User talk:Kasaalan/Publisher

Customer complaints

 * Note: Scam means "a clever but dishonest way to get money" according to LONGMAN  Dictionary of Contemporary English.

According to some online reviewers who purchase and complain about publishing house's, claim books has a notice inside the books that all the text books contains are extracted from wikipedia, which readers are not aware pre-purchase: "All texts of this book are extracted from Wikipedia. [...] Please be advised that nothing found here has necessarily been reviewed by people with the expertise required to provide you with complete, accurate or reliable information. Some information in this book maybe (sic) misleading or wrong."

It is also considered as a scam and/or fraud by many internet users over blogs and forums, since the fact that the content of the books are all extracted from Wikipedia, is not advertised through e-commerce bookstores like Amazon before purchase. Therefore the customers aren't informed of the very fact they are buying a freely available Wikipedia article in printed form [if they access to amazon.com they access to wikipedia] and signed by 3 editors who claims to edit 17.000 titles, for 6.8-189 dollars. The business model prevents them to judge whether they like to buy a freely available Wikipedia article in printed form or not, if they trust Amazon product review only. While Alphascript does not provide they are selling wikipedia duplicates in printed form, Betascript imprint of the same company provides they are actually selling wikipedia content in their product description.

As of February 2010, Betascript Publishing lists 13,935 Results in Amazon.co.uk, pricing between 21.25 pounds for Abtnaundorf: Parthe, Vorwerk, Heiterblick, Johann Ernst Kregel von Sternbach,  Völkerschlacht bei Leipzig, Peter Dybwad to 73 pounds (RRP 86) for William  Rehnquist: Law of the United States, United States Federal Courts,  Politics of the United States, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of  the United States all of which signed by same 3 "editors" named Lambert M. Surhone, Miriam T. Timpledon,  and Susan F. Marseken.

VDM has also been criticized for its claimed use of electronic  spamming to  approach thesis and  dissertation owners potential authors. It usually does not edit  or proofread manuscripts.

VDM's business practices were criticized in a November, 2009 article in the Swiss newspaper Tages-Anzeiger,  which described them as controversial and bordering on deception. The paper faulted VDM for not disclosing that the books it was publishing  were academic dissertations; for publishing mediocre works that received  just a barely passing grade; and for charging high prices.

Note:The prices for cheapest and most expensive titles constantly changes.

Possible concerns
Selling free content without attribution via e-commerce, is the same as, selling a replica of an ancient painting or statue for the same price as original or more, then sending the warning with a letter after customer purchased it or writing it under the statue or backside of the painting. See: Counterfeit watch in reverse manner.

SPAM and scam  always find a way to mislead people and law, that is why laws changes  to prevent such fraudulent  acts. I remind SPAM was not considered to be illegal once, yet now it is considered as is without a doubt, especially when it is committed in bulk fashion.

The issues are:
 * Buyers are not pre-warned   about copy paste issues until they buy and read the book
 * "Books" are actually freely  available articles copy pasted word-by-word
 * There are notice inside books, but not in e-commerce site of amazon
 * Books are over-priced even for  actual top quality books by reliable publishers
 * The scam committed in a bulk fashion for 20.000 titles
 * They sign as editors even though they do not edit the content
 * 3 people acts as if they edited over 17.000 titles in less that 2 years, which is an amount which is near  impossible for them to even read the mentioned articles
 * The bulk search spam is committed via amazon's search feature
 * Info on amazon about books and reviews are fake or misleading
 * Amazon is aware of the issue and does not care the complaint mails


 * If it is not considered to be illegal, then  we may
 * Warn media and public
 * Warn wiki community for awareness
 * Create a task force to bulk review, rate,  warn and put actual wikipedia links to the  wiki articles in amazon

Legal obligations
The National Library of Mauritius says at : "The principal source of acquisitions is the legal deposit system that stipulates that every printer in Mauritius is required to deposit free of charge with the Director of the National Library six copies of each publication, be it a book, periodical, report, newspaper or any other printed document."

PrimeHunter revealed a detail. Did Alphascript actually gave 6 copies for each books they printed. source User talk:Fences and windows/Archive 9

Business partners
Alphascript lists amazon.de, amazon.co.uk, amazon.com, knv.de, libri.de, schaltungsdienst.de, bod.de, VDM, VSG, ingrambook.com, umbreit.de, reha  Marketing, smartprofessionals.de, xing.de, lightningsource.com,  bischoffundpartner.de as business partners.

VDM Verlag Business partners Amazon.com,Amazon.co.uk, Amazon.de, Barnesandnoble, Blackwell UK, Abebooks.

Unexceptionally long titles and overpricing
As of 2010, the number of freely available wikipedia articles Alphascript offers via printed on demand "book"s in Amazon.com with no pre-notice of wikipedia, are over 17.000, which priced between 6.81 US dollars and 189 US dollars with unexceptionally long titles and no pre-mention of wikipedia before the purchase.

Pricing

 * Fanaa (Film): Bollywood, Aamir Khan, Kajol, Kunal Kohli, Hum Tum, Yash  Raj Films, Rishi Kapoor, Kirron Kher, Tabu (actress),  Shruti Seth,  Kashmiri people, Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham by  Frederic P. Miller, Agnes F. Vandome,  and John McBrewster (Paperback - Jan. 6, 2010) Price $49.00 (official) and 19.98(retailer)
 * Ecuador: History of Ecuador, Ecuadorian War of    Independence, History of the  Ecuadorian?Peruvian territorial dispute,    Politics of Ecuador, Geography  of Ecuador 6.81 $39.21 dollars [not sure why the price become much more expensive]
 * United States at the 2008 Summer Olympics: 2008    Summer Olympics, Archery at the 2008  Summer Olympics, Athletics at  the   2008 Summer Olympics, Archery at ...  Baseball at the 2008  Summer   Olympics 189  dollars

Review scandal by Amazon

 * Internet fraud
 * Devil wears prada (film) free wiki article published by Alphascript that costs 43 dollars and 68 pages long, lists "1,043 customer reviews", which is actually written for the actual 368 pages long book that costs 10 dollars with 1,043 customer reviews as the wiki article published.
 * Amazon reviews removed after complaints, after I created the page
 * Amazon removed comments 2 weeks after Manuel Schmalstieg complained for Amazon.com: All Star Batman and Robin the Boy Wonder (9786130246679): Frederic P. Miller, Agnes F. Vandome, John McBrewster: Books

Mention of wikipedia

 * Betascript publishing mentions they are selling Wikipedia titles in Amazon.com, while Alphascript do not.


 * No. 15 Squadron RAF: Royal Air Force, Panavia Tornado, RAF Lossiemouth, Operational  Conversion Unit, Farnborough Airfield, Royal Flying Corps, Royal  Aircraft Factory B.E.2, World War I (Paperback) from Betascript publishing where they actually state they extract Wikipedia Content in Product Description: "High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles!".

Covers

 * Book with no review: Alabama Crimson Tide football,  which has a soccer player on the cover.
 * 


 * "One might wonder if a human agent has participated in the selection of the covers, or if it was a fully automated software algorythm parsing a  stock-photo database."

Titles

 * Amazon.com: Reliability of Wikipedia: Reliability of Wikipedia. History of Wikipedia, WikiScanner,  English Wikipedia, German Wikipedia (9786130048822): Frederic P. Miller,  Agnes F. Vandome, John McBrewster: Books we are not sure reliability of wikipedia articles published
 * Rekeying: Lock, Locksmithing, Two-factor Authentication, Lock Picking, Cracking, Security Engineering, Sargon II,  Egypt, Dur-Sharrukin,  Phoenicia, Tigris.
 * Most of the Alphascript titles are listed in Google Books, although they don't have content previews available
 * Empowerment: Public Art, Empowerment (sculpture), Tibetan Buddhism, Empowerment (Tibetan Buddhism),  Spirituality, Politics, Confidence, Decentralization, Self-ownership,  Employee Engagement

University libraries and other scholar lists

 * Schools bought Alphascript books
 * http://view.fdu.edu/files/newbooks200909.pdf
 * http://www.ekl.oulu.fi/dh2008/Digital%20Humanities%202008%20Book%20of%20Abstracts.pdf
 * https://kataloge.uni-hamburg.de/DB=1/LNG=DU/SID=c3152e42-2/CMD?ACT=SRCHA&IKT=1016&SRT=YOP&TRM=Verlag+Mueller
 * http://www.sudoc.abes.fr/DB=2.1/SET=7/TTL=1/CMD?ACT=SRCHA&IKT=1018&SRT=RLV&TRM=Alphascript+publishing

USA libraries VDM claims to bought VDM books


 * Du Bois Library, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA 01003-9275
 * University at Buffalo, 235 Lockwood Library, Buffalo, NY 14260-2200
 * University of Florida, P.O. Box 117001, Gainesville, FL 32611-7001
 * University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Library, 1408 W.Gregory Drive, Urbana, IL 61801
 * George Bush Presid. Library, 1000 G. Bush Drive West, College Station, Texas 77847
 * University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Lincoln, NE 68588-4100
 * UC Irvine Libraries, PO Box 19557, Irvine, CA 92623-9557
 * University of Wisconsin-Madison Libraries, 728 State St., Madison, WI 53706
 * University of Arizona Library, Tucson, AZ 85721
 * Watson Library, University of Kansas Libraries, Lawrence, KS 66045
 * Michigan State University Library, East Lansing, MI 48824


 * Lists
 * http://wmlgage.com/readersguide/Scholarly_A.html
 * http://wmlgage.com/readersguide/Scholarly_A.html
 * http://www.engl.unt.edu/~jgpeters/Conrad/books.html

Academic circles

 * Academicians, academic students

Blogs are belong to 1 professor, 1 librarian, 1 phd, 3 master student/graduates, 2 publishing  professionals and 1 VDM author  who VDM contacted to obtain their thesis since they claim "they are  reliable enough".


 * VDM Author


 * Pasi   Hakkarainen, Publishing with VDM Verlag
 * VDM Verlag author with his Masters thesis in Computer Science and Information Systems, titled Groupware Support for  Operational  Management, 2003 which  is available on sale in Amazon.co.uk"
 * owner of kirnu.com explains the process of book publishing by VDM with screenshots about


 * Professor


 * Professor Brian Leither Leiter Reports: A Philosophy Blog:    Publishing One's Dissertation with a  Lesser-Known Publisher?
 * American philosopher and legal scholar as  John Wilson Professor of Law at the University of  Chicago
 * Director and  founder of Chicago's new Center for Law, Philosophy, and Human  Values
 * taught from 1995 to 2008 at the University of  Texas at Austin
 * taught for two  years in the law school at the University  of  San Diego
 * A visiting assistant professor of philosophy at the University of  California, San Diego.


 * Librarian
 * Dale Askey, Dale Askey: Wow, someone wants to  publish me!
 * Visiting professor  at College of Media at the HTWK-Leipzig since    2009
 * Head   of   Integrated Access Group and Web Development Librarian at Kansas    State   University, K-State    Libraries   between 2005-2009   CVabout
 * Publications at K-State Library page


 * PHD
 * Anna M.   Blanch, Goannatree: Vanity Press or Scam: VDM's kind   offer  to publish my M.A.
 * PhD Program – Theology and Literature  (exp. completion: 2012) Institute of Theology, Imagination and the Arts,  University of St Andrews
 * B.A. (Hons), LLB [ANU], M.A. Thesis titled A reassessment of the authorship of the  Cheap repository tracts.  at Baylor  University
 * Publications


 * Master
 * Aran Dorouhe,  Investigating “Lambert Academic Publishing” with      Google Square and What Strange Spam Is This?
 * Master's of Computer Science at the  University of  Toronto with thesis  titled Debugging Domain-Specific  Languages, 2010
 * Bachelor's degree in Cognitive Science from Queen's  University
 * Check other professional experience in biography


 * Christopher Collins, Christopher Collins: Academic Spam
 * MSc graduate with thesis titled Head-driven probabilistic parsing for word lattices at University of  Toronto, 2004
 * Publications


 * Rebecca Jee, Rebecca Jee: spam spam spam spam, “Undragon stories and    complicated  entanglement : questions of identity in Asian Australian  women’s writing: a creative piece and academic thesis” in University  of   New South Wales
 * Peter Andersson [wrong one] Peter Andersson, a common name | An It-Slave in the  digital saltmine, other  Peter Andersson's thesis titled "Charge Transport Modulation and Optical  Absorption Switching in Organic Electronic Devices", and actual Peter Andersson's  thesis about Web Based Management


 * Bing McGhandi, Happy Jihad's House of Pancakes: Shady academic publishing..., academic humor, not sure if they tricked VDM, or just changed the title for fun


 * Publishing  professionals


 * Manuel Schmalstieg, The Wikipedia ecosystem expands (or: The Good,     the  Bad & the Ugly)
 * Biography     CV
 * Copy editor      in Greyscale Press
 * Assistant at the university of arts  Geneva   between 2004-2007
 * studied in   Geneva (ESBA/atelier zero1   with Enrique Fontanilles and  Hervé  Graumann)  and Krakow (Academy of   fine  arts/animated film  department  with Jerzy  Kucia)
 * video,   performance and software artist,  experiments in field such as realtime video,      graphic novel,      animation    film and audio production


 * Chris Rand, The odd tale of Alphascript Publishing   and    Betascript Publishing
 * technical journalist, website publisher, engineering graduate.
 * assistant junior trainee assistant editor  of  Design Engineering Magazine
 * editor at Industrial Technology Magazine during 1990s
 * founder of pro-talk.com
 * editor in engineeringtalk.com
 * Professional career and about


 * Academic forums
 * The Chronicle of Higher  Education  forums
 * Publishing with Verlag Dr. Mueller? (VDM),  36 pages
 * http://www.phdcomics.com/proceedings/viewtopic.php?p=352769&sid=73aba666f1f7b457dcf7121aaf9f13b4

Community debates

 * http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?showtopic=26847&st=0
 * http://www.theblogmocracy.com/2010/02/21/did-the-jazz-guitarist-write-a-book/
 * http://forums.bellaonline.com/ubbthreads.php/topics/588223/Alphascript_Books_beware
 * http://www.gossamer-threads.com/lists/wiki/foundation/175137
 * http://www.interaction-design.org/references/publishers/vdm_verlag_dr__m%FCller.html
 * http://www.amiga.org/forums/showthread.php?t=51297
 * http://www.topix.com/forum/business/publishing/T75CFAR8D3DNVL3SU
 * http://www.ukclimbing.com/forums/t.php?t=332862
 * http://groups.google.com/group/STSGRAD/browse_thread/thread/6a6fc60ef673d98c


 * Amazon
 * http://www.amazon.com/History-Buddhism-Frederic-P-Miller/product-reviews/6130039123/ref=sr_1_20_cm_cr_acr_txt?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=1

VDM side

 * http://www.vdm-publishing.com/index.php?&act=nav&nav=10048
 * http://www.alphascript-publishing.com/index.php?&act=nav&nav=10048
 * https://online.vdm-verlag.de/downloads/interview.pdf full interview, removed by VDM
 * http://www.vdm-publishing.com/index.php?&act=nav&nav=10050 memberships

Reading

 * http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/wikipedia/6250515/Wikipedia-20-articles-earmarked-for-deletion.html
 * http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/wikipedia/4965132/Barack-Obama-receives-preferential-treatment-on-Wikipedia-report-claims.html
 * http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/technology/shanerichmond/100002023/wikipedia-should-delete-the-deletionists/

Wiki Related Discussions

 * Alphascript
 * Wikipedia Signpost/2009-08-17/News and notes
 * Administrators%27 noticeboard/Archive200
 * Requests for adminship/Fences and windows
 * Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Wine
 * Help talk:Books
 * Wikipedia talk:Wikipedia Signpost/Newsroom/Suggestions/Archive 7
 * Wikipedia talk:Reusing Wikipedia content

Village Pump

 * Village pump (miscellaneous)/Archive 25
 * Village pump %28policy%29/Archive 72
 * Village pump %28policy%29/Archive 68
 * Village pump %28proposals%29/Archive 57
 * Village pump (miscellaneous)/Archive 22
 * Village pump (miscellaneous)/Archive 24

Article talk

 * Official Talk:VDM Publishing House


 * Causing misinformation in Talk:Pitt – Penn State  rivalry
 * Causing misinformation in Talk:Kshatriya/Discussion Archive 5
 * Causing misinformation in Featured Article as first reference, reference removed Talk:Action  potential


 * Johnfos (talk) notices the articles are published by Alphascript, Talk:Anti-nuclear movement in the United States and Talk:Anti-nuclear movement  in Australia


 * User talk about articles
 * User talk:99.237.246.27
 * User talk:Superbowlbound
 * User talk:Elonka/Archive 39
 * User talk:Fram
 * Plagiarism from Wikipedia

Article deletion discussion

 * Articles for deletion/Battles of macrohistorical importance involving invasions of Europe %282nd nomination%29
 * Articles for deletion/Pre-Siberian American Aborigines
 * Articles for deletion/GoatTracker

Contributors, supporters and other interested editors
Spread the word with this userbox:

Note: I am adding signatures on my behalf over the community discussions who debated over the matter, feel free to add or remove your name or just ask me to do it
 * PrimeHunter (talk), content User:PrimeHunter/Alphascript Publishing sells free articles as expensive books,
 * Kasaalan (talk)
 * Quiddity (talk)
 * Milowent (talk)
 * Ttiotsw (talk
 * Half Shadow
 * RA  (talk)
 * Dcoetzee
 * Kvasir (talk)
 * Rich Farmbrough
 * AgneCheese/Wine
 * bd2412 T
 * User:Playmobilonhishorse
 * ---— Gadget850 (Ed)  talk
 * Fences &amp;  Windows  02:29, 1 March 2010 (UTC)
 * A More Perfect Onion (talk)
 * --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus
 * -- Wavelength (talk), links User:Wavelength/About Wikipedia
 *  DGG (  talk )
 * Mojoworker (talk) 00:13, 23 March 2010 (UTC)

Media list

 * Telegraph.co.uk
 * Shane Richmond
 * The Guardian
 * Bobby Johnson is the tech correspondent
 * Charles Arthur
 * Victor Keegan
 * Alison Flood
 * Cade Metz
 * The Register
 * Charles Eicher
 * Wired (magazine) and Wired News
 * Epicenter blog
 * Library Journal
 * TechCrunch
 * LibraryThing
 * Eric Goldman
 * Diagram Prize  by The Bookseller


 * Related news
 * Philip M. Parker and his Icon Group International
 * PediaPress initiative from German Wikipedia,
 * Copyfraud