Category: Nonfiction Books

General publishing announcements

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Mail Talk 8 October 2024, with bonus Craig Maloney Memorial Charity Auction starting–NOW

Next Tuesday, 8 October 2024, I’ll be talking about Running Your Own Mail Server at mug.org, 6:30PM EDT. MUG is my local “hard-core Unixy People” group. Giving a talk during a book release is bad planning, but I am crap at scheduling.

One of its members was Craig Maloney. Many years ago Craig asked me if I was the same Michael Lucas who had written a couple RPG books in the 1990s. I admitted my guilt. He pulled an obviously-read plastic-bagged copy of Gatecrasher out of his backpack and asked me to sign it. The dude had friends across the world and did his best to boost us all. An all-around great guy, who sadly lost his life to cancer earlier this year.

Craig had sponsored Run Your Own Mail Server. I am now left with his sponsor gifts. I’ve checked with Craig’s family, and they’re okay with me auctioning them off for charity. The Craig Maloney Memorial Auction runs on this page from now until my MUG talk ends1.

The sponsor gifts will never be available in bookstores, at least not new. (I do have a few extras that I will auction off for charity over the rest of my life, but I’ll stretch those out.) I don’t want to describe them here because not all the sponsors have their gifts yet and I’d rather not spoil the surprise, but you can see photos at link 1 and link 2.

I’m going to end this auction a little differently, though. The auction will close at the end of Tuesday’s mug.org talk. I’ll ask live, online for any last bids. You can bid by posting on the page or in the video session. The auction will close when bidding stops. Comment on this post to bid. Once the auction ends, I’ll notify the winner. The winner sends me the donation receipt and I ship the gifts. I pay for shipping.

The beneficiary is Mutual Aid Disaster Relief. They’re as close to the ground as you can get these days, and donations are tax-deductible in the US. You can choose from several donation targets. I don’t care if you donate cash, fill an Amazon shipment with the North Carolina wishlist, target Puerto Rico, or whatever. Just get them the money and get a receipt.

Anyway, leave a comment to bid. Good cause. Ridiculous prize.

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“Run Your Own Mail Server” is leaking out

My latest tech book, Run Your Own Mail Server, is starting to creep into bookstores. The book entry on my web site links to various stores that carry it, and will be updated as more stores appear.

Paperbacks are available on Amazon and will reach other stores shortly. They’ll be in the Ingram catalog, so you can have your local bookstore order them via ISBN 9781642350784.

Hardcovers are pending. Once the Ingram databases finish churning, they’ll also be available everywhere. Ask your bookstore to order ISBN 9781642350791.

I’m working with BookVault to manage direct print sales from my web site, but their Woocommerce plugin hit my store and promptly soiled itself. In their defense very few authors have been running direct sales for over ten years, and most of those don’t have as many features as tiltedwindmillpress.com.

Speaking of my bookstore, you can get the ebook there.

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Why “Run Your Own Mail Server” is not in Amazon’s Kindle store

I expect folks to ask this, so here’s a pre-emptive blog post. TLDR: for the same reasons OpenBSD Mastery: Filesystems is not. Amazon’s deal is unacceptable.

You can get Run Your Own Mail Server for Kindle direct from me at Tilted Windmill Press or at Gumroad. You can get a Kindle-friendly ebook from any number of other retailers, but while they’re all supposed to be DRM-free I can’t advise on prying the file out of another vendor’s ecosystem. The one place you cannot buy RYOMS for Kindle is Amazon’s Kindle bookstore.

TLDR: Amazon pays roughly 70% of retail price for books priced up to $9.99, and 35% for books $10 and over. Amazon is the only retailer that does this. Other retailers, I make somewhere around 65%-70% no matter the retail price. Everything follows from that math, but if you want the details read on.

According to economists, prices have gone up about 30% since I started releasing the Mastery books. According to my wallet, not so much. In 2012 I could get a cheap lunch for my wife and I for $10. I paid $18 last weekend. But let’s go with the official numbers. Just as “dime novels” now cost $10, I must raise prices. While book pricing is hotly debated, $14.99 is a reasonable price for a 350-page tech book like Run Your Own Mail Server.

If I charge $9.99 for this ebook, I make about $7.

If I charge $14.99 for the ebook, I make about $10.50 everywhere but Amazon. At Amazon, I make $5.25. For me to make that $10.50 at Amazon, I must price the book at $29.99. I’m fond of the book, but it ain’t worth that! And if I did, giving Amazon a $20 slice of every sale for no reason sticks in my craw.

Charge $29.99 at Amazon and $14.99 elsewhere? Amazon’s program has a Most Favored Nation clause. They can price match any other major vendor.

Will Amazon change their business because of this? No. Authors are plentiful and of low value. I am not worth Amazon’s time.

Amazon’s business model is based on squeezing prices down, and they play a long game. I don’t expect them to ever raise that $9.99 limit. A novel might sell tens or hundreds of thousands of copies. If I’m lucky, a book like RYOMS might sell five thousand copies at retail. (Why that many? The Kickstarter went viral, and I suspect it ate through the market.) The few extra bucks I’ll make by raising prices are important. That’s also why I’ve focused so hard on disintermediation through my Patronizers, sponsorships, and lately Kickstarter.

I have been expecting this for years now. I do not expect to publish future Mastery books on Amazon’s Kindle store, unless by some chance I write another very short one.

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“Run Your Own Mail Server” sponsor and Patronizer gifts

I spent the weekend transforming crates of stuff into a heap of packages.

Dear sponsors, you have a gift coming. It is not a copy of Run Your Own Mail Server. Go read the fine print on the description of what you backed: I said I will send you a gift, not a copy of the book. Your package contains not one but two items. They are irreplaceable, so when you trick them into falling into the smelter they will be gone forever.

Tricking them won’t be hard. They’re not that smart. Merely irreplaceable.

This heap also contains books for folks who chose the special edition during the RYOMS Kickstarter campaign. I have to make one more pass through the backer list to catch people who gave me their shipping information after I did the initial shipment. After that, I’ll check back in a month or so. I can’t force folks to give me their addresses.

I learned some important things in creating this heap.

Next time I ship gifts for a sponsorship that’s open longer than a year, I need to contact every backer and get their current shipping addresses. Probably some sort of web form for address collection.

Signing and shipping hundreds of books is a right pain. Next time, I must hire help. A teenager willing to help stuff books and carry boxes would have made this so much easier.

You must have IOSS paperwork to work with printers inside the EU. It’s not a legal requirement, but printers don’t want to work with any outsider who doesn’t have proper tax paperwork. You only need an IOSS number if you’re doing 10,000EUR or more of direct sales with the EU, however. That excludes me. That could change, but I don’t anticipate that happening. When I do a dropship-based sales, I’ll plan on shipping from the UK.

I still believe that this book was what authors call “a lightning strike.” These sales are not my new normal. The next book will have fewer backers, and that’s fine. I’ll enjoy the brief triumph and get on writing the next book.

Once the acetaminophen kicks in, that is.

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“Run Your Own Mail Server” Auction for BSD Conference AV Team

A team of volunteers led by the stalwart Patrick McEvoy records the talks for EuroBSDCon, BSDCan, and AsiaBSDCon and makes them available. They rent equipment from local suppliers every year. The rental fees approach the cost of purchasing the equipment, and the team has to configure the gear from scratch and desperately hope that the previous renter didn’t break any connectors or fry any capacitors, but at least they don’t have to lug heavy gear around the world.

Video equipment now small enough that they can lug it around the world.

The BSD A/V team is raising money to purchase their own equipment. They can configure it properly at home so (in theory) they arrive, plug in, and are ready to go. They’re taking donations directly via bsdfund.org, or if you need a charitable donation receipt you could funnel it through the FreeBSD Foundation and say “community AV team” in the comments.

If they don’t raise enough money to buy the gear they need? The conference will pay to rent it. You’ll still get videos. But it’ll stress out Pat and the gang. Let’s not stress out Pat.

In wholly unrelated news, I have a spare hardcover of Run Your Own Mail Server. Not yet available in stores. Not available anywhere.

I’m auctioning it off to benefit the AV crew.

Comment on this post to bid. All bids in US dollars.

The auction runs from now until 5PM EDT 15 September. If the bidding goes nuts in the last few minutes, I’ll leave it open until it settles down. There’s no sniping this auction at the last moment, as I want the bids to escalate beyond all sensible limits.

They need the money soon, so once I acknowledge your victory I’ll ask you to donate the money within the next day and send me the receipt. I will sign this book and send it to you on the 16th, along with the ebook.

Bid early, bid often.

Thank you.

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“Run Your Own Mail Server” official release date?

Folks are asking when this book will be available to the general public. Fair question. The short answer is, “it depends on UPS.”

I want my Patronizers, sponsors, and Kickstarter backers to have a reasonable chance of getting the book within a day or two of release. I’ve ordered a stack of print books. When the printer approves the backers-only edition, I’ll be ordering those. They will arrive here when UPS decides they will arrive.

Once they arrive, all other work stops. I start signing. Patronizers and sponsors get personalized signatures; the rest, I’m just signing my name. Personalized signatures add a layer of complexity to shipping, because I have to make sure the name I sign to matches the name on the shipping label and I am easily confused. Patronizers and sponsors get signed and shipped first because of that special care, then the rest will be handled in assembly-line style.

Once USPS picks up the books, I will open orders at my bookstore. That happens immediately. For the first time, I’ll be offering direct sales of print/ebook combos.

I’ll then open sales for bookstores and other, lesser venues, like Amazon. Note that while I’ll have Kindle-friendly versions in various stores, they won’t be in Amazon’s Kindle store for the same reasons OpenBSD Mastery: Filesystems isn’t there. An SEO-optimized post on that will appear in my Copious Free Time(tm).

I’m hoping to get all the books in my hands by the end of August. That’s up to the shipping companies and the printers, though.

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RYOMS preorders close 14 August 2024

For the next couple of days I’m reviewing the paperback print proof of Run Your Own Mail Server. I received the proofs just before I flew to Vegas, and while I glanced through the book in between my meetings, I spent most of my energy selling work and learning new ways to insinuate myself into the publishing ecosystem. I must dedicate time to examining each page, even though looking at the text triggers mental torment.

If it all looks good, or good enough, I’ll be closing preorders on this Wednesday, 14 August, so I can order paperbacks.

The hardcover proof is en route, because the printer screwed up shipping. The interior is exactly the same as the paperback, so I only need to review the cover and binding.

What exactly does “good enough” mean? Minor problems can be fixed by changing a word or adding a vowel mean I need to send the printer a new PDF, but I won’t order a new print proof. If I must redo the interior layout, including shifting content from one page to another or adjusting the cover text, I must order a new proof.

Between print sponsors and Kickstarter backers I must mail hundreds of these dang things. It’s especially important I get this one as correct as possible.

Once I can check the hardcovers, I’ll start those orders.

The art for the backers-only special edition has arrived. The special edition uses the hardcover as a base. Once I approve the regular hardcovers I can start on the special edition.

The ebook is based on the paperback. Once I finalize the paperback I can start on the ebook. Maybe this week?

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“Run Your Own Mail Server” print layout: 348 pages

Making it the biggest Mastery book I’ve ever written. I was right to make the ebook $15, and I suspect the print version will wind up being $35. Won’t know until I feed it to the printer.

Now I go through the manuscript page-by-page with my red pen and highlighters, looking for layout errors. And content errors. Yes, I’ve caught content errors at this stage before. The best way to perceive an error in a manuscript is to change the form.

With luck I’ll have a clean interior to submit to the printer in a couple days, and a print proof will arrive the week after. I check the proof repeatedly for a few days. If that works, I’ll be ordering the regular books. (The only blocker for the special edition is the art, which arrives about 15 August. I’ll order that proof right away.)

It’s been over a year since I did this kind of check, and it seems that all of my highlighters except the blue and pink have dried out. I fear that this will turn into some sort of gender reveal disaster… but I knew the risks when I got into this business.

Wish me luck. I’m going in.

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RYOMS back from copyedit, preorder time running out

Yesterday, the copyedits on Run Your Own Mail Server returned. This means that today I’ll be setting up a Discord and integrating into my Patronizer systems to replace the Video Hangout level, writing the next column for the FreeBSD Journal and, coincidentally, the last column for Dear Abyss. I asked Simon Travaglia if he’d be interested in doing a foreword but he sensibly declined, so I guess I better write something to introduce that travesty. (I’m open on suggestions for people to approach, mind you.)

Anyway.

Once I complete the copyedits, I start on the page layout.

Once I complete page layout, I order print proofs and make the ebook.

The print proof is my absolute last chance to fix errors. At that point, I turn off preorders and order sponsor, Patronizer, Kickstarter, and preorder copies.

I have no date for this. Depends on if the copyeditor can cause me as much pain as I caused her.

But it’s approaching. Preorder now if you want a signed book.

And before anyone else asks about a signed ebook: that was a Kickstarter-only item, sorry.