price, I earn more at the higher markup. 

With a deadline in 2018, I've got time to look into building my own store. I already have one that works; I'm just not happy with the visual layout, so I need to rebuild it from the ground up before promoting it.


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## Guest (Nov 7, 2017)

A. S. Warwick said:


> Going to be a bit of a pain to have to go and do all the reformatting to upload them to Amazon all over again. Just hope that the process doesn't lose any reviews already accumulated.


You shouldn't have to reformat. Pronoun lets you download your files still. Just upload the MOBI or ePub you get from them to Amazon when you do it on KDP.


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## skylarker1 (Aug 21, 2016)

Penang said:


> Any idea on the change over process? Should we unpublish on Pronoun before hitting submit on D2D or get our books live through D2D then pull them from Pronoun?


I'm concerned about this also. I wish there were a way to just ask the vendors (iBooks, B&N, Google Play, Kobo) to keep the existing book pages and transfer the control from Pronoun to the author.


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## Marseille France or Bust (Sep 25, 2012)

I have all of my books there for Library distribution and an omnibus non-fiction book where I can charge higher than what Amazon allows. This sucks.


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## JTriptych (Aug 23, 2015)

Travelian said:


> Besides Streetlib, there's also Publishdrive to get into Google.


Thanks, I'll check out PD. I really dont want to go back to Streetlib and their horrible interface.


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## Travelian (Jun 1, 2017)

JTriptych said:


> Thanks, I'll check out PD. I really dont want to go back to Streetlib and their horrible interface.


Ask about their royalty rates for Google. Just read over their pricing on their site. If I'm understanding them correctly, the % they take may be pretty high.


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## katrina46 (May 23, 2014)

Amyshojai said:


> Blast blast blast! I'd just uploaded several of my books to Pronoun to get into Google Play. Oh well... I'm told D2D is pursuing a deal with Google Play, and StreetLib.com also offers that. Anyone use StreetLib? I'm already working with D2D for others, and going direct with KDP.


I wouldn't hold my breath for D2D, though. I ask them once why they couldn't get a Google account and the problem is the pricing issue. They have a promise with the other retailers they won't offer a book for a lower price on another site, but Google loves to discount, so that's whats holding them back.


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## Patty Jansen (Apr 5, 2011)

katrina46 said:


> I wouldn't hold my breath for D2D, though. I ask them once why they couldn't get a Google account and the problem is the pricing issue. They have a promise with the other retailers they won't offer a book for a lower price on another site, but Google loves to discount, so that's whats holding them back.


Google Play did not discount Pronoun titles


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## AltMe (May 18, 2015)

Patty Jansen said:


> Google Play did not discount Pronoun titles


Not quite true.

With mine, they show them as $9.99 books, marked down to around $6.40, when I set them to $6.99. So definitely playing games. Not that it worried me at all. I just priced as per the recommendations here.


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## Travelian (Jun 1, 2017)

My understanding was Pronoun didn't discount Google US/Canada. International they discounted.


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## ZsofiaMacho (Sep 8, 2017)

Travelian said:


> Ask about their royalty rates for Google. Just read over their pricing on their site. If I'm understanding them correctly, the % they take may be pretty high.


Hi JTriptych,

Thank you for the mention of PublishDrive! We take 10% cut and go around the Google discounting by automatically re-pricing the books. We use an algorithm to 'overprice' the books on Google Play, so with the discounting they are priced exactly like you want the to be.

I hope this helps!


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## A. N. Other Author (Oct 11, 2014)

T. M. Bilderback said:


> Do any other distributors deal with Bibliotheca?


Publishdrive do GooglePlay and Bibliotheca. Not the nicest dashboard, but manageable.


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## ZsofiaMacho (Sep 8, 2017)

ADDavies said:


> Publishdrive do GooglePlay and Bibliotheca. Not the nicest dashboard, but manageable.


Hi ADDavies, thanks for the mention! Our developers are always improving the dashboard but your feedback would help them make it better. If there is anything specific you don't like, please let me know and I'll ask the IT team if they can change it.


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## Reveries (Feb 7, 2016)

Amyshojai said:


> Blast blast blast! I'd just uploaded several of my books to Pronoun to get into Google Play. Oh well... I'm told D2D is pursuing a deal with Google Play, and StreetLib.com also offers that. Anyone use StreetLib? I'm already working with D2D for others, and going direct with KDP.


I've been using Streetlib for Google Play and Overdrive for a while and get paid monthly via Paypal. Their site was a bit confusing, but things improved once they brought out their USA arm. Reporting is a bit slow, especially on Overdrive sales. My last payment was a lot more than I expected. I checked and a lot of Overdrive sales had appeared at the last minute.


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## Kathy Dee (Aug 27, 2016)

Dale Ivan Smith said:


> Saw this as well. Disappointing. I used them to get into Google Play. I go direct everywhere else. I feel for folks who went all in with them.


Yeah, that's me and I'm really pissed off about it!    But then, at least it gives me a chance to click the emojis I don't normally use


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## Goulburn (May 21, 2014)

I've had time to adjust and look at the work involved. It's more than I originally thought as I  have to recall multiple leads I've sent out with the Pronoun link in them.

I've begun the adjustment. I'm moving all of my fiction to Amazon. Once I hit publish, and the book is in review at Amazon  I'm unpublishing that book on Pronoun and canceling the books external promotions. The in review and the takedown times are both listed as 1-3 days. Amazon will be expecting a surcharge of changeover clients, so they are sure to understand. I expect there may be some delays in the system due to an overload of ebooks all coming in at the same time. 

When my books are clear from the other distributors, I might test the waters of KU for three months. It's been a long time since I tried it, and the countdown deal is the only way I know of to get a good return on a .99c promotion on Amazon. 

I'm going to sell my non-fiction books away from Amazon, and not even list them there. They sell better direct from blogs. 

No, I didn't like the change. I was so happy with Pronoun I can't deny it was a disappointment. I'm happy now that I've made the decision of what to do next and have begun to work toward it.


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## Goulburn (May 21, 2014)

Updating to let everyone know that a book I transferred from Pronoun to Amazon a couple of hours ago is live on Amazon now and with all its reviews intact. Good work by Amazon.


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## Guest (Nov 7, 2017)

Ryn Shell said:


> Updating to let everyone know that a book I transferred from Pronoun to Amazon a couple of hours ago is live on Amazon now and with all its reviews intact. Good work by Amazon.


I had a similar experience when I transferred all mine back. Pronoun allocate a new ASIN number to your book which is then linked by Amazon to your original ASIN [which is then unpublished]. This makes it easy to transfer your books back to Amazon direct. Just unpublish the Pronoun version and publish your Amazon version and everything should run as normal. Piece of cake


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## ZsofiaMacho (Sep 8, 2017)

Ryn Shell said:


> I've had time to adjust and look at the work involved. It's more than I originally thought as I have to recall multiple leads I've sent out with the Pronoun link in them.
> 
> I've begun the adjustment. I'm moving all of my fiction to Amazon. Once I hit publish, and the book is in review at Amazon I'm unpublishing that book on Pronoun and canceling the books external promotions. The in review and the takedown times are both listed as 1-3 days. Amazon will be expecting a surcharge of changeover clients, so they are sure to understand. I expect there may be some delays in the system due to an overload of ebooks all coming in at the same time.
> 
> ...


I understand your frustration with Pronoun but going back 100% to Amazon might not be the best idea: Amazon only accounts for around 35-40% of sales in case of international publishers: http://publishdrive.com/amazon-ebook-market-share/


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## AltMe (May 18, 2015)

ZsofiaMacho said:


> I understand your frustration with Pronoun but going back 100% to Amazon might not be the best idea: Amazon only accounts for around 35-40% of sales in case of international publishers: http://publishdrive.com/amazon-ebook-market-share/


"The numbers do not lie"

Sorry, but they do. You can make numbers say anything you want.

Nothing on that link looks anything like the numbers I've seen. Particularly here when people share their stats.

Are you taking into account that a large portion of your own stats is based on the fact that a huge number of your own authors go direct with Amazon, and so their Amazon sales are not showing up in your stats at all?


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## Bob Stewart (Mar 19, 2014)

Penang said:


> Any idea on the change over process? Should we unpublish on Pronoun before hitting submit on D2D ....


I would, they'll be given new listings/urls. When I read about this yesterday afternoon, I sent Pronoun an email and asked them to take my last two books down from all retailers (for some reason, these didn't have the link to do it myself.) By this morning, they're already gone from B&N, Kobo & Apple.


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## 75845 (Jan 1, 1970)

You can get into Google Play via the British based eBook Partnership, but they have a very different model in that they charge an annual fee and do not skim anything off your actual sales, so it may not be worth it for just Google Plus. OTOH they are useful for those wanting to avoid US Withholding Tax, because as a non-US aggregator eBook Partnership act as the non-US beneficiary for all their authors. Less useful for British authors who have a zero witholding treaty, but for those countries without a treaty or with 5% or 10% withholding it is very useful.

Be careful when comparing Google Play payouts on an aggregator to other retailers as Google Play pay low compared to others (52% I think). That is why Smashwords and D2D do not currently distribute to them as both of them pay the same percentage for each retailer and making up the 8% is a bridge too far.


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## ZsofiaMacho (Sep 8, 2017)

TimothyEllis said:


> "The numbers do not lie"
> 
> Sorry, but they do. You can make numbers say anything you want.
> 
> ...


Thank you for your comment! I would be very interested in seeing other stats. I used official data from AuthorEarnings and our data (which could be biased as you point it out). I don't want to go too far away from the topic but I'd be interested to know what other data have you seen.


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## JTriptych (Aug 23, 2015)

ZsofiaMacho said:


> Hi JTriptych,
> 
> Thank you for the mention of PublishDrive! We take 10% cut and go around the Google discounting by automatically re-pricing the books. We use an algorithm to 'overprice' the books on Google Play, so with the discounting they are priced exactly like you want the to be.
> 
> I hope this helps!


Hi there. I tried to copy and paste text from my notepad for the description while adding a book, but it doesnt seem to allow it. You need to allow copy and paste because I hate having to retype my book's descriptions one after the other.


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## 91831 (Jul 18, 2016)

I mentioned this in another thread, but I received an email from Google this morning inviting me to their partnership program - I signed up for this about a year ago. Timing finally worked right for me for once!

Note that this didn't go to my author email but to my Google account email.  I don't know if that's a helper to anyone, but perhaps if you have both and don't bother to check the Google one often, now would be a good time to check?


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## Guest (Nov 7, 2017)

I feel the pain of those who have to go through the transition, but at least Pronoun is continuing through mid-January and apparently plans on providing transition tools for authors.

Amazon gave us *two weeks notice* before they closed the Createspace estore, with *no support for the upcoming holiday season.*

So while I am sorry folks have sprained ankles, I'm still nursing two broken legs.  

Okay, that was a bit sithy of me. But my point is simply to offer a little context to those who are planning on going exclusively back to Amazon. It is unfortunate that people are losing Pronoun, but I caution that the answer is not necessarily to go exclusively to Amazon. Spreading around one's risk helps cushion you from the sudden changes in the industry, and mitigating risk is even more important if writing is your sole or primary source of income. No company, especially Amazon, is going to care as much about your business as you.


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## ZsofiaMacho (Sep 8, 2017)

JTriptych said:


> Hi there. I tried to copy and paste text from my notepad for the description while adding a book, but it doesnt seem to allow it. You need to allow copy and paste because I hate having to retype my book's descriptions one after the other.


Hi, that's odd, copy and paste should work just fine! (I just tried it just in case and it works OK for me.) Could you please send a print screen to our support team so they can look specifically into the issue?


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## JTriptych (Aug 23, 2015)

ZsofiaMacho said:


> Hi, that's odd, copy and paste should work just fine! (I just tried it just in case and it works OK for me.) Could you please send a print screen to our support team so they can look specifically into the issue?












Where is the copy/paste text?


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## Goulburn (May 21, 2014)

ZsofiaMacho said:


> I understand your frustration with Pronoun but going back 100% to Amazon might not be the best idea: Amazon only accounts for around 35-40% of sales in case of international publishers: http://publishdrive.com/amazon-ebook-market-share/


For my Gray Nomad Australian travel books you are correct. I never needed Amazon to sell my travel writing work, and they rarely sell on Amazon, only a handful a month.

For my fiction, after not having tried Select for over two years, and given I need to change things around anyway, this seems a good time to try it again for three months. I can put the ebooks into Draft2Digital at the end of the three months if I wish. There is no perfect, 'this is the best way' answer, or we would all be doing it.

I've only got a couple more books to move across. The worst part of this is that Amazon is dragging up some old covers and not my latest co-ordinated designs, and it will be a few days before my book stock looks good again. I removed all promotions as I'll not want to draw attention to the books until they look good visually when viewed together.

I did well out of my time with Pronoun, so I'll look at the positives of having been with them from the beginning until the end and finding them easy to work with. I'm now thinking of the opportunities I can try given I'm making change.

Re depending on one distributer: I don't. I earn a writing income from other sources. I can also afford to experiment, as I am past retirement age and have a retirement income. I continue to work for the love of it.


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## AltMe (May 18, 2015)

ZsofiaMacho said:


> Thank you for your comment! I would be very interested in seeing other stats. I used official data from AuthorEarnings and our data (which could be biased as you point it out). I don't want to go too far away from the topic but I'd be interested to know what other data have you seen.


I guess there hasn't been a recent thread I can point to, or if there was I missed it. But if you look at any of the "wide" threads, stats are quite regularly posted showing the breakdown of where they sell. What I've seen is repeated posts over several years, all saying roughly the same thing.

Don't get me wrong, I'd be really happy if Amazon was only 45%, but sadly, its not, or at least not according to the big wide sellers here.


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## Amyshojai (May 3, 2010)

FWIW, I sent an email to Google Play and this morning received the following answer (my email at the bottom, their response at the top):

Hello Amy,

Thank you for contacting us.

I have consulted your query regarding publishing of books via Draft2Digital platform with our broader team and will get back to you as soon as we hear from them. Thanks for your feedback on the price policy. I'll be sure to pass your feedback along to the relevant individuals.

Appreciate your patience and understanding in the matter.

Best regards,
Casper
The Google Play Books Team

Chat live with a Google Play Books support agent. Available 24/7, depending on demand.

Google Inc., 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA 94043, USA

If you received this communication by mistake, please don't forward it to anyone else (it may contain confidential or privileged information), please erase all copies of it, including all attachments, and please let the sender know it went to the wrong person. Thanks.

On 11/07/17 04:50:47 [email protected] wrote:
Hello,

I published my books with New York for many years before reissuing many of them as a small independent publisher. While I know the Google Play audience is filled with avid, discerning readers, I had no easy way to gain access to the venue, until recently I discovered Macmillan's Pronoun service.

Sadly, that avenue has now closed with the announcement that Pronoun will shut down in January 2018. That means several of my books will automatically be removed from the Google Play store--until and unless I can find another platform.


Most of my books are distributed to other platforms via the Draft2Digital.com platform, which I give high marks. They are easy to work with, and eager to provide solutions for publishers as well as readers. 


Unfortunately, because Google Play discounts Ebooks without author/publisher approval, that can create a very bad reader and author experience when other platforms seek to "price match" to offer the lowest possible price. I understand wanting to offer discounts to avid readers--but this potentially punishes the author, the publisher and the reader when we have no say or knowledge of such changes. 


So I'm told that unless this can be coordinated across the board, Draft2Digital tells me they are reluctant to add Google Play to their distribution list.

I am writing to respectfully request that Google Play consider changing your price-policy to include an author/publisher approval process to help prevent future issues. That would open up Google Play to many more titles from distributors such as Draft2Digital or others, increase readership and income across the board, and certainly be a boon to the marketplace. 


Thank you in advance for reading my request and I hope to hear back from you--and hopefully work with you down the road. 


Amy Shojai, CABC
www.SHOJAI.com
Furry Muse Publications

30+ Pet Care Titles &
Thrillers with Bite!
Bling, Bitches & Blood


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## Amyshojai (May 3, 2010)

ZsofiaMacho said:


> Hi JTriptych,
> 
> Thank you for the mention of PublishDrive! We take 10% cut and go around the Google discounting by automatically re-pricing the books. We use an algorithm to 'overprice' the books on Google Play, so with the discounting they are priced exactly like you want the to be.
> 
> I hope this helps!


I hadn't heard of PublishDrive, looking more into this now. Thanks for the info--interesting work-around for the pricing.


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## tvnopenope (Sep 14, 2015)

I didn't expect them to shut down so soon. Does anyone know how I can contact Google Play? I wish they would work out a deal with D2D. I don't want to lose my Google Play sales.


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## Amyshojai (May 3, 2010)

taliwrites said:


> I didn't expect them to shut down so soon. Does anyone know how I can contact Google Play? I wish they would work out a deal with D2D. I don't want to lose my Google Play sales.


You can email them at books-support ([email protected])


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## tvnopenope (Sep 14, 2015)

Amyshojai said:


> You can email them at books-support ([email protected])


Thank you!


----------



## AltMe (May 18, 2015)

I've had a response from Google Play which appears to indicate they have not been informed of Pronoun closing down.

I've sent them a copy of the email. 

But from the tone of the reply, I dont think they care if thousands of books vanish from their store in Jan.


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## ZsofiaMacho (Sep 8, 2017)

JTriptych said:


> Where is the copy/paste text?


Thanks for pointing this out! Our development team has fixed it, everything should be working OK now


----------



## AltMe (May 18, 2015)

So now I have an email from D2D saying they now send your books to Amazon.

The question is, are these two major game changer situations, happening at the same time because:

[list type=decimal]
[*]Its a co-incidence?
[*]They are actually related somehow.
[/list]Que the conspiracy theorists.

One has to wonder if D2D making a breakthrough with Amazon is connected to Pronoun crashing? Has Amazon done a new deal with one and terminated its deal with the other?


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## Amanda M. Lee (Jun 3, 2014)

TimothyEllis said:


> So now I have an email from D2D saying they now send your books to Amazon.
> 
> The question is, are these two major game changer situations, happening at the same time because:
> 
> ...


D2D mentioned a month ago (at NINC) that they were in the works to get Amazon distribution back. Apparently the Pronoun peeps thought it was business as usual until this weekend, which seems to suggest that whatever happened to them came from the higher-ups ... and suddenly. Forget all that, though. Why would one have anything to do with the other? Is there a reason Amazon can only work with one distributor that I'm not aware of? It seems far more likely to me that Pronoun abused their trade agreement with Amazon to make Pronoun possible and Amazon cut them off at the knees. Pronoun has been around under other names -- including Vook -- for a lot longer than most people realize. It was only recently that they offered the unsustainable terms, and most people seem to think the aim was data mining. We will have to see what, if anything, comes out of all this but I hardly think D2D is the reason Pronoun failed when Pronoun was offering a pay structure that everyone knew wouldn't last.


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## AltMe (May 18, 2015)

Amanda M. Lee said:


> Why would one have anything to do with the other? Is there a reason Amazon can only work with one distributor that I'm not aware of? It seems far more likely to me that Pronoun abused their trade agreement with Amazon to make Pronoun possible and Amazon cut them off at the knees.


That sort of is my point.

Did Amazon time cutting them off at the knees with a new deal with D2D, perhaps giving Pronoun an ultimatum of some kind based on the new deal with D2D?

Just throwing ideas out there.


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## aimeeeasterling (Sep 22, 2014)

Well, I guess it was worth it dipping my toe into the Pronoun pool for a year to take advantage of 70% royalty on box sets. Too bad I'll lose my rank on those same box sets when I bring them back direct with Amazon. Does anyone have ideas for mitigating the transition beyond some facebook ads and/or a promo on the books in question?


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## Used To Be BH (Sep 29, 2016)

TimothyEllis said:


> That sort of is my point.
> 
> Did Amazon time cutting them off at the knees with a new deal with D2D, perhaps giving Pronoun an ultimatum of some kind based on the new deal with D2D?
> 
> Just throwing ideas out there.


Are you suggesting that Amazon somehow benefits from having an aggregator involved. If so, I don't see how. I do see how having an aggregator undercut them by giving better terms then they can offer to authors going through KDP would have been an issue, though. The D2D thing looks like coincidence. My guess is that Amazon started raising questions about whether or not Macmillan's terms should really apply to Pronoun. As crazy as Amazon sometimes is, I actually understand that position (if that is in fact what happened).

As good an operation as D2D has, unless one is absolutely determined to have only one dashboard to look at, I can't see the benefit of using them as an aggregator to get to Amazon. I'd also be worried that Amazon would change its mind again. After all, it did cut off D2D's distribution once before. Barring a very long-term contract, I'd have a hard time trusting that arrangement.


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## Taking my troll a$$ outta here (Apr 8, 2013)

Amanda M. Lee said:


> Apparently the Pronoun peeps thought it was business as usual until this weekend, which seems to suggest that whatever happened to them came from the higher-ups ... and suddenly.


From my recent communications with Pronoun, I feel like they were working towards the future, not expecting a shutdown. I do agree that whatever happened came on very suddenly, and I don't think they saw it coming. I think Amazon put the hammer down on them in some way and it didn't make sense to keep at it.

I am tending to believe that Amazon wasn't happy about authors with banned KDP accounts being able to jump over to Pronoun & start a "publishing company", nor the way authors could defeat the KDP file size requirements for $0.99 price points by going through PN. Until PN came along, some box set publishers were doing shady things like putting half of the advertised books in the file & linking to the rest of the books on instafreebie, because they could not get the $0.99 price via KDP with the huge file size. When KDP cracked down on that, they simply published through Pronoun, AND they got 70% royalty on the $0.99 on top of it.

I'm personally a little frustrated as I'm dealing with options for the pen names/series I had listed with PN, but it's like everything else in this industry; it's good to try new things, but we have to be flexible and bounce back if it doesn't work out. As annoying as this is, at least we're not getting screwed on royalty payments (nightmares of All Romance cropped up when I read the Pronoun closing notice) and they have given us plenty of time to sort it out.

Right now I'm fiddling with D2D and seeing how it can work for me. If anyone knows of any other distributor that lists with Amazon, and especially any that I can publish as a permafree (with no hassle), please let me know. That was a big perk of Pronoun that I am sorry to see go. I do have a Google account, but I'd rather deal with one distributor instead of going direct with all the vendors.


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## Sonya Bateman (Feb 3, 2013)

JTriptych said:


> Where is the copy/paste text?


Once you've hit copy on your description, try putting the cursor in the description box and hitting CTRL + V. That usually works with any program, even if there isn't a copy and paste option on the menu. Also, the little clipboard icon on the top row to the right is probably paste (that's usually the icon used for paste). Those three icons at the top right (scissors, two pieces of paper, clipboard) should be cut, copy, paste.


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## AltMe (May 18, 2015)

aimeeeasterling said:


> Too bad I'll lose my rank on those same box sets when I bring them back direct with Amazon. Does anyone have ideas for mitigating the transition beyond some facebook ads and/or a promo on the books in question?


It should be as easy as getting a KDP account if you dont have one, contacting KDP, and asking them to move each book to your KDP account, providing them with all the detail.

I would expect KDP might be expecting a lot of this to happen over the next few months.

It is worth asking, because only they can move books retaining rank. They do it for death of an author, so they have the ability.


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## Goulburn (May 21, 2014)

Update.

Everything has changed!

D2D now distributes to Amazon!  
Tomorrow, I reverse all I did today    Back to D2D


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## Monique (Jul 31, 2010)

Well done, D2D! 

But remember, they can't distribute your book at a price point of free. You have to pricematch to get that. No pre-orders and no Select.

Still it's a big step for them to get distribution there.


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## Goulburn (May 21, 2014)

Monique said:


> Well done, D2D!
> 
> But remember, they can't distribute your book at a price point of free. You have to pricematch to get that. No pre-orders and no Select.
> 
> Still it's a big step for them to get distribution there.


I don't do permanent-free. I do free with a newsletter signup. 
Amazon has lost my payments to my Australian bark and had me out of pocket for more than a thousand dollars for over six months till they fixed things at their end. That's why I initially went to Pronoun. That's why I'd prefer D2D and no hassles in being paid, over Amazon. It's a personal issue unique to me. Amazon says my bank has too long a name. (Bank of Australia) and they condense the name and the payments don't arrive. Silly issue. I refuse to change my bank because Amazon states their system drops the end off my bank details. I've never had a problem being paid by D2D.
So that explains why I jumped with excitement at the D2D news and reversed plans in an instant.


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## Anna Drake (Sep 22, 2014)

Bill Hiatt said:


> As good an operation as D2D has, unless one is absolutely determined to have only one dashboard to look at, I can't see the benefit of using them as an aggregator to get to Amazon. I'd also be worried that Amazon would change its mind again. After all, it did cut off D2D's distribution once before. Barring a very long-term contract, I'd have a hard time trusting that arrangement.


I'll go with D2D because of their formatting options. That was another part of Pronoun's charms. They produced an excellent ebook. I spent half the morning trying to come up with something half as good and failed. Forget it. My time is better spent writing. As to Amazon changing its mind, it's already doing it. A lot of what authors do isn't working as well at Amazon as it once did. This is a crazy business. There are no guarantees.


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## 75845 (Jan 1, 1970)

Bill Hiatt said:


> Are you suggesting that Amazon somehow benefits from having an aggregator involved. If so, I don't see how.


Support. 
The crucial final point on the D2D blog post


> Just to sum this up, if you opt in you're getting:
> Distribution to Amazon
> All your books sales and royalties reported in one place, with our beautiful, powerful, easy-to-read reporting tools
> Amazing customer support for all your books, including those distributed on Amazon!
> That last one may actually be the biggest news of all.


D2D handling support saves Amazon time and grief, but at the expense of losing control and data acquisition. It is why Scribd do not allow direct submission and Apple only allows it in order to sell more Macs.


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## Taking my troll a$$ outta here (Apr 8, 2013)

I got all excited for, like, 30 seconds when I saw the D2D announcement about Amazon distribution. Then I realized it wouldn’t help with my permafree. 

Oh, well, guess I’ll try something different. I switched my permafree back to KDP; both PN & KDP version were listed for a few hours, now it’s just the KDP version at regular price. It took an act of God to get it priced matched, so I think I’m gonna just go with it & let it stay paid. 

Fingers crossed bahaha. 

My day sucks donkey butt right now. So over converting & loading books. 👎🏻


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## David VanDyke (Jan 3, 2014)

VirginiaMcClain said:


> Oh man. I just got the e-mail too. This is a bummer. I have to say though, I was nervous about them ever since MacMillan acquired them. It seemed to me like another chance for the Big 5 to shut down an avenue for indies. Does anyone else think that's likely what happened or am I being overly suspicious?


I think they gave it a go but it probably wasn't profitable. I never understood how they could pay 70% for 99c books. They had to subsidize that somehow, even if only with overhead. No doubt a lot of indies jumped to Pronoun specifically because of that single advantage, but didn't bring their other books to Pronoun, which may have broken the model.


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## David VanDyke (Jan 3, 2014)

Martitalbott said:


> So the way to wealth is to start a platform for Indies that McMillan will pay big bucks for, and then shut down? It's not like it hasn't happened before. Anyway, glad I stayed with D2D.


That's actually a viable business model for many entrepreneurs. Start something that becomes popular by providing a service in a niche, always intending to ruthlessly sell out to a big corporation who either wants to buy a division whole in order to get ahead of the curve, or buy it in order to delay or sideline the disruption.


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## David VanDyke (Jan 3, 2014)

Patty Jansen said:


> I have another angle on this.
> 
> I've seen this with Smashwords and D2D. Both used to distribute to KDP.
> 
> ...


Putting on my tinfoil hat for a moment:

I just got notified today that D2D was distributing to Amazon. Is it possible this was driven by a bunch of banned scammers pleading with D2D, and D2D (hopefully without realizing it) thinking the desire was all from legit authors?

But, D2D still presumably is not a route to KU, where most of the abuse lies. Still, free download abuse might be routed through D2D to "launder" the process.


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## Giac (Nov 21, 2016)

JTriptych said:


> Thanks, I'll check out PD. I really dont want to go back to Streetlib and their horrible interface.


Hello JTriptych,
Giacomo of StreetLib's here. I'm sorry that you had an unpleasant experience with us, and you're welcome to provide any feedback about our user interface. As a matter of fact, we work every day to improve and evolve our platform, and we do that mostly thanks to our customers' feedbacks. 
Thank you,
Giacomo


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## Kathryn Meyer Griffith (May 6, 2013)

Hi all. I've followed some of this thread, am a little confused, and have a question for anyone/someone. What exactly is PublishDrive? Is it like a D2D, where you list your books and they send them out to a mess of other eBook online publishers? And if I am in D2D, Amazon, Smashwords and Google Play...would it do me any good to list my 26 eBooks at PublishDrive? Just wondering.


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## Bob Stewart (Mar 19, 2014)

Martitalbott said:


> So the way to wealth is to start a platform for Indies that McMillan will pay big bucks for, and then shut down? It's not like it hasn't happened before. Anyway, glad I stayed with D2D.


How do you know Macmillan paid big bucks? I think it's more likely they took over some floundering company and gave them a lifeline and a chance to make a go of it. Like many initiatives of big companies, it didn't work out. I seriously doubt anyone made big money off of this.

Or that Macmillan had some ulterior motive, like getting data. Let's face it, no one (including me) put a book in Pronoun that was doing well in KDP. We put books there that we hoped could do better.

Big companies screw up all the time, Dilbert isn't so far from reality.


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## Elizabeth Ann West (Jul 11, 2011)

Be careful when you try to post your books BACK on Amazon. I just got slammed with a prove your copyright on a book published under my legal name. I escalated to the Jeff email, wrote back the quality team and I had already opened a help ticket because the book was stuck in LIVE under review.

As to why anyone would want Amazon through Draft2Digital instead of dealing with them directly. Oh, I can think of a few reasons right now......


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

Folks,

TEMPORARILY locking this thread while I review. It seems to have derailed and we need to review and get it back on topic. Give us a bit and we'll reopen.

_EDIT: OK, here's the deal. Giac: you have a vendor thread for StreetLib here:http://www.kboards.com/index.php/topic,244525.0.html

I encourage you and members who have had *first hand experiences with your services* to post about your service there and for you to answer questions there.

While members did ask for alternatives to Pronoun, and so some discussion of these services is appropriate within this thread, the kind of detail that's been posted concerning the account of a customer who is not a member of this forum is not appropriate and will be removed. We're in the midst of discussion and review and additional edits will likely be made.

We don't want this thread to be derailed as it is very useful to the community. I'll be opening it shortly._

EDIT2: OK, opening it; as I said, we will likely do further edits. Let's move on--and if you want to discuss your own experiences with StreetLib, please move to their vendor thread, linked above.

*EDIT3: Additional edits have been made. I think we are done. Please report any other posts that you think are inappropriate. If you have first hand experience with a vendor mentioned in this thread, please post about it in that vendor's thread. Please don't hesitate to PM me if you have any questions.*

Betsy
KB Mod


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## Taking my troll a$$ outta here (Apr 8, 2013)

Elizabeth Ann West said:


> Be careful when you try to post your books BACK on Amazon. I just got slammed with a prove your copyright on a book published under my legal name. I escalated to the Jeff email, wrote back the quality team and I had already opened a help ticket because the book was stuck in LIVE under review.
> 
> As to why anyone would want Amazon through Draft2Digital instead of dealing with them directly. Oh, I can think of a few reasons right now......


I just had three books yanked from "publishing" status to "draft". I'm assuming I'll get a "prove your copyright" statement shortly, but it hasn't hit my email. It's on a second pen name that I currently have books published on via KDP. I'm guessing moving anything over from Pronoun is going to be a mess; waiting until the morning to start firing off emails since I'm exhausted over dealing with this all day.

For those who use D2D, curious if you have issues proving copyright when publishing to Amazon under different pen names.


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## dgcasey (Apr 16, 2017)

brkingsolver said:


> Reading between the lines in their epilogue, a suspicious mind might think McMillan bought Pronoun just to kill it.


That's what I was thinking. What better way to get rid of competition than to buy them out and shut them down? I'm sorry, but I can't believe that one of the Big 5 couldn't figure out a way to make that platform work. I'm guessing it was never their intention to get it to work.


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## Anna Drake (Sep 22, 2014)

I'm wondering how many people responding here are wide and how many are exclusive with Amazon. I suspect there is a different outlook between these two camps. As I said, I went with Pronoun for the ability to price my books to free. Plus, I preferred the 70 percent royalty over the 35 percent. But I fell in love with Pronoun's services.

If I got a new review, I received an email, telling me which book and how many stars it was given. If I ranked in the top whatever percent of an obscure sub-genre of cozy mysteries, I received another email informing me of that fact. Both emails arrived with a post to send to Twitter or Facebook with me doing nothing more than clicking a button. Click and done promotion. Wow.

When I had questions, I dealt with a real person. They were not only live, they were polite and knowledgeable and did not make me feel a jerk, even though many of my questions were sophomoric -- or worse.

I have no concerns with returning to D2D. They are staffed with competent and helpful people. But a small part of me will always miss Pronoun.

Now, I only hope when I return to Amazon or go through D2D, I won't have to prove I wrote my books.


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## ZsofiaMacho (Sep 8, 2017)

Kathryn Meyer Griffith said:


> Hi all. I've followed some of this thread, am a little confused, and have a question for anyone/someone. What exactly is PublishDrive? Is it like a D2D, where you list your books and they send them out to a mess of other eBook online publishers? And if I am in D2D, Amazon, Smashwords and Google Play...would it do me any good to list my 26 eBooks at PublishDrive? Just wondering.


Yes, PublishDrive is a lot like D2D. There are some authors who prefer to go to both D2D and us as we have a wider range of distribution and go to stores and countries others might not (OverDrive, Tolino, Odilo for example).

Please let me know if you have any questions.

_Edited to remove promotion. Please also see PublishDrive's vendor thread for more info:
http://www.kboards.com/index.php/topic,257805.0.html. --Betsy_


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## thomas.jurun (Nov 8, 2017)

Here's another one who has all the books on Pronoun. It is not that alarming for us because we have developed website and our sale is pretty good. But hey, Amazon is Amazon right. Most important thing why we chose Amazon is because we have few book that cost more than $9,99 and with KDP we would get only 30%, with Pronoun we were getting from 40-60%. 
Going alone through Amazon is not so good for use. Any other solutions like Pronoun out there?


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## Elizabeth Ann West (Jul 11, 2011)

Some people are saying we need to ask Pronoun for a rights reversal letter, my issue with that is that's a letter of something I didn't do in the first place. At NO TIME did I give Pronoun or MacMillan an exclusive right to publish the book, that always remained with me. And I don't want to be submitting paperwork to Amazon that gives the appearance that this book's rights at any time left my control.

I am trying to wait patiently for 24 hours from when I emailed them before they get a full blast of military wife who eats bureaucratic red tape for breakfast.


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## CassieL (Aug 29, 2013)

I moved about thirteen titles from Pronoun back to Amazon about two weeks ago. And on one of those titles I did get the "prove your copyright email." I wrote them back, explained that I had always owned the copyright to the title, that I was simply moving the book back from distribution through Pronoun to distribution to Amazon, and that I didn't have a copyright registration to give them. That solved it. Book was listed in a day. The other twelve titles went through no hassle.


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## Goulburn (May 21, 2014)

Elizabeth Ann West said:


> As to why anyone would want Amazon through Draft2Digital instead of dealing with them directly. Oh, I can think of a few reasons right now......


There are legitimate and honest reasons for selecting Amazon on Draft2Digital, Elizabeth, as I have explained in other threads.

One of those reasons is that Amazon has shortened the word Australia when sending bank transfers, and my payments have been lost, presumably sent to Austria, where Aust abbreviated items go.

Amazon lost thousands of dollars worth of my royalties twice. They said that the reason was my bank account name was too long, and their system shortened it. When I was experiencing this problem, over two years ago. I didn't come here complaining, I kept it quiet and worked through emails over six months with Amazon to get my money, which was the correct way handle a private matter. I am an ethical business person.

I only find it necessary to explain now, due to insinuations that an author might not have ethical motives if they are seeking to publish to Amazon via another distributor. Amazon has never blocked me. I'm a busy person, and I find having one distributor also saves time.

It's every author's personal decision who they distribute through, not ours to question their motives, or assume the worst of others if they make different business decisions to the ones we make for ourselves.


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## Elizabeth Ann West (Jul 11, 2011)

Ryn Shell said:


> There are legitimate and honest reasons for selecting Amazon on Draft2Digital, Elizabeth, as I have explained in other threads.
> 
> One of those reasons is that Amazon has shortened my the word Australia when sending bank transfers, and my payments have been sent to Austria and to the dead payment files and have been hard to recover.
> 
> ...


I think you misunderstood my post. *I* am having issues with Amazon right now over the copyright baloney. As to why someone would WANT Draft2Digital for Amazon instead of going directly, I can think of a few reasons right now because I am not a happy customer with KDP right now. It would be brilliant if I was facing this same stupid thing I had D2D's wonderful customer service to go "ACK, HELP!" and their help in resolving Amazon's stupidity.

I am not insinuating anyone would use Draft2Digital for any other reason but that it sure would be awesome to have their help when Amazon goes bonkers because KDP has next to NO customer service. How you read otherwise is beyond me.


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## Goulburn (May 21, 2014)

Elizabeth Ann West said:


> I think you misunderstood my post. *I* am having issues with Amazon right now over the copyright baloney. As to why someone would WANT Draft2Digital for Amazon instead of going directly, I can think of a few reasons right now because I am not a happy customer with KDP right now. It would be brilliant if I was facing this same stupid thing I had D2D's wonderful customer service to go "ACK, HELP!" and their help in resolving Amazon's stupidity.
> 
> I am not insinuating anyone would use Draft2Digital for any other reason but that it sure would be awesome to have their help when Amazon goes bonkers because KDP has next to NO customer service. How you read otherwise is beyond me.


Okay, Elizabeth. I'm firing on lack of sleep following what feels like days of moved books form Pronoun to Amazon and then out of Amazon to Draft2Digital, plus dyslexia has me putting my foot in my mouth at the best of times. My apologies if I misinterpreted what you said. 

Elizabeth, your post followed one speaking about authors who had been blocked by Amazon getting back on Amazon via other distributors. It was wrong of me to have thought that you were referring to that issue. I do apologise.


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## AltMe (May 18, 2015)

Ryn Shell said:


> One of those reasons is that Amazon has shortened my the word Australia when sending bank transfers, and my payments have been sent to Austria and to the dead payment files and has been hard to recover.
> 
> Amazon lost thousands of dollars worth of my royalties twice. They said that the reason was my bank account name was too long, and their system shortened it.


That makes no sense at all. The bank name isn't the important bit. The BSB defines the bank and branch, and they are unique. The Swift code is how it gets into Australia, and those are unique as well. So as long as you entered the correct information, the name of the bank should make zero difference.

ANZ in its long form is far longer than Bank of Australia. The fact BofA was once a credit union, and credit unions always had problems getting funds through banks unless you used the correct bank information which often was different from the credit unions.

Amazon pay into National Bank using wire transfers, which forwards to everyone else. If it didn't get to National Bank in Sydney, then the swift code must have been wrong.

I cant see how this was a name of bank being too long for the field problem. Whoever told you this obviously had no clue what they were talking about.

Edit:

Austria
Austral

No, not the same thing, and no way you can confuse them and send money to the wrong country.

Something else was wrong, and the person who got back to you was typically clueless.

Edit 2: Why aren't you using Payoneer?


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## Taking my troll a$$ outta here (Apr 8, 2013)

Elizabeth Ann West said:


> Some people are saying we need to ask Pronoun for a rights reversal letter, my issue with that is that's a letter of something I didn't do in the first place. At NO TIME did I give Pronoun or MacMillan an exclusive right to publish the book, that always remained with me. And I don't want to be submitting paperwork to Amazon that gives the appearance that this book's rights at any time left my control.
> 
> I am trying to wait patiently for 24 hours from when I emailed them before they get a full blast of military wife who eats bureaucratic red tape for breakfast.


I can't see how we'd need a rights reversal, when Pronoun never owned the rights to our work, the same as Smashwords, Amazon, Google, or any other vendor. For a few of the titles I wanted taken down immediately, I emailed them and Pronoun responded and took them down within a half hour; they were even removed from the retailers in that time period, like, crazy fast. Man, I am going to miss that super-fast response time from Pronoun, ugh!

As for the books that I published to KDP & then were bumped back to "Draft" status, I received an interesting email that I haven't seen before. Bolding is mine. It's good to bypass writing up something to explain I am the pen name & own the rights (which I never had an issue with, it only took a simple response in the past, but still, lately who knows how that's working). I'm wondering if this is a simplified way for KDP to deal with a large influx of books being transferred:



> Hello,
> 
> Thanks for publishing with Amazon. We're contacting you regarding the following book(s):
> 
> ...


I suppose we shall see. Fingers crossed for a smooth transition. For my books on pre-order with Pronoun, that's another story & I'm still stressing over the best way to handle that.

So far I am absolutely loving Draft 2 Digital. I haven't found any other viable alternative to list permafrees or preorders with Amazon, but I really like Draft 2 Digital and am kinda kicking myself for not exploring them before this all happened. I will be sticking with them in hopes that they will have more options with Amazon in the future. I'm still a huge Smashwords fan for wide distribution, but I have to admit that D2D's interface is superior. I absolutely love that I can upload an ebook & they give me a fully formatted, beautiful PRINT bonus version as well that I am free to use anywhere, which has saved me a crap ton of work. Some of the books I am transferring from Pronoun to KDP do not have print versions, so in order to keep my reviews linked to the new ebooks, I'm putting up print versions, linking the PN version once the print version is live, unpublishing the PN version, then publishing via KDP & linking to the print version. It's more work than I care to do right now, butsome of the books under my pen names have a significant amount of reviews & I hate to lose them.


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## Elizabeth Ann West (Jul 11, 2011)

EB said:


> I can't see how we'd need a rights reversal, when Pronoun never owned the rights to our work, the same as Smashwords, Amazon, Google, or any other vendor. For a few of the titles I wanted taken down immediately, I emailed them and Pronoun responded and took them down within a half hour; they were even removed from the retailers in that time period, like, crazy fast. Man, I am going to miss that super-fast response time from Pronoun, ugh!


I agree. I don't need my situation any more complicated than it already is.



EB said:


> As for the books that I published to KDP & then were bumped back to "Draft" status, I received an interesting email that I haven't seen before. Bolding is mine. It's good to bypass writing up something to explain I am the pen name & own the rights (which I never had an issue with, it only took a simple response in the past, but still, lately who knows how that's working). I'm wondering if this is a simplified way for KDP to deal with a large influx of books being transferred:


My email was different.



> Hello,
> 
> Thank you for publishing with Amazon. Copyright is important to us - we want to make sure that no author or other copyright holder has his or her books sold by anyone else. To publish your book, please respond with documentation confirming your publishing rights within four days:
> 
> ...


About 1 hour BEFORE I got this email, I had opened up a Help Ticket about the book because the status went to LIVE (in review) it had been a day of that and none of the links were showing the book.

Then I got this email. I wrote back :
"I have been publishing with KDP since 2011. This is published under my legal name attached to my social security number that is in the tax documentation.

This email address is the one that has published this book with paperback, ebook, and audio.

The publisher name on the book is MY NAME: Elizabeth Ann West.

There was no publication rights to revert, they have always remained with me."

For good measure I also wrote back:
"Also I AM the author and this email is from my official website.

I grant myself all rights and territories to publish my books.

To fulfill this bullet:
- If you are not the author, an e-mail from the address listed on the author's (or their agent's) official website confirming that you have the rights to publish their book in the territories, languages, and formats you have selected

And you will notice my website is the official website listed on the ISBN. "

And I wrote to JEFF email a very courteous "Been with KDP since 2011, account closure threatened when I HOLD THE COPYRIGHT" and I explain that I have received this email with 4 days threat and I need help please resolving this.

1 more hour and executive gets another email with I NEED A PHONE CALL TODAY


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## Victoria LK (Jan 31, 2014)

Elizabeth Ann West said:


> Be careful when you try to post your books BACK on Amazon. I just got slammed with a prove your copyright on a book published under my legal name. I escalated to the Jeff email, wrote back the quality team and I had already opened a help ticket because the book was stuck in LIVE under review.
> 
> As to why anyone would want Amazon through Draft2Digital instead of dealing with them directly. Oh, I can think of a few reasons right now......


 Maybe this is a good reason for us to provide an isbn for your books? just wondering


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## AltMe (May 18, 2015)

Elizabeth Ann West said:


> 1 more hour and executive gets another email with I NEED A PHONE CALL TODAY


1 hour? You should at least allow them to finish their first coffee for the day.


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## Bob Stewart (Mar 19, 2014)

For those with receiving copyright notices: did you use a Pronoun ISBN or supply your own?

I had about a half dozen books in Pronoun, all previously in KDP, and all with my own imprint and ISBN. I moved some back a couple weeks ago and the rest yesterday with no problems. 

I wonder if that's what makes the difference, Pronoun was listed as the publisher.


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## CassieL (Aug 29, 2013)

I had used the Pronoun ISBN. All of mine moved back no issue except one that after I replied I realized had been in a non-exclusive box set at one point. I got the same email Elizabeth did.


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## Elizabeth Ann West (Jul 11, 2011)

I used my own ISBN. the 1 hour was to the 24 hour mark from when I emailed yesterday. I waited 23.5 hours, they already got another email to the JEFF email with lots of caps that I NEED A PHONECALL TODAY and my phone number.

If they can send out an email of "respond in 4 days or else" they sure as heck better respond when someone responds back right away.

I own the ISBN on this book on all formats. This is my legal name, not a pseudonym. 

I can understand skepticism, because yeah, I've had it myself. Amazon is not screwing ME over, so why would they do this to that author? That author must have done something wrong. Nope. The behemoth can't see the individual and this will get resolved, one way or the other. Regardless, there will be big changes in my business model on the back end of this mess.


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## Elizabeth Ann West (Jul 11, 2011)

Another JAFF author got the same email I did a few weeks ago just on changing her PRICE. All of her books were delisted until she could keep the emails going back and forth to the quality team to get the books back up. They did so with no explanation of why they were all taken down in the first place.

Their copyright check process is broken. it's getting a lot of false positives, and I'm still seeing garbage published in the Amazon store. And at some point, the length of account SHOULD be a factor in getting a pair of human eyes on the situation.


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## Bob Stewart (Mar 19, 2014)

Elizabeth Ann West said:


> I can understand skepticism, because yeah, I've had it myself. Amazon is not screwing ME over, so why would they do this to that author? That author must have done something wrong. Nope. The behemoth can't see the individual and this will get resolved, one way or the other. Regardless, there will be big changes in my business model on the back end of this mess.


Please don't think I was in any way skeptical, just curious as to whether there was a logic to it. These things have been happening way too frequently for anyone to feel safe from it. I'm probably somewhat insulated from suspicion by my meagre sales.

Good luck, and try not to let the anxiety overwhelm you. (fixed,thanks Timothy.)


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## AltMe (May 18, 2015)

Bob Stewart said:


> Good luck, and try to let the anxiety overwhelm you.


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## Elizabeth Ann West (Jul 11, 2011)

Bob Stewart said:


> Please don't think I was in any way skeptical, just curious as to whether there was a logic to it. These things have been happening way too frequently for anyone to feel safe from it. I'm probably somewhat insulated from suspicion by my meagre sales.
> 
> Good luck, and try to let the anxiety overwhelm you.


I understand totally. I am not trying to have a tinfoil hat moment. But it's low 5-figures (like the lowest to qualify for 5-figures) of income that's waiting to be paid this month and next. It's a significant amount of money to ME if they close my account, or in any other way impair my payments over this mess. And delisting my books would cost me about $100 a day right now. I know that's small compared to some, big to others, but it's my situation.

This is why for years on this board I have said over and over again, I work with Amazon, I do not trust them to be my sole vendor. Don't get me wrong, I want my money owed to me. Those are sales of my IP. But, if it IS delayed, I am not destitute. I have the other vendors bringing in enough that I can cover my business expenses and that's something I want to increase to even beyond that. I just won't have a paycheck, which my family plans to have happen from time to time, so even that won't be the end of the world, but it's still not right or fair to me.

I am keeping my fingers crossed they call me and I get this fixed TODAY. This is making it difficult for me to focus on anything else as well.


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## Amyshojai (May 3, 2010)

ZsofiaMacho said:


> Yes, PublishDrive is a lot like D2D (but better  ) There are some authors who prefer to go to both D2D and us as we have a wider range of distribution and go to stores and countries others might not (OverDrive, Tolino, Odilo for example). We're also told to have an amazing customer service
> 
> Please let me know if you have any questions.


I'm with D2D for everything but amazon (go direct) but had used Pronoun specifically for Google Play access so was majorly bummed to lose that just as I started to get traction. A couple of writer colleagues mentioned PD on Facebook, with glowing comments, so when mentioned here, too, I signed up yesterday. I have to say, the transition thus far has been seamless. A couple books have been kicked back with (minor, easily fixed) stuff and I appreciate these notes that serve to improve my books' reach. Paws crossed, this will be the beginning of a long term beautiful relationship.


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## Goulburn (May 21, 2014)

My banking choices aren't really relevant.
Moving to the positive. Does anyone have any suggestions on promoting all of your books together, to pick up on the lost rankings caused by having pulled them all out of Pronoun and then petting them back again through a different distributor?  I'd be prepared to help with a multi-author cross-promotion, using my blogs as a base to launch it from, for authors in this situation, in return for an equal value cross-promotion. Brainstorm the idea and let me know if I can help, and at the same time help my books pick up some ranking again. I would use universal links rather than just Amazon affiliate links so as to promote the books wide.


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## Amyshojai (May 3, 2010)

Ryn Shell said:


> Moving to the positive. Does any one have any suggestions on promoting all of your books together, to pick up on the lost rankings caused by having pulled them all out of Pronoun and then petting them back again through a different distributor?


Once my titles are back up, I'll likely email my newsletter subscribers, do a blog post, etc with a WEEPING/WAILING/TOOTH-GNASHING PLEA to re-post any reviews and explain the debacle. Might help, might not, but couldn't hurt.


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## Goulburn (May 21, 2014)

Amyshojai said:


> Once my titles are back up, I'll likely email my newsletter subscribers, do a blog post, etc with a WEEPING/WAILING/TOOTH-GNASHING PLEA to re-post any reviews and explain the debacle. Might help, might not, but couldn't hurt.


Are you interested in joining heads and drafting out a well worded plea?  Then pooling together to do a group launch with links to each author's site? It's 2.30 am here, so I wasn't stay up to chat about the idea. I'll reopen my messages and check back on this tomorrow.


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## Guest (Nov 8, 2017)

Just a reminder to those worried about lost reviews:

IF you have your book available in print
AND your print and ebook are linked

Your reviews are not going anywhere. Just make sure the proper version of the ebook is linked to the print, and all the reviews will be visible.


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## Amyshojai (May 3, 2010)

Ryn Shell said:


> Are you interested in joining heads and drafting out a well worded plea?  Then pooling together to do a group launch with links to each author's site? It's 2.30 am here, so I wasn't stay up to chat about the idea. I'll reopen my messages and check back on this tomorrow.


I think that's a great idea--BUT--the genres need to be a fit between books and mailing lists for it to benefit each other. I write pet-centric thrillers and prescriptive pet nonfiction so mystery/suspense/thriller or pet stuff would appeal to my audience. *shrug* This probably is a good idea for another thread, though.


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## Amyshojai (May 3, 2010)

Bards and Sages (Julie) said:


> Just a reminder to those worried about lost reviews:
> 
> IF you have your book available in print
> AND your print and ebook are linked
> ...


That's true for Amazon but not to other platforms that don't have print books (iBooks, Kobo, etc) unless there are older editions and those indeed may link and carry over I suppose. Good note.


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## Seneca42 (Dec 11, 2016)

call me crazy but i think most things come down to money. Perhaps they saw how little indies make and thought "wtf were we thinking aggregating for pennies a month." Sure, they would have known this at the time of acquisition, but perhaps they thought the business was run poorly and when they cleaned it up (or offered a different royalty model) revenues would increase... but pennies remained pennies so they said enough. 

Like everything in this business, without volume the margins are crap.


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## PhoenixS (Apr 5, 2011)

*************


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## Taking my troll a$$ outta here (Apr 8, 2013)

Elizabeth Ann West said:


> I agree. I don't need my situation any more complicated than it already is.
> 
> My email was different.
> 
> ...


Yeah, the email you received is the one I expected to get. I was kinda shocked to see something different, especially since it said just to republish to confirm.
It took a few hours after I republished and now the books are live.

Received a message from Pronoun today; it sounds like they are never, ever, getting back together with Amazon lol & they said they won't be getting back into indie publishing.


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## Guest (Nov 8, 2017)

PhoenixS said:


> I have little love for Amazon right now myself, as you might imagine, but I've dealt with about a quadrillion of these copyright verification mails between all the box sets and multiple authors I've worked with. You'd think after nearly 6 years, 1.7M+ sales and well into the 7-figures in royalties, our press account would be green-flagged. Nope.
> 
> Here's how it goes: I hit publish*. If it doesn't go live within 8 hours, I know I'll be getting one of the copyright mails. I sit around waiting for it to come, anywhere from 12 to 24 hours after hitting publish. I respond. Then wait anywhere from 6-24 hours more before the book is finally published. I receive no other email acknowledgement. To date, I've never had any problems with any of those quadrillion requests, and the books have always gone live within 24 hours of my reply.
> 
> ...


That's how it's always worked, but, apparently, now Amazon might take a book down before they even send the copyright email, which is more than a little scary.


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## GT59 (Jul 6, 2014)

This happened to me last week.  I tried to change the price on one of my books and it was IN REVIEW for about 5 days.  I emailed asking what was going on, and guess what happened.  The book was BLOCKED on my dashboard and the book was removed from sale.  After numerous emails, I received the "prove you own copyright" email.  I replied within the hour.  It took 3 more days for the book to go back up for sale.  Ridiculous way to handle this.


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## Elizabeth Ann West (Jul 11, 2011)

And people respond to copyright email and get their whole catalog taken down. Learned that happened to a friend. 

This is a mess. From what I hear Amazon knows and is trying to fix it. But meantime everyone affected is trying to play musical chairs and not get made collateral damage.


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## Amyshojai (May 3, 2010)

Oh crap, this morning I decided to change prices on 4 of my titles. Appears they're live on amazon, but on my dashboard, it's still saying "live updates publishing" and "continue setup"

Whoopsie. Will monitor, after reading the issues others have had.


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## Guest (Nov 8, 2017)

GT59, the same thing happened to a friend of mine. She didn't even realize the book was blocked until an email arrived days later.

Elizabeth, I guess the takeaway then is don't make any changes for the time being unless you absolutely have to. What a mess, once again...


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## Elizabeth Ann West (Jul 11, 2011)

SummerNights said:


> GT59, the same thing happened to a friend of mine. She didn't even realize the book was blocked until an email arrived days later.
> 
> Elizabeth, I guess the takeaway then is don't make any changes for the time being unless you absolutely have to. What a mess, once again...


Yep. For my friend it was a price change that triggered everything. It's bananas.

And I think we are all getting to live the wonderful results of the public shaming of Amazon the last few months the over scammers. Sooo glad the solution is now we are all scammers to Amazon.


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## GT59 (Jul 6, 2014)

0


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## GeneDoucette (Oct 14, 2014)

as regards reviews: when I reacquired the rights to my novels and republished them, Amazon linked the old reviews to the new listings for me with an email, even though I also had to send in a new print edition. Barnes and Noble linked the reviews without my having to ask. Kobo and Apple wouldn't link reviews.

A bigger issue is that you should expect to lose also-boughts.

I wrote about the whole thing here: http://genedoucette.me/2016/09/about-also-boughts-or-how-i-ruined-everything/


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## Elizabeth Ann West (Jul 11, 2011)

Puddleduck said:


> Elizabeth, your experience is the only thing so far that's really making me think it might be worth going through D2D for Amazon. The convenience of having it all in one place is not worth 10% to me, and I don't have the other issues some are talking about, but if we could be guaranteed better customer service to resolve issues like yours (given all the problems people are reporting with Amazon shenanigans lately), that might be worth 10%. I guess that depends on how much help D2D would be in a case like yours, or if going through D2D would help keep it from happening in the first place. I hope people who decide to go that route report back with their experiences.


I am just someone late getting affected. Others without names well known here on Kboards have been dealing with this for months. Some just expect it like Phoenix points out. Sigh.

I am okay to weather this storm because I plan for them to happen as much as I can. That is what I would urge everyone to start taking steps to do: if you're exclusively with Amazon don't think it can't ever happen to you, save for the day it WILL happen. If you're wide, same thing. If you're using an aggregator . . . that can always go sideways too. I remember years ago when D2D had Amazon distro and it poofed overnight, which is what I think happened to Pronoun, because they clearly aren't out of money.

This week sucks for me and I ordered pizza for dinner tonight and I'm going to go binge watch my shows like I do once a week. But I was planning on a go harder 2018 that was publishing more books and finally stepping up to open an author education site that's Mom/part-time writer centric with all videos having transcripts and all lessons in a very reasonable amount of time. Now I'm having to add a few more plans to 2018, but not anything I wasn't already working on....

This too shall pass. Uncertainty in publishing? Never.


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## Elizabeth Ann West (Jul 11, 2011)

AMAZON CALLED ALL IS FIXED!

If you are with Pronoun, email them so they can send an email to Amazon stating your ISBNS and Titles and that you never conferred rights. Also, apparently the emails I sent from my domain, pointing out the tax record etc. would have been enough.

Still not changing that I will keep preparing for storms from any vendor.


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## Amyshojai (May 3, 2010)

Elizabeth, so glad all is fixed! 

I see that Pronoun updated their page with details about payment for preorders, which is great. 

My price changes just came through, too, whew!


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## Elizabeth Ann West (Jul 11, 2011)

I mentioned the frustration we are feeling about how a price change can cause a copyright issue and was told "we can request proof of copyright at any time it says so in our terms and conditions" 

So. If you have not been hit.... Don't wait. Read those emails we are getting and make SURE you have some way to satisfy Amazon on every pen name you are publishing.


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## AlexaGrave (Jun 11, 2015)

For those who used Pronoun for Google Play, I highly recommend contacting Google Books and telling them the situation.

I contacted them yesterday morning, received an email slightly less than 24 hours later with a link to fill out the Interest Form.

So, I filled out the form this morning with the hope that I'd get put on their "waiting list" and then get an invitation in a few months.

Well I just got the invitation, less than 12 hours after filling out the form!

It may be a little extra work to get an account there, but it's clearly worth it to try.


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## John Anthony (Nov 12, 2014)

AlexaGrave said:


> For those who used Pronoun for Google Play, I highly recommend contacting Google Books and telling them the situation.
> 
> I contacted them yesterday morning, received an email slightly less than 24 hours later with a link to fill out the Interest Form.
> 
> ...


I second this advice. This happened to me, as well. I just finished setting up my Google Play Books Partner account.


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## juliatheswede (Mar 26, 2014)

JohnAnthony said:


> I second this advice. This happened to me, as well. I just finished setting up my Google Play Books Partner account.


This sounds great, but what about Google Play changing book prices however they see fit? Wouldn't it be better to go with PublishDrive where they make sure the price you set stays the same? Can someone please explain?


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## John Anthony (Nov 12, 2014)

juliatheswede said:


> This sounds great, but what about Google Play changing book prices however they see fit? Wouldn't it be better to go with PublishDrive where they make sure the price you set stays the same? Can someone please explain?


I was directed to this post (credit to OP: TK aka BB), which gives a chart of data telling you how to price your book so the price comes out correct. It takes into account that Google will discount it. May work, may not, but I'd rather be direct with as many retailers as I can, so it's worth giving it a try. At least for me. I don't sell thousands of books, so I have some flexibility to play around with some different options.


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## GeneDoucette (Oct 14, 2014)

JohnAnthony said:


> I was directed to this post (credit to OP: TK aka BB), which gives a chart of data telling you how to price your book so the price comes out correct. It takes into account that Google will discount it. May work, may not, but I'd rather be direct with as many retailers as I can, so it's worth giving it a try. At least for me. I don't sell thousands of books, so I have some flexibility to play around with some different options.


I'm direct with Google Play, and so far I've had no issue pricing my books following this.


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## AlexaGrave (Jun 11, 2015)

JohnAnthony said:


> I was directed to this post (credit to OP: TK aka BB), which gives a chart of data telling you how to price your book so the price comes out correct. It takes into account that Google will discount it. May work, may not, but I'd rather be direct with as many retailers as I can, so it's worth giving it a try. At least for me. I don't sell thousands of books, so I have some flexibility to play around with some different options.


I'll be using this chart as well. Honestly, going direct where I can is the best bet for me. I'm way too paranoid about distributors going poof (like Pronoun is). The only bigger ones I'll be using distribution for are iTunes and Overdrive, as well as a bunch of small places through Smashwords (glad I never switched my Smashwords stuff over to Pronoun!).


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## John Anthony (Nov 12, 2014)

GeneDoucette said:


> I'm direct with Google Play, and so far I've had no issue pricing my books following this.


That's great to hear. And encouraging. Thanks for sharing that info, Gene.


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## AltMe (May 18, 2015)

ParkerAvrile said:


> They know Pronoun has shut down. They sent me an invite to go direct the same day. I'm betting they sent out plenty of invites.





AlexaGrave said:


> For those who used Pronoun for Google Play, I highly recommend contacting Google Books and telling them the situation.
> I contacted them yesterday morning, received an email slightly less than 24 hours later with a link to fill out the Interest Form.
> So, I filled out the form this morning with the hope that I'd get put on their "waiting list" and then get an invitation in a few months.
> Well I just got the invitation, less than 12 hours after filling out the form!
> It may be a little extra work to get an account there, but it's clearly worth it to try.


I contacted them the other day, and must have been among the first of many. My inbox had the same invitation to fill out the interest form just now, sent during my night, and I just submitted it.

Hoping now they let me sign up straight away.



Amyshojai said:


> Oh crap, this morning I decided to change prices on 4 of my titles. Appears they're live on amazon, but on my dashboard, it's still saying "live updates publishing" and "continue setup"


Its normal to take an hour or 2 to publish the book, and get the email about it 8 hours later. Until they send the email, it remains in review mode and cant be changed.


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## AaronShep (Nov 18, 2011)

Just a tip: To retain your reviews, you can link new ebook directly to old ebook by requesting that at Author Central, without needing a print edition as intermediary. BUT you have to supply the old ebook ASIN or ISBN as well as the new. So, if you're moving from Pronoun, make sure you've recorded one or both of those BEFORE the Pronoun ebook disappears. (And if you're with KDP, you can do the same to guard against losing reviews from arbitrary delisting.)


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## Abalone (Jan 31, 2014)

Amanda M. Lee said:


> D2D mentioned a month ago (at NINC) that they were in the works to get Amazon distribution back. Apparently the Pronoun peeps thought it was business as usual until this weekend, which seems to suggest that whatever happened to them came from the higher-ups ... and suddenly. Forget all that, though. Why would one have anything to do with the other? Is there a reason Amazon can only work with one distributor that I'm not aware of? It seems far more likely to me that Pronoun abused their trade agreement with Amazon to make Pronoun possible and Amazon cut them off at the knees. Pronoun has been around under other names -- including Vook -- for a lot longer than most people realize. It was only recently that they offered the unsustainable terms, and most people seem to think the aim was data mining. We will have to see what, if anything, comes out of all this but I hardly think D2D is the reason Pronoun failed when Pronoun was offering a pay structure that everyone knew wouldn't last.


I have to agree with you, Amanda. I was around during the period D2D lost their deal with Amazon. And, if I recall correctly, that was a result of banned users abusing the system. I believe that D2D has since then instituted more rigorous checks to keep banned people out and scrutinize certain subject matters more, such as sex heavy books or anything of an illegal nature. To me, Pronoun is shutting down because they abused their terms, but the likely reason being they expended more money than they brought in. Prior to Mac~ buying them out, Vook was having money flow issues.

Aside from D2D, I can think of IngramSpark, LibStreet and Publish Drive offering Amazon distribution. IngramSpark costs money, but they seem to be throwing around coupons here and there to entice authors who relied on Creative whats-it that published paperback PODs.


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## Nate Hoffelder (Jun 9, 2014)

Patty Jansen said:


> You're missing a substantial piece of the puzzle. In order to keep scammers at bay, Google Play shut for new accounts two years ago.
> 
> They open for very short periods of time, and apparently you can also try emailing them explaining who you are and show them your books.
> 
> But otherwise, there is Streetlib.


when did they open it, do you know?


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## ImaWriter (Aug 12, 2015)

Nate Hoffelder said:


> when did they open it, do you know?


I can't give you specifics, but they have opened it at least twice this year. Both times it's been talked about here. And IIRC, it's been for short periods of time, as in hours, not days or longer.


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## Nate Hoffelder (Jun 9, 2014)

ImaWriter said:


> I can't give you specifics, but they have opened it at least twice this year. Both times it's been talked about here. And IIRC, it's been for short periods of time, as in hours, not days or longer.


thanks!


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## C. Gockel (Jan 28, 2014)

GeneDoucette said:


> I'm direct with Google Play, and so far I've had no issue pricing my books following this.


I have this post in my bookmarks. It's always worked well for me.


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## Amyshojai (May 3, 2010)

ALLi blog just posted a great round up of alternatives to Pronoun:

https://selfpublishingadvice.org/replacing-pronoun/


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## Sailor Stone (Feb 23, 2015)

Amyshojai said:


> ALLi blog just posted a great round up of alternatives to Pronoun:
> 
> https://selfpublishingadvice.org/replacing-pronoun/


Great article. Thanks for the link.


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## Taking my troll a$$ outta here (Apr 8, 2013)

*Question: Are there any other distributors that can do pre-orders on Amazon? *
Pronoun was excellent with that, and it was great being able to push up or push back pre-order dates without any penalty. That is one feature that was golden to me.

So far I am loving a lot about D2D, especially the formatting & free conversion. I'm not yet taking advantage of their Amazon distribution, but if they were able to do pre-orders via Amazon I'd be all over that.


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## Sailor Stone (Feb 23, 2015)

EB said:


> *Question: Are there any other distributors that can do pre-orders on Amazon? *
> Pronoun was excellent with that, and it was great being able to push up or push back pre-order dates without any penalty. That is one feature that was golden to me.
> 
> So far I am loving a lot about D2D, especially the formatting & free conversion. I'm not yet taking advantage of their Amazon distribution, but if they were able to do pre-orders via Amazon I'd be all over that.


I'm switching to D2D also, and so far, so good...very good, in fact. 
I am also jealous of your Time Walkers Collection cover. It's an eyecatcher for sure, and artfully, fantastically beautiful.


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## Don DeBon (Jun 18, 2016)

EB said:


> *Question: Are there any other distributors that can do pre-orders on Amazon? *
> Pronoun was excellent with that, and it was great being able to push up or push back pre-order dates without any penalty. That is one feature that was golden to me.
> 
> So far I am loving a lot about D2D, especially the formatting & free conversion. I'm not yet taking advantage of their Amazon distribution, but if they were able to do pre-orders via Amazon I'd be all over that.


In the D2D announcement they said "at this time we are unable to support pre-orders through Amazon." I do find it interesting D2D was able to get Amazon when Smashwords had them on the "soon to be available for all" list for a long time. I haven't used D2D yet but I may for my next release. I assume they have the ability to upload a epub direct without conversion?


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## Amyshojai (May 3, 2010)

Don DeBon said:


> In the D2D announcement they said "at this time we are unable to support pre-orders through Amazon." I do find it interesting D2D was able to get Amazon when Smashwords had them on the "soon to be available for all" list for a long time. I haven't used D2D yet but I may for my next release. I assume they have the ability to upload a epub direct without conversion?


D2D does the conversion for free from a WORD doc.


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## Sailor Stone (Feb 23, 2015)

Don DeBon said:


> In the D2D announcement they said "at this time we are unable to support pre-orders through Amazon." I do find it interesting D2D was able to get Amazon when Smashwords had them on the "soon to be available for all" list for a long time. I haven't used D2D yet but I may for my next release. *I assume they have the ability to upload a epub direct without conversion?*


Yes, it takes them about two seconds to accept it. Very simple process.


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## Don DeBon (Jun 18, 2016)

Amyshojai said:


> D2D does the conversion for free from a WORD doc.


I know that. But some of us either have their own epub done, or do it themselves. I know I hear they do a good job, but after having a lot of experience with Smashwords (and not having the epub exactly the way I want in the end without any option for the formatting I want) I am a little leery of letting D2D do it.

@Sailor, thanks that is what I wanted to know.


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## TonyWrites (Oct 1, 2013)

My deepest sympathies to all my fellow authors affected by Pronoun's shutdown. I had no books out with them, but I had joined their editors community for a time until pulling out a while ago due to getting no response but the chirping of crickets punctuated by one query from someone who never replied back to me.  
Publishing platforms like Pronoun seem to rise and fall more than grow and evolve.


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## Steve Vernon (Feb 18, 2011)

I have ALWAYS been impressed by D2D's constant efforts to improve and involve their service. Mark Coker's Smashwords also continues to grow.

However, a new group has thrown their hat into the ring.

https://the-digital-reader.com/2017/11/10/publishdrive-releases-pronoun-importer/


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## Taking my troll a$$ outta here (Apr 8, 2013)

Sailor Stone said:


> I'm switching to D2D also, and so far, so good...very good, in fact.
> I am also jealous of your Time Walkers Collection cover. It's an eyecatcher for sure, and artfully, fantastically beautiful.


Thank you! I have a few other upcoming books with the same look, trying to give the spin-off series a unique look while sticking with the overall theme 



Sailor Stone said:


> Yes, it takes them about two seconds to accept it. Very simple process.


I am very impressed with D2D's conversion service. I use Word and have found that it converts pretty much spot-on without any hassle.

Overall, I'm going with the service that is user-friendly and gives me decent royalty rates. It doesn't look like any other distributor is going to be able to provide Amazon pre-orders or permafree pricing at Amazon, so at this point, it's just personal preferences for going wide. When other distributors can offer those two key services, I'll pay attention, but otherwise, I'm going to stick with someone who has a proven track record, like D2D or Smashwords.


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## Amyshojai (May 3, 2010)

Yes, PublishDrive now has an importer. 

When this happened, I sent a polite email to Google Play as well, expressing dismay and asking about the possibility of them working with D2D. I also sent a similar note to D2D. I've received back answers from both, in effect saying they do not (yet) have working arrangements together.

Then this morning, I received another note from Google Play inviting me to apply for my own account. Hmnnn. I've already put my books back up through PublishDrive, but likely will apply to have a way to go direct to Google Play.


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## Guest (Nov 11, 2017)

Amyshojai said:


> Yes, PublishDrive now has an importer.
> 
> When this happened, I sent a polite email to Google Play as well, expressing dismay and asking about the possibility of them working with D2D. I also sent a similar note to D2D. I've received back answers from both, in effect saying they do not (yet) have working arrangements together.
> 
> Then this morning, I received another note from Google Play inviting me to apply for my own account. Hmnnn. I've already put my books back up through PublishDrive, but likely will apply to have a way to go direct to Google Play.


I definitely think it's worth opening an account with GP. I can't help feeling that the sands of Indies'm are shifting and that we need to keep a close eye on the opportunities around us. I see all of the platform aggregators vying for your business which means two things. Your business is of value to them and that there is growth 'in the wind' (either that or business is bad and they're struggling to make ends meet). Either way there's action out there behind the scenes.


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## Vinny OHare (May 3, 2013)

This has been a nightmare for authors. We have had about 75 authors contact us and we have moved most of the books up because they don't want to lose the preorders. They will just launch early. Some authors had preorders up and were going to publish in February and March. Needless to say that plan has been derailed. Some authors have already republished and got new asin's.

I am sure there are more authors out there that need to reschedule or switch to another book. We will work with you on that. 

I also had the honor of meeting the people over at D2D this past week and had some great conversations.


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## FFJ (Feb 8, 2016)

Amyshojai said:


> Yes, PublishDrive now has an importer.
> 
> When this happened, I sent a polite email to Google Play as well, expressing dismay and asking about the possibility of them working with D2D. I also sent a similar note to D2D. I've received back answers from both, in effect saying they do not (yet) have working arrangements together.
> 
> Then this morning, I received another note from Google Play inviting me to apply for my own account. Hmnnn. I've already put my books back up through PublishDrive, but likely will apply to have a way to go direct to Google Play.


Thanks for sharing. What email address did you use to contact Google Play please?


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## Used To Be BH (Sep 29, 2016)

TobiasRoote said:


> I definitely think it's worth opening an account with GP. I can't help feeling that the sands of Indies'm are shifting and that we need to keep a close eye on the opportunities around us. I see all of the platform aggregators vying for your business which means two things. Your business is of value to them and that there is growth 'in the wind' (either that or business is bad and they're struggling to make ends meet). Either way there's action out there behind the scenes.


Google Play has a lot of potential. Of course, I said the same thing five years ago, and their market share actually dropped. Platform aggregators vie for it mostly because authors keep asking for it, not necessarily because they think it will be a gold mine.

Then there's Google Play's repellent tendency to discount automatically without the author or publisher's permission. Sure, you can work around that, but why should you have to?

On the other hand, some people have reported that Google Play is their best non-Amazon market. Clearly, someone going wide should get access one way or another. I haven't been invited, so I'm using PublishDrive, which does the price adjustment to counteract Google Play's weird discounting.

I'm experimenting right now with one book. Basically, I'm seeing how the different aggregators perform so that I can make good choices as I prepare to take a whole series wide. D2D's approval process is faster, just as it was in the old days, but Smashwords and PublishDrive both got the job done within three days and started shipping to stores. When I have time I'll probably also try Streetlib. Each aggregator has some unique outlets, though if I find that one of them has unique outlets that don't produce any business, I may not bother to distribute future releases through them.


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## Don DeBon (Jun 18, 2016)

FFJ said:


> Thanks for sharing. What email address did you use to contact Google Play please?


There isn't a specific email address to send to. What you can do is sign into google do a search for "contact google books support" second item on the list says "Books Help - Google Support" click that. It brings up the partner center help options. On the upper right is a contact us option. Use it via email and fill out the form explaining the problem. They may send you a invite, or a form to fill out to let you know when a opening is available.

This seems to be the best method unless you are already in the Google Play Partner Center. If your account is active there, there is a help link on the upper right under the cog wheel icon with options at the very bottom for email via web form. This is also available from main Google Play page as well (via a help button on the upper right). However, I think both of these go to the general Google Play team, where as the first one I mentioned goes directly to the Google Play Books team.


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## thesmallprint (May 25, 2012)

Is there any indication that money owed to authors by Pronoun might not being paid?


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## David VanDyke (Jan 3, 2014)

TobiasRoote said:


> I definitely think it's worth opening an account with GP. I can't help feeling that the sands of Indies'm are shifting and that we need to keep a close eye on the opportunities around us. I see all of the platform aggregators vying for your business which means two things. Your business is of value to them and that there is growth 'in the wind' (either that or business is bad and they're struggling to make ends meet). Either way there's action out there behind the scenes.


As an invited author, Google Play gives me a better deal and more control of my pricing than you will get through an aggregator. I suspect any invited author will get this deal, but even if you don't, you will have the control and you will not have to pay the aggregator fee.

GP has turned out to be just as profitable for me as Apple, Nook or Kobo, some months more so. It may be because they're curating better (at least curating some authors) and less dreck is available that they are doing well, at least in some markets.


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## Forgettable (Oct 16, 2015)

.


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## Ellie L (Aug 6, 2016)

NOTHING TO SEE HERE


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## Forgettable (Oct 16, 2015)

.


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## Andrei (May 27, 2015)

Well, I've been procrastinating but promised myself that after the holidays, I'd finally transfer my Pronoun book away. Here we are, with January 15 (the date at which they'll be removing all of the remaining Pronoun books from all platforms) just 12 days away 

My main concern has to do with not losing reviews on Amazon.

They apparently have a special process in place for Amazon books:



> Hello,
> 
> With the recent announcement that Pronoun will be ending distribution on 1/15, Kindle Direct Publishing is working with Pronoun to create a special process to help authors who wish to publish directly with KDP preserve their title's existing reviews and Sales Rank.
> 
> ...


... what I'm not sure of is this:

*1) Should I remove/delist the book through the Pronoun.com interface first and then upload to Amazon... or the other way around?*

*2) What about the other platforms (BN, iBooks and Kobo in my case)? Should I remove my book from Pronoun and upload to the platform in question or upload to that platform and then remove from Pronoun?*

TIA


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## CassieL (Aug 29, 2013)

Record the ASINs of your books as they are now. Next, delist on Pronoun. Then list on Amazon. (I think that's the case on the all platforms or you're going to end up with two listings on each platform and that could trigger copyright inquiries that you don't need.) After the book is live on Amazon, email Amazon with the ASIN for the old version and the new version and ask them to link them.  (That's what I did when I moved my books from Amazon to Pronoun originally. As long as you have both ASINs it's pretty straightforward.)


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## 31842 (Jan 11, 2011)

Just wanted to mention that i'm stuck in Copyright Verification Hell trying to get two books I had listed on Pronoun switched over to KDP.  While I know everything will eventually work out just fine, it has now been a week that my two books have been down (one directly through KDP, one via D2D).  Plan some extra time as you make the switch over.


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## 39416 (Mar 18, 2011)

I was pleasantly surprised by the ease of getting onto Google Play, and I like that I can see how many people visit the books every day, and how many of the free pages they read. (I have eleven books only one of which is erotic. Guess which book gets the most pages read.) So then I moved on to Nook with my epubs, opened their Editor and..._ ABANDON HOPE ALL YE WHO ENTER HERE!_ My gosh. I had to give up some very simple formatting and actually change a few words to get it past that crazy drunken Editor and deranged Previewer.


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## Don DeBon (Jun 18, 2016)

loraininflorida said:


> I was pleasantly surprised by the ease of getting onto Google Play, and I like that I can see how many people visit the books every day, and how many of the free pages they read. (I have eleven books only one of which is erotic. Guess which book gets the most pages read.) So then I moved on to Nook with my epubs, opened their Editor and..._ ABANDON HOPE ALL YE WHO ENTER HERE!_ My gosh. I had to give up some very simple formatting and actually change a few words to get it past that crazy drunken Editor and deranged Previewer.


I never used their online previewer. Their apps are a better judge in my experience. I downloaded the epub from their system and checked with the apps and Nooks I have. I didn't have any issues, the ePubs I made worked fine out-of-the-box. At least with the apps/devices.


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