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 Gentleman_Jellyfish wrote:

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
Trust me, I know.

Care to expand upon your credentials?

How sad do you want to feel?

I did buy a second set of Star Trek Fleet Captains so I could snip the ships of the bases and play pew pew with them. I also read Quantum Leap tie-in fiction and enjoyed it. I'm salivating over the Sedition Wars novel, even though I only bought the game to play pew pew with the models. Should I go on?

I think it's safe to say I'm in their bread and butter demographic.

You missed his point. You made your statement as though you were an industry insider, thus he was asking what your credentials were in the publishing industry that make your statements have any weight at all beyond anyone else.

In short, can we trust you because you know a thing or two about the publishing and marketing of books, or are you just another fan who thinks they know things about things?

Personally, when I sold books, no one blinked twice at the names of various publishers(several with very awkward names), I doubt a pirate themed sub-imprint owned by a pirate themed company would put the average customer off.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:

 gunslingerpro wrote:

 cincydooley wrote:

And I still think Skull Island eXpeditions is just an awful, awful publishing house name.

You've made this abundantly clear.

Maybe it's a cultural thing. In my culture, it is impolite not to warn a company that their publishing arm's name is so bad that it will cost them sales to all but the most devoted fans.

I would wholeheartedly agree that warning a company about a name you feel will harm their product in not impolite. Via email. Or phone call. Or letter.

Repeatedly stating that you dislike a publishing house's name on a forum is less effective, no?


Moving on, I doubt a publishing company title will really deter the target audience. Except perhaps you, Bob.

I just dont get it, considering how many other options there could be. eXpeditions is really the worst part. eXpeditions doesn't tell me they're a publishing arm. Further, if they're going to do ridiculous things with the capitalization that borders on leet speak, it's not going to appeal to everyone. The title of the publishing arm literally makes me skeptical to take it seriously. I'm giving it a chance only because I like CL Werner. I mean, what would have been wrong with:

Privateer Publshing
Freebooter Press
Arcane Archive
Lael Library

If you google the first two, Privateer Press is literally the first thing that comes up for both. Why not leverage what you already have?

 gunslingerpro wrote:

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:

 gunslingerpro wrote:

 cincydooley wrote:

And I still think Skull Island eXpeditions is just an awful, awful publishing house name.

You've made this abundantly clear.

Maybe it's a cultural thing. In my culture, it is impolite not to warn a company that their publishing arm's name is so bad that it will cost them sales to all but the most devoted fans.

I would wholeheartedly agree that warning a company about a name you feel will harm their product in not impolite. Via email. Or phone call. Or letter.

Repeatedly stating that you dislike a publishing house's name on a forum is less effective, no?


Moving on, I doubt a publishing company title will really deter the target audience. Except perhaps you, Bob.

On a 40k based forum as well!

Also I have no idea what publishing company puts out most of the books I read. I only care about author and content


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 cincydooley wrote:
I just dont get it, considering how many other options there could be. eXpeditions is really the worst part. eXpeditions doesn't tell me they're a publishing arm. Further, if they're going to do ridiculous things with the capitalization that borders on leet speak, it's not going to appeal to everyone. The title of the publishing arm literally makes me skeptical to take it seriously. I'm giving it a chance only because I like CL Werner. I mean, what would have been wrong with:

Privateer Publshing
Freebooter Press
Arcane Archive
Lael Library

If you google the first two, Privateer Press is literally the first thing that comes up for both. Why not leverage what you already have?

Am I the only one that finds it a clever play on the traditional pirate maps?

I wish these were in print.

When I saw the topic name on the board, I honestly thought it was about that April Fool's joke novel.

The name sounds like a Lego product line. I too am baffled as to how they came up with it and nobody cringed the moment it was said aloud.

RiTides wrote:

Thanan wrote:Simon,

Will convergence still be included in the fluff, in a similar manner to the other factions, in each book (similar to Colossals?)

PPS_Simon wrote:With the launch of SIX we're considering some new ways to address the narrative fiction in the anthology books and how we advance our overaching meta-plot, so I don't have a solid answer to your question right now.

So they call it SIX in the office? That sounds better

Skull Island is a reference to King King, right? So it's a reference to pulp. I don't see what the problem is -- other than folks missing the reference ITT.

Just because it's a reference doesn't automatically make it a fitting or good-sounding name for a publishing branch. And how many people care for King Kong or remember the name of the island? I had a Lego set once that looked like a skull island, though.

In terms of impulse buying the publisher (at least for SF/Fantasy) really does not matter

the author matters (if the prospective buyer has heard of them), the title matters, the cover really matters, the blurb on the back matters a little but a surprising number of buyers never reads it

the publisher really does not (except if it's seen as an arm of a games company, where it is then immediately less credible than a normal SF/F book publisher)


EDIT: actually I'm wrong, the publisher will matter, but only in terms of getting the book into the shop/webstore in order for the potential buyer to see it (and SIX is probably going to struggle a bit there)

 cincydooley wrote:


And I still think Skull Island eXpeditions is just an awful, awful publishing house name.

But "the X makes it sound cool"! ...in the 90's. It's also got the irregular capitalization... that was kind of a thing, maybe as late as early 2000's.

And, umm, it's kind of got an indiana jones font... that was kinda' cool in the 80's

Then there's the island itself, too: they showed you a picture of what they were talking about as a visual aid. Skull islands have definitely been parodied within the last ten years. I think, that means they're caught up with current popular culture?

We can't forget the word "skull", though. I mean, GW's made an empire from putting skulls on things, and they're pretty hip and edgy. It also evokes such timeless images as dead people, the Red Skull, and Skeletor.

And then there's the dotted line and red x! The most current of all- I saw that on a playset in the super market within the last year!


I guess I've got to respectfully disagree with you cincy, PP is showing that they've put a lot of thought into this trend-setting, mature logo.

I'm only annoyed that I have to register for another site.

Would have been great to just buy it via my tablet shop

 malfred wrote:
I'm only annoyed that I have to register for another site.

Would have been great to just buy it via my tablet shop

You can buy it via Amazon

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
A casual reader who sees the name and isn't under 12 years old, will think "This doesn't look like something I'd want to read," no matter how much of a steampunk, brass gear, pew pew-loving manchild he is.

A casual reader who sees the covers and isn't under 12 years old, will think "This doesn't look like something I'd want to read" as well.
But then again, maybe only 12 year olds would prefer reading a book on their iPhone.

BTW I actually missed this thread because I mistook the title for a PC game.

 Kroothawk wrote:


BTW I actually missed this thread because I mistook the title for a PC game.

Proof this wasn't the best name for a book imprint

Blame this man:

Maybe he's calling it Skull Island so he can try and leverage it into some sort of Hollywood production.

Maybe a new version of Legends of the Hidden Temple.

I think (or maybe, hope) that he dropped the Hollywood dream after that horrible Level 7 movie.

 BrookM wrote:
I think (or maybe, hope) that he dropped the Hollywood dream after that horrible Level 7 movie.

That picture disagrees with you.

*edit* Plus, as long as PP has that central both at SDCC, he is still chasing Hollywood.

Wow... never seen that pic before. Looks like such a tool... had that gut feeling of "something's wrong..."

And, yeah, hopefully level 7 was the end of that aspiration.

 spiralingcadaver wrote:

 cincydooley wrote:


And I still think Skull Island eXpeditions is just an awful, awful publishing house name.

But "the X makes it sound cool"! ...in the 90's. It's also got the irregular capitalization... that was kind of a thing, maybe as late as early 2000's.

The way it's done, I think it's more of "X marks the spot", like a treasure map. It even has the dotted line leading to the X.

 Platuan4th wrote:

 spiralingcadaver wrote:

 cincydooley wrote:


And I still think Skull Island eXpeditions is just an awful, awful publishing house name.

But "the X makes it sound cool"! ...in the 90's. It's also got the irregular capitalization... that was kind of a thing, maybe as late as early 2000's.

The way it's done, I think it's more of "X marks the spot", like a treasure map. It even has the dotted line leading to the X.

That's what I've been saying!

That picture reminds me of Michael Bendis for some reason. Not good.

 Platuan4th wrote:

 spiralingcadaver wrote:

 cincydooley wrote:


And I still think Skull Island eXpeditions is just an awful, awful publishing house name.

But "the X makes it sound cool"! ...in the 90's. It's also got the irregular capitalization... that was kind of a thing, maybe as late as early 2000's.

The way it's done, I think it's more of "X marks the spot", like a treasure map. It even has the dotted line leading to the X.

umm...

 spiralingcadaver wrote:
And then there's the dotted line and red x! The most current of all- I saw that on a playset in the super market within the last year!

...maybe I should have been more explicit. Yeah. I got that it was a treasure map reference.

I got your thickly sauced on sarcasm spiral. Don't worry .

Here's the problem. While they may be "privateer press" absolutely no one associates them with pirates. No one.

Thickly sauced or bitingly cold are about the only ways to do it

And, apparently newbs/people who haven't heard of them associate them with pirates... but that doesn't seem too helpful...

I just wish there was YouTube video of that meeting where they decided the name.

 Platuan4th wrote:
You missed his point. You made your statement as though you were an industry insider, thus he was asking what your credentials were in the publishing industry that make your statements have any weight at all beyond anyone else.

In short, can we trust you because you know a thing or two about the publishing and marketing of books, or are you just another fan who thinks they know things about things?

Personally, when I sold books, no one blinked twice at the names of various publishers(several with very awkward names), I doubt a pirate themed sub-imprint owned by a pirate themed company would put the average customer off.

I had no idea that my statement could be read as from an industry insider. I thought I sounded like a neckbeard fanboy insider.

I can't really claim to be an insider, but I did work for a bookstore for years, and I did see some strange things. For instance, the name "Baen Books" actually can scare away certain customers pretty consistently, just as it also attracts a certain demographic; people who read a lot of Science Fiction know what they are going to get with a Baen book, regardless of the author (with a few exceptions grandfathered in, like David Drake). Many Star Wars EU fans claim to have noticed a tremendous drop in quality when Del Rey lost the license to Random House. I have noticed some friction selling Angry Robot books to certain genre die-hards because they thought the company only did comic book tie-ins (and they may have been thinking of Black Flame). Solaris books is 'infamous' for the 2-star quality of its books. I personally avoided certain publishers known for treating authors badly back in the days when people took literary rabble-rousers like Harlan Ellison seriously. I also tried to boycott buying from publishers who didn't give credit to their cover artists on the back cover or inside copyright page, but that was before the age when digitally manipulated stock photos and simple graphic designs became de rigueur. I also tended to promote and sell books that were better represented by their publishers or authors' agents, especially if the delightful Joshua Bilmes was involved. (Seriously, he's a mensch.)

Romance readers also swear by different prose-crunching machines publishers, too. And don't get me started on readers of translated texts.

So, while I wasn't being dead serious--this is the internet and that might kill someone--there was a nugget of truth in there somewhere.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Manchu wrote:
Skull Island is a reference to King King, right? So it's a reference to pulp. I don't see what the problem is -- other than folks missing the reference ITT.

Oh, I got it (and mentioned it). It's just, in the wake of Peter Jackson's spirit-crushingly terrible remake, it might be a bad idea to remind people of King Kong.