The shameless hucksters at Author Solutions (iUniverse, Trafford, xlibris, etc.) have issued another ludicrous "white paper" touting the virtues of vanity press publishing and, once again, Victoria Strauss and the fine folks at Writer Beware are there to point out all the falsehoods, exaggerations and omissions, concluding that:
even if you ignore the misrepresented facts and misleading comparisons in this latest whitepaper, AS does writers an extreme disservice with its glib presentation of self-publishing–all upside, no downside, suitable for anyone no matter what their needs or ambitions. Rah, rah! Vive la revolucion! Cue clenched fist! But the truth is that the choice to self-publish is a complicated one that should be made only by writers who have studied the alternatives and clearly formulated their goals. Too many writers fall into self-publishing out of ignorance, unrealistic assumptions about its potential benefits, or misconceptions about traditional publishing.
Her detailed post should be read by anyone who is thinking about paying hundreds, or perhaps thousands, of dollars to a vanity press (and why would you when you can do it for no cash out-of-pocket through Createspace or Lulu… or better yet, bypassing print altogether and publishing digitally through Smashwords, Barnes & Nobles, or Amazon?)