User:Richard Fitt/sandbox

Authors On Line Ltd
Authors OnLine Ltd was established in 1997 to allow authors to publish their work on the Internet. It was started as a subsidiary of a web design company, Managed Web Space Ltd., which operated until 2010. One of its founders, Richard Fitt had tried unsuccessfully to publish a book in 1992, and when he was approached by his friend Derek Reece, in 1995 to see if he was interested in starting MWS, jokingly said, 'Only if we can have a website to publish authors who have been rejected by mainstream publishers.' The idea stuck however, and when Derek Reece went to Sri Lanka to visit a friend for 3 months in 1997 he decided to sit on a beach and design the UK's second ever e-book site. The website was subsequently launched in October of that year and the company incorporated a year later.

In 2000 the company came to hear of a revolutionary new printing and publishing system being launched by Gardners Books, the UK largest book distributor called 'Print On Demand', or POD for short and decided to incorporate that into its portfolio, little realising that it would be the first ever UK company to do so, thus securing its own place in publishing history with its first POD title, 'The Jet Stone' by Peter Townsend launched in January 2001.

Now Based in Gamlingay on the Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire boarder, England, the company started life in Hertford, an attractive county town some 20 miles north of London, in offices over 'The Dark Horse Brewery' in Adams Yard, supplier to many of the local pubs. A small independent brewery, it was on prime building land and the landlord eventually closed the building as the developers moved in. Unfortunately the brewery itself failed to relocate and a great brew was lost for ever.

Category:Self-publishing companies