[this post went to Patronizers at the beginning of September, and to the public at the beginning of October.]
Pretty sure August was eating locoweed.
The “Run Your Own Mail Server” Kickstarter owned most of my hide this last month. Not all of it. A patch on the back of my neck remains freehold. I managed to make a few words on what I’m calling #projectIDGAF, but mostly it’s been investing in production stuff. Which means spreadsheets.
My main printer, IngramSpark has facilities in the US, UK, Australia, and Italy. When I launched the RYOMS Kickstarter, I intended to dropship copies through them. Turns out, it’s not quite that easy. Part of the problem was scale. Based on previous Kickstarters, I thought I might need to dropship to thirty, perhaps fifty people. I got over seven hundred. The IngramSpark ordering interface is tortuous. I am not capable of correctly entering seven hundred orders in that interface. I began looking for a virtual assistant. Found one.
Then I discovered a way out.
Turns out that IngramSpark has a secret industrial-scale ordering system that accepts orders via spreadsheet. Gaining access to it requires you have a friend who already has access, who is willing to vouch for you. Fortunately, I have such a friend. You also need to be submitting several hundred orders. I barely qualified. (Random people on the Internet, please don’t contact me asking me to vouch for you. I don’t endorse random Internet people.) It’s an Excel spreadsheet, complete with macros, that must be filled out in a very specific manner. You know, like every application written in-house by non-programmers. Once you grow accustomed to its quirks, though, it’s infinitely better than entering orders by hand.
I’m keeping the virtual assistant info, though. With luck, I’ll need them later.
When it came to ordering books for backers in the EU, the plan fell apart. The EU has VAT. I have never worried about VAT. I don’t have to worry about VAT until I hit ten thousand euros of EU business per year. Even with RYOMS, I didn’t hit that. When I ship from the US, recipients pay VAT as part of the delivery. It varies by country, but the general pattern seems to be “recipient is contacted, recipient goes to a web site to pay, carrier delivers package.” My sponsors and Patronizers are pretty familiar with how that works.
When I cross ten thousand euros a year, I have to register for the Internet One Stop Shop VAT. This is expensive, but if I’m doing over ten thousand euros a year it would start to be worth it. That’s very much a First World Author problem, though.
If I print books inside the EU, the books would be mailed to recipients without those fees. The problem is getting people to print books in the EU. IngramSpark’s interface to their Italian plant is in the UK, and is legally treated as a UK entity. (I don’t pretend to understand the details, but presumably they have the contracts and lawyers to make it legit.) Brexit fubar’d everything for me there. There are other printers in the EU, however. Some of them would print a few hundred books for me! Except every one of them wants my IOSS paperwork beforehand. It doesn’t matter that I don’t need IOSS. Printers run quite conservative businesses, and take zero risks. It doesn’t matter that even with the lightning strike of RYOMS I don’t meet IOSS limits.
So I’m shipping most backers globally from IngramSpark. Based on the advice of assorted experienced folks, I’m using BookVault to fulfill EU orders. The books will be shipped from the UK, which is greener than shipping from the US.
I started fulfilling dropship orders in Australia, mostly because I needed a smaller group to test Ingram’s spreadsheet ordering but also because Australia is traditionally last in everything. The Australian copies have started to arrive. The rest of the world should follow shortly.
Then there’s books for me to sign. I have four crates of paperbacks in my living room to sign, pack, and ship. Hoping the hardcovers arrive soon, as well as the backer-exclusive special editions. I have something special for print level sponsors and Patronizers this time. Silly, but special. I’m hoping I can tell you about that next month, but the recipients need to receive them first.
Once those go out, I can launch the Dear Abyss Kickstarter. Quite a few people are telling me that the RYOMS Kickstarter is my new normal. As much as I’d love to trade up to that problem, I have no reason to believe that’s so. And seriously, Dear Abyss is not going to push me over the IOSS limit. If the new edition of Networking for Systems Administrators was to also experience explosive crowdfunding I’d look more seriously at IOSS, but not before. I don’t act based on lightning strikes until I start consistently attracting lightning.
Am I ignoring the success of RYOMS in my planning? Nope. There’s clearly a market for crowdfunding tech books. I’m hoping it will raise $20k, but will leave headroom for more. Hope for the best and plan for WTF, that’s the business.
After all these big projects, I need to write a palate cleanser. Something daft, and quick, and fun. I’m starting something I won’t talk about in public, yet, but if you’re curious you could follow #projectIDGAF on the fediverse. Why that hashtag? I have no idea if this thing will work, or even if it can work, but I’m going to have fun with it and that’s all that matters. I’d like to knock a full draft off by the end of September, but we all know that’s not going to happen. After a few years of these heavy projects like RYOMS, SNMP, TLS, and so on, my spirit needs a quick hit of weirdness.
In unrelated news, I sold five short stories to various anthologies at the beginning of the month. They include a new Aidan Redding tale, a Rats’ Man’s Lackey tale, and some one-offs. Look for those to escape in 2025. I’ll also have a new Rats’ Man’s Lackey tale in the next issue of Pulphouse.
Anyway. Off to sign a bunch of paperbacks, and maybe even get them mailed!
