Do you ever lose sonbooks?

[mindonstrike]

Cool!

Curious to see how they stand up to the rigors of bar life.

Sam

[bryant]

I wonder if the patrons will tend to write and mark in them? Tear out pages etc. One page gone and that book becomes useless.

[Lonman]

Originally Posted by bryant

I wonder if the patrons will tend to write and mark in them? Tear out pages etc. One page gone and that book becomes useless.

I get people writing in the books now on the sheet protectors. Pages gone as well, easier to fix in the binder however as you kind of hinted at.

[alanross]

Originally Posted by Lonman

Sounds like a great idea, but how do you add in new disc listings? Or do you just get an entire new batch every time you buy a disc? Or do you get a separate book made for new songs?

This is always the first question I get and the answer is, it really depends on how well the books will hold up. For the first few months, we'll probably just print out an additional listing on regular paper and have them available at the book table. If the books become destroyed within the first six months, then we'll integrate the additional songs into the books and produce a new edition of the main books. If the books hold up well, then in six months, we could easily publish an additional song listing book for about $5/book. We're going to have to see how it goes.

Originally Posted by bryant

I wonder if the patrons will tend to write and mark in them? Tear out pages etc. One page gone and that book becomes useless.

This was a major concern when we began to consider this option. It would be easy for people to tear out pages, but we stress respect for the equipment as well as the other singers and our current books hold up real well because people treat them fairly well normally. We're hoping this continues.

We use golf pensils, so there hasn't been a lot of writing in the books we had before because it's hard to write on a sheet protector with pencil, but these new books may lend themselves to all kinds of graffiti. We're hoping that with the option to buy their own books, the "regulars" will have their own books at home and therefore not feel the need to trash the show books. With the "Property of" box on the cover of the show books, we're also thinking it will discourage some people from taking liberties.

The bottom line is, we'll never be able to eliminate people's stupidity, but we're hoping to keep it to a minimum.

This is an experiment, so only time will tell, but the cost savings and benefits make it worth the risk. If it becomes a horrible nightmare after six months, We will probably go back to using binders at the shows, but there's no reason why we can't continue to sell the completed books on-line. If we release a new edition every six months or so, we're bound to have a few people buy the newest versions when they come out.

Modifying the books on-line is really easy. All I have to do is upload a new version of the song list, replacing the old one and the books are only printed when an order comes in. It costs nothing to upload updates, so the on-line books can be as up to date as possible all the time.

The possibilities are as exciting as the worries are troubling. We'll see which becomes more real.

- Alan

[ddouglass]

Alan, what did you use to produce your database file for this publication?

[Lonman]

I checked it out, may do a demo book myself - it's free to sign up & actually get a project started to see how it works & what it needs file wise, i'll probably just use a standard pdf file, but it looks like it will take several other database types such as Acess, Excel, Word, .rtf, and a few others.
Got to get my computers back into check first, both my home computers caught a nasty virus(s) over the weekend & had to reformat everything, so i'm in the process of reloading & reconfiguring everything. I like the idea of the low cost.

[alanross]

I prepared my songbooks by using Hoster's Songbook program, then formatting them in WordPerfect (Microsoft's Word will work too) so that each artist's name appears at the top of each column. Once I had the WordPerfect document formatted exactly as I wanted it, I converted it into .pdf format with a nifty little program I found on-line called PrimoPDF. and then I uploaded the .pdf file to the Lulu web site.

The cover art for the front and back covers, I created in a graphics program (Print Artist) then I converted that art into .jpg format and uploaded it to the Lulu web site. If you follow the steps on the web site, all you really have to do is upload those files and set a price.

Although, Lulu's retail price generator recommended a price of $35.00 for my books, I knew they wouldn't sell at that, so I set the price to $17.99 and I think that's fair.

Lulu only produces books to order, so you can build a book and do nothing with it or make it available for sale and see what happens. It costs nothing to set it up and Lulu only makes a commission on each book sold, so what's the harm? I believe this could be the new wave in Karaoke. I like being a trailblazer.

- Alan

NOTE: One word of warning, however you format your book is exactly what it will look like finished. In other words, any errors you make, will be transferred to your finished project. Double check your .pdf file before uploading it or your errors will appear in your final books.