POD Experience

[BenWBell]

Since the news that SJG will be experimenting with POD I thought I'd pass along an experience I have had with a recommendation.

RedBrick have made their Earthdawn books available exclusively via PDF and POD. Their POD is handled by a company called Lulu who are their exclusive partners in this. http://www.lulu.com/redbrick

Just last week I received my copies of the Players and Gamemasters Compendiums from Lulu. I must say the quality is excellent. The print is great, the binding good and the paper excellent. Even with postage the price came to what I would expect to pay for books of that size. Also since Lulu have two facilities (one in the US and one in Spain), they can get the product to people by printing it closer to them and shipping it from there to reduce costs.

I think this is a great model and would quite happily buy books POD'd by Lulu. Something to think about.

Ben.

[Kuroshima]

Lulu has a facility in Spain? That I didn't know. This could mean that shipping to Spain would be rather economical?

Where did you get this information?

[Hex]

Originally Posted by Kuroshima

Lulu has a facility in Spain? That I didn't know. This could mean that shipping to Spain would be rather economical?

Where did you get this information?

I heard a testament eerily similar to this one in another thread...maybe Ben is just over zealous...or...

[Ze'Manel Cunha]

Originally Posted by Hex

I heard a testament eerily similar to this one in another thread...maybe Ben is just over zealous...or...

Doing a quick search of his posts, most of them involve PDF and printing from them. Not to say it automatically makes him a ringer, he may just be a big PDF and POD fan.

[BenWBell]

Well the Earthdawn books I got from them were posted from Spain. Redbrick initially said in their POD announcements that this was the case. Their actual sentence was "Secondly, Lulu partners with printers in the United States (for US customers) and Spain (for International customers)." European customers who have ordered have had them printed and posted in Spain, US ones printed and posted in the US. Works out quite handy like that. I don't know if they have a partner in the far east or not.

Oh I'm not a ringer, I'm just trying to pass on some information as I read the SJGames site every day but tend to frequent other forums (as I don't actually own a single GURPS rulebook but have several GURPS books). I'm a fan of PDF as I'm running out of shelf space, and I like to take my collection with me on my tablet PC. I thought SJG would like another input on the matter. I've never used POD before, and am incredibly impressed by the Earthdawn books as they're as good quality as I'd expect from a normal books. I honestly think PODs time may well have come.

Plus the only RPG book I've managed to write so far has only, to this point, been published in PDF format. I'm a fan of the format.

Edit: Oh and here is a link to the RPG.net thread that made me order them in the first place. It contains copies of the Redbrick press release and some questions and answers. http://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?t=273953

[Alacrity Fitzhugh]

Originally Posted by Hex

I heard a testament eerily similar to this one in another thread...maybe Ben is just over zealous...or...

That would be me. I bought the same Earthdawn books and was equally impressed with the print quality and the speed in which I received the books.

And no, I am not Ben. :p

[Hex]

Originally Posted by Alacrity Fitzhugh

That would be me. I bought the same Earthdawn books and was equally impressed with the print quality and the speed in which I received the books.

And no, I am not Ben. :p

What you guys copy and paste each other or just have some uncanny mental mind meld?

[Akicita]

FWIW, my only POD experience was with Lulu. I picked up Lisa Steele's Fief, and was entirely satisfied with the printing. (And it goes without saying that I was pleased with the content.)