Latest / The WritersWeekly Podcast / Episode 52 (PT 2)- 4 Industry Professionals Discuss Scams, Author Egos, and AI

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Episode 52 (PT 2)- 4 Industry Professionals Discuss Scams, Author Egos, and AI · The WritersWeekly Podcast

0:01
SPEAKER_04: Welcome to the Writers Weekly Podcast, a forum geared toward the writing enthusiast of those who want to make money from their writing.
0:08
SPEAKER_04: I'm Brian Whitman, and I'll be your host, creator.
0:36
SPEAKER_04: You can also click over to writersweekly.com.
0:40
SPEAKER_04: There you'll find not only thousands of articles about professional writing, you can also find current paying markets and job listings to help you boost your writing career and even your bottom line.
0:52
SPEAKER_04: But for now, let's get on to this episode of the Writers Weekly Podcast.
1:17
SPEAKER_04: And today we're going to continue on with part two of last week's interview with Stephanie Smikowski and Troy Lambert.
1:25
SPEAKER_04: They are the hosts of the Pros Talking Prose podcast.
1:29
SPEAKER_04: They are each uh publishing and writing professionals.
1:34
SPEAKER_04: They deal with authors and writers on a daily basis, one-on-one.
1:39
SPEAKER_04: Stacey has her own business offering all kinds of uh writing and publishing services and services to uh authors and writers.
1:48
SPEAKER_04: And Troy uh is a prolific author and he also works directly with writers and authors, helping them develop their stories and come up with better manuscripts.
2:02
SPEAKER_04: So uh that being said, let's go ahead and continue on with part two of this episode 52 of the Writers Weekly Podcast.
2:15
SPEAKER_04: So from where where you guys sit, are you seeing what avenues are you commonly seeing the scams uh offers generating from?
2:24
SPEAKER_04: Is it are they are they going after the publishing side of things, editing, marketing, distribution?
2:29
SPEAKER_04: What what are you mostly seeing um targeting?
2:34
SPEAKER_01: I'm seeing mostly the publishing and marketing side of things.
2:37
SPEAKER_00: Um I think on the editing side, legitimate editing is expensive enough for most indie authors, most of them understand that, and most of them balk at playing at paying normal editing prices.
2:54
SPEAKER_00: So I don't see a lot of the editing things going on, except I've seen a few now where people will be like, I will edit your manuscript for$400.
3:04
SPEAKER_00: Or bargain basement price and they're just using AI editors or they're not doing it at all.
3:11
SPEAKER_01: And then the AI thing that you know, there's a lot, and I know I'll call it a scam, is a lot of people will say, Oh, just use my AI platform to edit your book for 50 bucks.
3:19
SPEAKER_01: And you're just like, Don't, don't, don't, don't, don't, don't.
3:22
SPEAKER_01: I mean, you may, you'll get 50, you'll get a$50 edit.
3:25
SPEAKER_01: I'll tell you that.
3:27
SPEAKER_04: You'll get a$50 edit.
3:28
SPEAKER_04: We recently did an episode on authors that we we try to explain this is a scam, don't do this.
3:37
SPEAKER_04: And they will they they'll just they'll just stop listening and they'll go for it anyway.
3:42
SPEAKER_02: Um they come back later and say, Oh, you're fine.
3:45
SPEAKER_04: How often are you guys experiencing pushback from authors that you deal with when you regularly say, Don't do this?
3:53
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, I'm ashamed to say that.
3:55
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, uh well, I just opened the door for you, so go ahead.
3:58
SPEAKER_00: He's like, but this is a Hugo award-winning book and all this other stuff, and I look at the cover and I'm like, Man, I I don't think so.
4:07
SPEAKER_00: I tell him, I said, Listen, whoever told you this or sold you this, I said, I'm sorry, man, but you're you're not even in the ballpark.
4:15
SPEAKER_00: I'm like, also, nobody can there's steps you have to take.
4:19
SPEAKER_00: If you really want to win a Hugo Award, we can put you in a position where at least you could be nominated, but you've got to realize all the work that's involved with that.
4:29
SPEAKER_00: I'm like, you this cover looks like it was made on KDP's cover creator, right?
4:36
SPEAKER_00: It's like it's is it adequate?
4:41
SPEAKER_00: Not even, not really, but you know, it is a cover, right?
4:45
SPEAKER_00: You the formatting is is horrible.
4:49
SPEAKER_00: And he's like, Well, I'm on social security and on a fixed income, and I can't afford to do all that.
4:54
SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, Well, then you aren't then you don't have a Hugo Award winner, right?
5:00
SPEAKER_00: Right, but somebody told him, and so he's like, he's got it in his brain, if I do this the right way and I do this and do this, and they told me this is a great book, and all I need you to do is just read through it and tell me if there's any problems.
5:12
SPEAKER_00: Uh no, like I'm like, you're not even close, you're not even in the ballpark.
5:17
SPEAKER_00: But um and and then next thing I know, I look and he's at some event locally and he's published that book, just self-published that book with that cover, with the everything.
5:28
SPEAKER_00: Uh, and I'm like, I and I just I just had to not just not disconnect, disconnect, disconnect and not say anything.
5:36
SPEAKER_00: But I'm like, if I say anything to him at this point, he's gonna be like, that Troy guy is just trying to discourage new authors.
5:42
SPEAKER_03: He's just trying to destroy my career.
5:44
SPEAKER_00: He just doesn't believe in them, he's a terrible dude.
5:48
SPEAKER_00: And and I'm like, no, I really am looking out for your best interest.
5:53
SPEAKER_00: I'm trying to, but I mean, I've gotten pushback from authors that are like, well, this person tells me they can edit my book for$500.
6:00
SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, well, then you will get a$500 edit.
6:03
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I mean, I get what you'll get.
6:06
SPEAKER_01: I get that a lot.
6:07
SPEAKER_01: So I I but here's where I'm gonna, here's where I'm gonna kind of like caution everybody.
6:12
SPEAKER_01: First and foremost, Troy and I have talked about this before on our podcast ourselves about the ego and how how much it's linked to a creative's work.
6:20
SPEAKER_01: Like, really, we we pour our heart, blood, souls, everything out.
6:25
SPEAKER_01: We're like we expose ourselves in our manuscripts, right?
6:28
SPEAKER_01: As as authors.
6:29
SPEAKER_01: And so I can completely understand why you want to believe that all the work that you've put into this masterpiece has got to be desired by hundreds, if not thousands, of people.
6:47
SPEAKER_01: So, you know, I get it.
6:48
SPEAKER_01: I get that there's like this like part of you that wants this to be wanted.
6:53
SPEAKER_01: It's your baby.
6:54
SPEAKER_01: We all want to be, yeah, we all want to be wanted, we all want to be loved.
6:58
SPEAKER_01: Um, but the the the fact remains that there's a lot of work that goes into actually creating um these works.
7:07
SPEAKER_01: And and like Troy said, a lot of it, a lot of it is lightning in a bottle, a lot of it is a unicorn, a lot of it does kind of just happen by luck.
7:15
SPEAKER_01: And so you can put yourself out there and be available.
7:18
SPEAKER_01: And when lightning strikes, hopefully you're in the way, right?
7:21
SPEAKER_01: Um, that's what we're really trying to like teach authors when we're out there and talking to them.
7:26
SPEAKER_01: But the pushback we get from them is mostly tied to that ego.
7:30
SPEAKER_01: It's tied to that, well, this and this and this, and I know this, and I saw this.
7:34
SPEAKER_01: And there was a podcast that said this, and my best friend said this, and my my mother believes this about me.
7:39
SPEAKER_01: And, you know, all those things.
7:41
SPEAKER_01: Oh, we love the mother comments.
7:42
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, the mother comments are great.
7:44
SPEAKER_01: Um, they're my fave.
7:46
SPEAKER_01: Um, but you know, like I really my my push, my favorite pushback story came from an author who had been around the block a few times.
7:54
SPEAKER_01: She was, um, I would I let's just say she was a former government official.
8:01
SPEAKER_01: Um she uh she was in the ranks of some of our some of our, you know, yes, like spy networks.
8:10
SPEAKER_04: She was in oh, okay.
8:12
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, she was intelligence.
8:13
SPEAKER_04: Okay.
8:13
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so she was intelligence.
8:15
SPEAKER_01: Um she she had published several books.
8:18
SPEAKER_01: Um, not necessarily like made bestseller ranks.
8:22
SPEAKER_01: Maybe she she claimed to have, maybe she got a you know, badge from Amazon at one point.
8:28
SPEAKER_01: Anyway, so she like she was kind of like high on her horse when she contacted me.
8:35
SPEAKER_01: Um she wanted an editor.
8:37
SPEAKER_01: She had told me that she'd gotten into it with her previous editor, and I don't imagine what I have no clue why, but she was like in no way compatible at all.
8:47
SPEAKER_01: But she um she was coming at me with this like you know, I attitude like I am this person and you need to do it this way.
8:58
SPEAKER_01: And I was trying to explain to her, look, you know, when you vet an editor, there's we're gonna get naked together, basically.
9:05
SPEAKER_01: So you kind of need to know that you're gonna be comfortable with me and I'm gonna need to be comfortable with you.
9:10
SPEAKER_01: And if you and I are not gonna jive, this isn't gonna work.
9:14
SPEAKER_01: And she was trying to tell me, well, I've been approached by publishing companies that have told me they'll pay me$30,000,$40,000 advances for this book.
9:22
SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, that's great.
9:24
SPEAKER_01: Why haven't you gone with them?
9:26
SPEAKER_01: And well, you know, and she was afraid to tell me that they were scams.
9:29
SPEAKER_01: Again, her ego was getting in the way, right?
9:32
SPEAKER_01: But she wanted to let me know that she wanted it to do, she wanted me to work with her in a certain way because of these previous approach companies.
9:41
SPEAKER_01: Well, I knew they were scams, she didn't even have to go into it with me, but her ego was so tender.
9:47
SPEAKER_01: And the pushback I was getting from this woman, we of course we didn't end up working together because I pretty much told her, I'm so sorry.
9:53
SPEAKER_01: It was funny too.
9:54
SPEAKER_01: At one point, after I turned her down and I said, Look, I I wish you the best of luck.
9:58
SPEAKER_01: I think that I'm not your editor.
10:01
SPEAKER_01: Um, she came back to me like a week later and is like, I don't know what to do.
10:06
SPEAKER_01: My book club has dropped me, my treat group don't want they don't want to talk to me because they found out I was paying for reviews and my sister, she's mad at me, and my dog died last week and like everything, you know, like the whole world was crashing.
10:21
SPEAKER_01: And she was trying, like, and I'm like, look, honestly, if if you were gonna be such a hag at the beginning, I don't know why you're begging me now to come.
10:31
SPEAKER_01: Like, no, like, no, right, because I already know how you're gonna treat me.
10:35
SPEAKER_01: That's the difference between hiring somebody and finding somebody that's begging you to work with them.
10:42
SPEAKER_01: Um, right.
10:43
SPEAKER_02: Industry perfectly a lot of narcissism was involved with that.
10:47
SPEAKER_02: Oh, yeah, there was a lot of a lot of ego.
10:50
SPEAKER_00: I have another example.
10:52
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I've turned down authors and they came back later and I turned them down again, but they will tell you unending stories about how bad their life has turned and why they need you so bad.
11:02
SPEAKER_02: And I'm not I'm not buying the de dog died story.
11:05
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
11:06
SPEAKER_04: I just just just before you start, Troy, I just want to point out to our readers, this is one something that we've said before uh uh about writing it, right?
11:14
SPEAKER_04: Keep your ego in check.
11:16
SPEAKER_04: I mean, yeah, you gotta have somewhat of an ego.
11:18
SPEAKER_04: It's it's like a fighter pilot.
11:20
SPEAKER_04: You gotta know you can do it, or you're not gonna be able to do it.
11:23
SPEAKER_04: You gotta have something inside of you that says, I can, I can, I can make that.
11:27
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna figure this out.
11:28
SPEAKER_04: But you you also have to have some humility to you because that's exactly what's gonna get you s caught in these traps, thinking that you're so great and so wonderful, and the bo the world must read your book, and then somebody comes and strokes your ego a little bit and you're gonna hand them your money like that.
11:47
SPEAKER_04: Go ahead, Troy.
11:49
SPEAKER_00: Well, so I have two examples that's really interesting, but one of them is a guy that Stacy and I worked with, and he was being very resistant to our edits.
11:57
SPEAKER_00: And he said, Well, I've got this award and all these great reviews.
12:03
SPEAKER_00: Well, he had like 10 reviews on one of his books on Amazon, and they were mostly positive, but kind of a little iffy.
12:12
SPEAKER_00: But then he tells me about this award, and I'm like, Oh, this award.
12:16
SPEAKER_00: Well, first of all, it was a book cover award, not for his book itself.
12:21
SPEAKER_00: And when I went and looked and dove deep into it, the reason he got second in that category in book covers that year was because there were only two entries.
12:32
SPEAKER_03: Oh and they it was a pay to enter contest.
12:38
SPEAKER_00: So the contest itself was a scam.
12:41
SPEAKER_00: There were only two entries, and of the two entries, he got second place.
12:46
SPEAKER_00: But because he was an award-winning author, I was supposed to let him write things however he wanted.
12:53
SPEAKER_00: Uh and another guy who approached me at a conference once and he said, 'I really need you to help me find a publisher.' I'm like, Okay.
12:59
SPEAKER_00: He said, I want them to publish this book that I wrote exactly as I wrote it with no changes.
13:07
SPEAKER_04: Oh, and I went we had one of those come across the transom just recently.
13:12
SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, it's just the ego is a good idea.
13:14
SPEAKER_00: And then I had one other one that Stacy and I were talking to, and this is where the ego part comes into play, is he was like, the first Zoom call we got on with this guy after I sent him back a manuscript evaluation, he was mad.
13:28
SPEAKER_00: He was mad, he was mad at me.
13:30
SPEAKER_00: Like, I'm not talking a little mad, I'm talking red-faced mad.
13:33
SPEAKER_00: Now him and I are friends.
13:35
SPEAKER_00: But and part of that I think is because when he said, he said, you cannot talk to me that way about my book, you can't talk to anybody that way.
13:44
SPEAKER_00: And I said, actually, yes, I can.
13:48
SPEAKER_00: Because that's what I get paid to do.
13:51
SPEAKER_00: I said, if you want to pay somebody to tell you they like your book in the crappy shape it's in right now, I guess you found the wrong guy.
14:00
SPEAKER_01: And that's your validation right there.
14:02
SPEAKER_01: That's your validation right there that you're working with a scammer.
14:05
SPEAKER_01: If they're completely, completely agreeable and go in love with your book, if they're if they give you zero pushback, then you're you need to put you need to throw up about 10 red flags.
14:19
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, very good point.
14:20
SPEAKER_00: Run away, run away.
14:21
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that person doesn't care about your story.
14:24
SPEAKER_00: And back to my and this is the thing about scammers, is they don't care about your score story, they care about your wallet.
14:31
SPEAKER_00: When you come to people like Stacy and I, the deal is the reason we're in this industry, that and we were just talking about this yesterday, and I'll go off on it every time somebody gives me a gives me a chance, is the only thing I care about is story.
14:44
SPEAKER_00: My entire life is centered around story.
14:47
SPEAKER_00: My story is helping other bring people bring their stories to life.
14:50
SPEAKER_00: If I'm working on marketing, it's because I'm telling your business story.
14:53
SPEAKER_00: If I'm working on ghostwriting, it's because I'm helping you tell your story because your story matters, right?
15:00
SPEAKER_00: So to me, the only thing that matters in the whole equation is story, right?
15:05
SPEAKER_00: The scammer is so I like I do things that are ridiculous for ridiculous amounts of money to help people bring their stories into the world.
15:13
SPEAKER_00: We had a guy uh last year dying at Parkinson's, he had Parkinson's, he can't type anymore, but he wants to barely communicate with us and get his story into the world.
15:23
SPEAKER_00: So, what did I do for a ridiculous amount of money?
15:26
SPEAKER_00: I helped him finish that book.
15:28
SPEAKER_00: We yeah, extremely low pay.
15:30
SPEAKER_00: But why did I do it?
15:31
SPEAKER_00: Because I care about the guy's story.
15:33
SPEAKER_00: As soon as I heard his story, and he's like, I can't afford this, but this is what I can afford.
15:38
SPEAKER_00: I'm like, done deal.
15:39
SPEAKER_00: Let's get it done.
15:40
SPEAKER_00: Let's get your story out into the world.
15:43
SPEAKER_00: Now, so when people say I'm too expensive, I'm like, I'm expensive because that enables me, those of you that do have money and can hire me, it enables me to do that.
15:51
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, because otherwise I can't.
15:54
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, we've also worked with several authors who were literally on their deathbeds, and we put them on the fast track and give that book to them as soon as they can so they can hold it before they die.
16:03
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, that's they can hold it before they right.
16:05
SPEAKER_01: Like that's I have loads, I have like a few of those in my back pocket that I just absolutely love.
16:10
SPEAKER_01: But Brian, back to what you said earlier about like kind of like having that that ability to kind of set fear aside and kind of go, okay, I you gotta have a little bit of ego to kind of be able to say, I'm gonna do this thing.
16:23
SPEAKER_01: Um, there's a really great master plot um masterclass that was taught by Chris Hatfield.
16:28
SPEAKER_01: He's the captain of the space station for a while, um, astronaut, amazing.
16:32
SPEAKER_01: I love this guy.
16:33
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna recommend that if you haven't seen this masterclass, it's great.
16:36
SPEAKER_01: But there he does one on fear, and he does a uh one of his classes is on fear, and he talks about how um you have to kind of set fear aside and kind of like, but the way you set fear aside is with knowledge, it's it's with it's with understanding and knowing.
16:51
SPEAKER_01: So the way you do the dangerous things, the way you guys go out there and do this publishing world and the way that you approach this business is to have and gain more knowledge.
17:03
SPEAKER_01: And the way you do that is with trusted, vetted professionals that have taken the steps beforehand and that you can, you know, learn from, grow from, and then, you know, again, go out and venture and go forth.
17:15
SPEAKER_01: But the thing about it is that a lot of times people allow that fear to overcome or overtake the whole process.
17:24
SPEAKER_01: And that's when you are vulnerable to these people who are the sharks and the predators.
17:29
SPEAKER_01: Right.
17:30
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, because they come, they talk so smoothly.
17:33
SPEAKER_01: And and and you know, if somebody's just stroking your ego and telling you how great your book is, chances are they're not, yeah, they're not um so your ego might be big, but you're letting fear take over if you're allowing yourself to not be criticized.
17:48
SPEAKER_00: And this is an interesting thing.
17:50
SPEAKER_00: The best authors that I know have extremely large but fragile egos.
17:55
SPEAKER_00: So they have a large ego, they're very confident in the things that they do, and it's true of fighter pilots and stuff too, but underneath that, number two is a level of insecurity and a level of fear of what if I'm not as good as I think I am.
18:09
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and so when somebody is telling you, yeah, man, you are good, you are amazing, and then when somebody like me comes along and says, Hey man, you know that ego, let's just pop up.
18:21
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, you can you can improve this, this, and this, and that's telling them you're not you're not all you think you are, and then boom, you're right.
18:28
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, who do you who do you want to listen to instead?
18:31
SPEAKER_04: You'd rather listen to the this is amazing.
18:33
SPEAKER_04: Wow, what a great book.
18:34
SPEAKER_04: All you need to do is make it into a movie, we'll make it even more.
18:37
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, exactly.
18:38
SPEAKER_01: I will say this too.
18:39
SPEAKER_01: It's getting increasingly harder to um to receive critical feedback or to delve, you know, dish out critical feedback because I think more and more people are in this state of mind where they think they're they're being yeah, they're very validated in everything that they do.
18:57
SPEAKER_01: And I mean, this goes to this, I'm gonna blame social media for this because we're too validated.
19:02
SPEAKER_01: We we get in our our confirmation bias bubbles and we think, oh, you know, everybody thinks the way I do.
19:09
SPEAKER_01: And it just when somebody comes and challenges that, it's very, very difficult.
19:14
SPEAKER_01: So when you have you sit down with a professional who's like Troy, who's a little bit brash, and me who's a little bit like, I don't know, too.
19:21
SPEAKER_04: Toilet paper coming out of the butt kind of comment.
19:23
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I'm a little out of pocket.
19:25
SPEAKER_01: I'm as my son, as my son-in-law says, you're out of the pocket, but he doesn't say it that way.
19:30
SPEAKER_01: Um, um, I always like to say the pocket.
19:33
SPEAKER_01: Um, but anyway, he um but my point is is like, you know, when you get that kind of feedback from people like Troy and I, it it's it's it's hard.
19:41
SPEAKER_01: It it does, it takes a hit, it's a hit, right?
19:44
SPEAKER_01: But again, I think we're getting increasingly worse and worse at receiving that critical feedback because we're allowing ourselves to be so enveloped and then so in encapsulated in these social media confirmation biases.
19:58
SPEAKER_01: You guys need to leave the confirmation bias, go out, touch grass, get in a fight with your neighbor, and then maybe I mean, maybe you'll get out there and get your feelings hurt a few times.
20:09
SPEAKER_04: You'll believe you'll find out amazingly enough, you'll survive it.
20:12
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, exactly.
20:13
SPEAKER_00: And let's have intelligent discussions about things.
20:15
SPEAKER_00: That guy that hated me when I mean he was mad when he came on to our thing.
20:19
SPEAKER_00: He didn't mad.
20:21
SPEAKER_00: But then him and I had a conversation where I said, Listen, this is what story is.
20:26
SPEAKER_00: And the problem is you took your first draft and sent it to an editor because you thought it was great, because you spent a couple weeks up in a cabin in the mountains creating this thing, but it's your first draft.
20:37
SPEAKER_00: So yeah, I can talk to you that way about your first draft because I'm like, because he was like, Well, you don't know anything about this water engineering thing that was in the book.
20:45
SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, You're right, I don't.
20:47
SPEAKER_00: I go, I wouldn't last one day as a water engineer unless I had some education.
20:51
SPEAKER_00: So what makes you think that you can write a novel without any without any training?
20:56
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
20:56
SPEAKER_01: So that then that's the thing.
20:58
SPEAKER_01: I mean, what you know, once you get past those those hurt feelings, and this this particular client and in particular, he's with he's like with working on this third revision right now with Troy.
21:08
SPEAKER_01: Like he's um, like we've we've got we've got a lasting relationship with the guy, and he's gonna eventually publish an amazing debut novel.
21:16
SPEAKER_01: Um, and it's because he's actually like set that ego aside and and understood that that kind that that applies to scams.
21:23
SPEAKER_01: That really does apply to this.
21:25
SPEAKER_01: That's why I'm saying the driving factors, you know, Brian, one of your questions was like, you know, what are your driving, what are the driving factors behind writers getting scammed?
21:32
SPEAKER_01: That is it.
21:33
SPEAKER_01: I think it is ego, 100%.
21:35
SPEAKER_04: That's a big one, I think.
21:36
SPEAKER_04: 100%.
21:37
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, but interesting uh that I've noticed is how many authors uh trust Booklocker enough to write Angie and say, Do you think this is a scam?
21:47
SPEAKER_04: Do you think this is a scam?
21:48
SPEAKER_04: Do you think this is a scam?
21:49
SPEAKER_04: Well, if you trust us enough to ask us to identify scams for you, why don't you trust us enough to sign up with us?
21:56
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I had a yeah, yesterday another one.
21:58
SPEAKER_02: A guy I've been going back and forth.
22:00
SPEAKER_02: With and these were scammers that were charging thousands more than booklocker charges.
22:06
SPEAKER_02: And he sent me another six names of companies to research for him.
22:10
SPEAKER_04: Like we got nothing better to do.
22:12
SPEAKER_04: I mean we do it, we do it for free.
22:14
SPEAKER_04: We do it and I'm one, two, maybe three, but then don't be sending us your list.
22:18
SPEAKER_02: And then I send them my eleven ways to tell if it's a scammer, but they still come back with more names.
22:23
SPEAKER_02: And I'm like, and I tell them right above my signature, I said, Booklocker's been in as in its 27th year is located in the United States, has an excellent reputation.
22:32
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
22:32
SPEAKER_02: Well, what about this company and that company and that?
22:34
SPEAKER_02: And I'm like, and one of them was gonna charge him$8,000.
22:37
SPEAKER_02: They said, Why would you publish your thousand when Booklocker can do it for$975?
22:42
SPEAKER_02: And I started to suspect that some of these people are scammers that are trying to waste my time.
22:47
SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
22:49
SPEAKER_04: Now uh perfect segue into uh another question I have, and that is um, you guys are you seeing any indicators that authors and writers are actually educating themselves on potential scams or are researching online offers that they're considering?
23:05
SPEAKER_04: Um one of the um I don't know where was I gonna go with that?
23:10
SPEAKER_02: I can tell you that more people on social media are calling out the scam posts on the author groups, they'll say, Hey, uh it's it's show your cover Tuesday or something, and and click on that person's profile, they're in Pakistan or Nigeria, and they're just trying they're they're data mining to address the code.
23:30
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, they're getting a PDF of your cover.
23:33
SPEAKER_02: And more and more people are not posting their covers and are instead saying, Go away, scammer, why isn't the moderator taking care of this, etc.
23:40
SPEAKER_04: So this is this is what I was gonna say is is is more and more we're having to tell people because I mean we we've been building a list of the scammers that we're finding.
23:51
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, we're over we're over three thousand.
23:53
SPEAKER_02: And our spreadsheet, we don't have time to add up to our website, can't do it.
23:56
SPEAKER_04: We can't publish it anymore.
23:57
SPEAKER_04: I mean, it's just that we can't keep up.
23:59
SPEAKER_04: And we tell people, you know, there's so many of them out there, there's no way we can list them all for the only thing you can do it, you have to educate yourself.
24:07
SPEAKER_04: Right, you do have to learn how to detect these things.
24:11
SPEAKER_04: You do, you absolutely do.
24:13
SPEAKER_00: I the I just want to comment on the fact of like let's let's look at a broader question.
24:19
SPEAKER_00: Are authors educating themselves on the craft and business of writing the way they should?
24:25
SPEAKER_01: In general, and the answer is no.
24:28
SPEAKER_00: And the the reason is this is because so I often tell people, I'm like, you'd be surprised the amount of education you need to write a novel.
24:36
SPEAKER_04: And I don't mean college, we don't mean getting an MFA, Troy writing writing's the fun part.
24:42
SPEAKER_04: Learning about writing, that's the hard stuff, right?
24:46
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, learning about how to do it, but learn if they would if writers would understand that learning about how to do it makes the process more enjoyable because you're better at it.
24:56
SPEAKER_00: But I'm like, in general, the problem with writers is the way they start out often is they go, I read this novel, it was pretty bad.
25:07
SPEAKER_00: I think I can do better, so I'm gonna write my own novel.
25:11
SPEAKER_00: Without going, I mean, this like the one guy, I was like, you don't have an inciting incident.
25:17
SPEAKER_00: He goes, What is an inciting incident?
25:21
SPEAKER_00: Okay, maybe we need to take a step back and look at a little bit like how much education it takes to be an author.
25:27
SPEAKER_00: Well, when you add on top of that, if you want to do this commercially, the amount of business education you need to open an author business.
25:34
SPEAKER_00: I like some of you, it's like you went and had a bad experience at the dentist.
25:38
SPEAKER_00: You thought, you know what?
25:40
SPEAKER_00: I bet I can be a better dentist.
25:43
SPEAKER_00: So you go downtown, you rent an office space, you hang out a shingle, and say, Troy Lampert, dentist.
25:50
SPEAKER_00: What how many years of experience do you have?
25:53
SPEAKER_00: None.
25:53
SPEAKER_00: None.
25:54
SPEAKER_00: How many certain do you did you go to school?
25:56
SPEAKER_00: No.
25:56
SPEAKER_00: Well, I don't need a DDS.
25:58
SPEAKER_00: That guy's a crackpot.
26:00
SPEAKER_00: I you know what DDS is a scam.
26:04
SPEAKER_00: Getting a DDS is a total scam.
26:06
SPEAKER_00: Here's where you need one to clean teeth.
26:08
SPEAKER_00: Anybody can clean teeth, and you just open a business, pretty quickly, you're gonna find out you need an education.
26:15
SPEAKER_01: Do you know what's you know what's really sad about that though is that it's just it's that easy.
26:20
SPEAKER_01: And that's why I think a lot of times people like they get frustrated because they think, well, it was so easy to get started, to write the book, to publish it, to get it out there.
26:30
SPEAKER_01: Why is it so hard to keep it going?
26:32
SPEAKER_01: Well, it's because you never really did the homework and set the foundation, right?
26:36
SPEAKER_01: So, like, really it's the same thing.
26:39
SPEAKER_01: Um, but ultimately, I think that the education to that it takes to determine whether or not you're about to be scammed or you know, that this professional is worthy of your money and time, like it I think people are lazy.
26:55
SPEAKER_01: I think they're just lazy.
26:56
SPEAKER_01: They're looking for somebody again to give them the easy button, and there's just no easy button on this.
27:01
SPEAKER_01: So AI makes it look and sound very, very easy.
27:04
SPEAKER_01: And I think what a lot of people are doing is they're throwing stuff right into AI.
27:09
SPEAKER_01: The problem is about AI and research is that it's not often gonna give you the right statistics.
27:15
SPEAKER_01: It's not gonna give you the right information, it's it's going to be biased, it's not gonna be really adversarial in a lot of ways unless you prompt it to be, but also it's not gonna give you valid, um uh valid, I guess, information that's going to be right.
27:31
SPEAKER_01: Um, so it's it's your job to double check it.
27:34
SPEAKER_01: And a lot of times it's too easy to get just the AI overview and go with that.
27:38
SPEAKER_01: Um, case in point, there's this one lady that she wrote a book about um uh she it was a it was a New York Times bestseller, no joke.
27:47
SPEAKER_01: This woman she worked at Harvard, she published this book.
27:50
SPEAKER_01: It was about uh these two women that I guess are well known in the slaving in, you know, the slaving world.
27:55
SPEAKER_01: And I just found out that this woman, her book was pulled from the publisher and she's been like stripped of her teaching degree, you know, teaching position in Harvard and everything, because they found out that the book had been like there was in misinformation in the book.
28:09
SPEAKER_01: She like said certain things or like she she did some things in the book that were like not right.
28:14
SPEAKER_01: And so the somebody who is a valid reviewer came through, and of course, now she's I mean, I hate to throw the word out, but she's like calling racism on and everything, and it's just it's not what it is.
28:26
SPEAKER_01: But but ultimately what happened was is that this woman had put a book out there, she it it hit hit the list, right?
28:35
SPEAKER_01: Like it was really easy.
28:37
SPEAKER_01: But the AI overview of of her book and what she did was enough to for you know, people to kind of just say it was okay, like it was okay that what she was saying was right.
28:52
SPEAKER_01: It wasn't until this reviewer, who's a well-respected historical reviewer, came in and did the deep dive on her book and found these mistakes that things were like, oh, wait, wait, wait, wait.
29:03
SPEAKER_01: So, my point is that AI is just not going to do a good enough job.
29:06
SPEAKER_01: You have to go in there and you have to do the work.
29:08
SPEAKER_01: You have to do you have to get dirty.
29:10
SPEAKER_01: I'm so sorry.
29:16
SPEAKER_04: We were actually talking about um there were there have been lawyers that have that have been arguing cases in front of a judge and offered case law to prove their point.
29:29
SPEAKER_04: And when you actually look back and find there is no case, it wasn't even a real case because they went to AI.
29:36
SPEAKER_04: Um Angie, uh as soon as she said the word lazy, I saw you start leaning towards the microphone.
29:40
SPEAKER_04: Did you have something to say about that?
29:42
SPEAKER_02: I well, it's a horrible word.
29:46
SPEAKER_02: I can't remember the term.
29:48
SPEAKER_02: We we did we did an episode last week on on anthropic and other AI companies.
29:55
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
29:56
SPEAKER_02: Um Brian left his ringer on.
29:58
SPEAKER_00: Potential scam.
30:00
SPEAKER_02: Oh, potential scam, okay.
30:01
SPEAKER_01: Oh my gosh, that's funny.
30:03
SPEAKER_00: Potential scam, answer it live.
30:05
SPEAKER_00: Let's find out what they're I love answering those sometimes, by the way, or texting back into work.
30:10
SPEAKER_00: So we but I mean, yes, go ahead, Angela.
30:14
SPEAKER_00: Sorry.
30:14
SPEAKER_02: So last week our episode was about AI company, Anthropic, and other AI companies buying up rare books and scanning them.
30:22
SPEAKER_02: Cut the spines off, scanning them and trashing them.
30:25
SPEAKER_02: And I am now seeing tons of articles about that topic.
30:31
SPEAKER_02: Um TikTok videos about that topic.
30:34
SPEAKER_02: A writer's group contacted me yesterday and asked me to help them create a letter to send to their representatives because they're we're trying we're trying to push for copyright law to change because the way they can use that fair use, the a federal judge determined that it was based on a copyright um uh part of the copyright law that was added in 1908.
30:57
SPEAKER_01: Yep.
30:58
SPEAKER_02: But what what one thing we uncovered, and there's a term for it, I can't remember it right now.
31:05
SPEAKER_02: Um AI companies have so much data now, data on top of data, on top of data, they're feeding each other's, they're stealing from each other's data, and now there's like Stacey said, a lot of it is incorrect information.
31:18
SPEAKER_02: Now you can't not trust AI information anymore.
31:20
SPEAKER_04: Belching out copies of copies and instant getting correct.
31:23
SPEAKER_00: The other thing is so the thing about AI is because it's predictive and because it's been trained on this huge data set, right?
31:33
SPEAKER_00: The the biggest thing about AI is that it leans towards the mean.
31:37
SPEAKER_00: What's the most probable next word in this sentence?
31:41
SPEAKER_00: Well, that's average.
31:42
SPEAKER_00: So I'm like, do you want to create something that is average?
31:47
SPEAKER_00: I tell people, nobody comes to me and says, Hey Troy, I know you're the plot dude.
31:53
SPEAKER_00: Can we get this book to average?
31:56
SPEAKER_00: Right now it's really bad.
31:58
SPEAKER_00: Can we make this an average book?
32:01
SPEAKER_01: I just want an average cover, Stacy.
32:03
SPEAKER_01: I just want to get there and I want to be an average book.
32:05
SPEAKER_00: Can I just have an average cover?
32:07
SPEAKER_00: One that just kind of blends in.
32:09
SPEAKER_00: It kind of looks like everybody else's.
32:10
SPEAKER_00: It's kind of average.
32:11
SPEAKER_00: Can I have an average cover?
32:13
SPEAKER_00: And could you edit this book to an average level?
32:15
SPEAKER_00: No, they say, I want my book to be great, and then they go, so I'm going to use whatever AI to evaluate my book and tell me what I need to do to make it great.
32:29
SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, AI isn't going to tell you that because it doesn't know what great is, it knows what average is.
32:35
SPEAKER_00: So it creates average code.
32:37
SPEAKER_00: So coders go, Yeah, I can take that code and make it great, but the stuff it spits out is average.
32:44
SPEAKER_00: It's lazy.
32:45
SPEAKER_00: And it is lazy.
32:46
SPEAKER_01: And it is lazy.
32:47
SPEAKER_01: And and the AI, the information, like you said, Brian, is when you're looking for research, you're gonna you have to double check it, which is again.
32:57
SPEAKER_01: Like you're you can't be lazy.
32:59
SPEAKER_01: You cannot be lazy.
33:00
SPEAKER_01: And writing a book has never been lazy.
33:04
SPEAKER_01: Being an author has never been lazy, it's never been easy, it's never been lazy.
33:08
SPEAKER_01: The the successful authors in this business are the ones that were they did the hard thing and they got they got dirty and they they they exposed themselves, they made mistakes, they failed, they you know, they did all the things to get to where they're at, and they all have amazing, amazing, harrowing stories about how they became successful authors.
33:32
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and none of them, it was none of them, not even.
33:36
SPEAKER_01: I mean, I had to go down a deep dive recently about Harper Lee because somebody said, Well, Harper Lee wrote one book and she was a millionaire from that one book.
33:42
SPEAKER_01: And well, I was like, Well, I'm gonna find out why, you know, and so I did the deep dive, and it was not an easy trek for that poor woman.
33:50
SPEAKER_01: And honestly, she was, you know, her her millions wasn't really as what people think it is.
33:56
SPEAKER_01: So, people, you know, like that's the thing.
33:58
SPEAKER_01: People need to understand there's a lot that goes into being an author.
34:02
SPEAKER_01: It is not an easy task.
34:04
SPEAKER_01: That's one of the reasons why it was one of those jobs that kind of was held up on a pedestal for a while because everyone knew that it wasn't tough.
34:12
SPEAKER_01: Every, you know, 90% of us are sitting around going, Oh, I have this great idea for a book.
34:17
SPEAKER_01: And only a small percent of it is small percentage ever gets that on paper.
34:22
SPEAKER_01: And a smaller percentage of that even gets that published, and a smaller percentage of that ever even sells a book.
34:28
SPEAKER_01: So, like, really, guys, we're you know, you're part of an elite group.
34:32
SPEAKER_01: You're really elite.
34:33
SPEAKER_01: And by the way, this community is small, it's a very small community.
34:38
SPEAKER_01: So if you don't, if you've never heard of somebody in this business, it's not unheard of that you won't have heard of them, but it's also not unheard of that you wouldn't ask somebody and they say, uh, I know who that is, because it's you know, it it's it's small.
34:54
SPEAKER_01: It's small.
34:55
SPEAKER_02: Now the the community of real authors is small, yeah.
34:58
SPEAKER_02: Right.
34:58
SPEAKER_02: The growing community, the growing community is the people who call themselves authors who are using AI to write their book.
35:06
SPEAKER_01: Now that that is increasingly getting bigger, yeah.
35:08
SPEAKER_02: But there are legitimate authors who are using AI to you know help them with their book, which which leads them to be a little less legitimate in my eyes.
35:18
SPEAKER_02: And what they're not realizing is when you upload your manuscript to AI to ask for help, then AI is using it to train their system.
35:27
SPEAKER_02: And then if you submit your book to Harper Collins and they run it through an AI detector, it's gonna show up as being 100% AI.
35:35
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, written.
35:35
SPEAKER_01: Well, it's gonna do that anyway, anymore.
35:37
SPEAKER_01: Um written um human books are getting flagged, and there's yeah, it's because they're getting jammed.
35:43
SPEAKER_04: I saw y'all's uh podcast episode where you were talking about even AI detectors are getting it wrong now.
35:49
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, well, AI detectors have never been good at detecting AI.
35:53
SPEAKER_00: I mean, here's the thing you're acting asking AI to detect if AI is being used in an AI thing.
36:00
SPEAKER_00: And the worst, the problem is so the other problem with feeding rough manuscripts into AI is AI trains on that data, and therefore, straight AI writing without human intervention gets worse because it's being trained on rough drafts and bad manuscripts.
36:20
SPEAKER_00: So if you train it on bad manuscripts, what is it going to imitate?
36:24
SPEAKER_00: Garbage in, garbage out, garbage in, garbage out.
36:27
SPEAKER_01: The the other thing about speaking of lazy, AI is lazy, it can't do more than a few, like you know, even if you're asking it to to like read a manuscript for you and kind of analyze it for you, you have to realize that when you the more you give it to think about, the lazier it's gonna get.
36:44
SPEAKER_04: It's gonna kind of short, it's gonna shortcut so it's trying to it's trying to compile everything into something right.
36:51
SPEAKER_00: Your context window, so so well anyway, that's it's technical, but I mean just understanding up your context that you give.
37:00
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but yeah, so many the problem with authors too is so many of them can AI be a useful tool?
37:08
SPEAKER_00: Yes, it can.
37:09
SPEAKER_00: Can it also be absolutely terrible?
37:12
SPEAKER_00: Yes, it can because it's like a shovel.
37:14
SPEAKER_00: I can kill somebody with a shovel or dig a hole, not to bury somebody, but I mean for some other reason.
37:20
SPEAKER_00: Oh, you can use a shovel to bury somebody.
37:21
SPEAKER_04: You can use a shovel for both.
37:23
SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah, I can use a shovel for both.
37:25
SPEAKER_01: I've done it before.
37:25
SPEAKER_01: I've done it, I've done it for that.
37:27
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you know, I mean, yeah.
37:30
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I did not do that last week.
37:32
SPEAKER_00: I had to get a new shovel.
37:33
SPEAKER_00: Anyway, um, but you gotta be like same reason you know, by the shovel, the lime, and the duct tape at the same store.
37:39
SPEAKER_00: Don't do it at the same store.
37:41
SPEAKER_04: It's a saying you hear up here on the mountain all the time.
37:44
SPEAKER_04: Shoot, shovel, and shut the hell up.
37:46
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, exactly.
37:48
SPEAKER_01: Where where are you guys at?
37:49
SPEAKER_01: I where are you at?
37:50
SPEAKER_04: We we live up on top of Sand Mountain in uh northwest Georgia.
37:55
SPEAKER_02: Northwest Georgia, the lights of Chattanooga from our back porch.
37:59
SPEAKER_02: Awesome.
37:59
SPEAKER_00: That's where I was born in Chattanooga, Tennessee.
38:02
SPEAKER_00: In Montana.
38:03
SPEAKER_00: My parents to move by the time I was six months old.
38:06
SPEAKER_01: You know, um we're not we're not in Montana, we're in Idaho, but like uh I have a friend that lives in Montana, and he says they'll get on the CB radio and say, uh, I need help planting an orange tree.
38:18
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, because orange trees grow in Montana, really.
38:20
SPEAKER_00: That's exactly right.
38:21
SPEAKER_00: I mean the point is the point of it is that AI is a tool, right?
38:25
SPEAKER_00: And you there's things that AI is good at, and then you can that you can use it for.
38:29
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean, you can debate the ethics and all that kind of stuff.
38:32
SPEAKER_00: We can debate that all day long.
38:34
SPEAKER_00: But I mean, as an author, I'm like, why I want an AI robot that will vacuum my house, mow my lawn, and do my laundry so I can write more.
38:45
SPEAKER_01: That's exactly right.
38:46
SPEAKER_00: Why I want to spend time writing, I love drafting, I love writing.
38:51
SPEAKER_00: I'm not talking about making my drafting process more efficient, I'm talking about making my drafting process more fun all the time because that's why I do it.
39:01
SPEAKER_00: So, why do we want to apply AI to the writing process when that's the thing that's the joy and the fun that we get?
39:10
SPEAKER_00: And so I'm like, look, you're just using it for the wrong things.
39:14
SPEAKER_00: It's okay, but I mean, think for a minute.
39:17
SPEAKER_00: Don't let don't outsource your thinking to AI, outsource your non-thinking to AI.
39:24
SPEAKER_00: You know, automate something that you don't have to think about, so it's one less thing on your plate.
39:29
SPEAKER_00: I mean, come on.
39:29
SPEAKER_01: And if you and if you're using it for research, you're gonna have to still be a researcher.
39:33
SPEAKER_00: Oh, just like an intern.
39:35
SPEAKER_00: I tell people it's like an intern that you know you have to double check their work.
39:39
SPEAKER_04: Right.
39:39
SPEAKER_04: Exactly.
39:40
SPEAKER_04: We're gonna have to have you guys on again for an AI episode.
39:43
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, I think I wanted to mention one thing.
39:47
SPEAKER_02: Um there's a lot in the author groups on social media, there's the pro AI writers and the anti-AI writers.
39:54
SPEAKER_02: You're using it.
39:54
SPEAKER_02: I'm sure y'all are seeing those arguments, right?
39:58
SPEAKER_02: One one common one from the pro AI people is well, if you're using Microsoft Word to check your spelling and grammar, then that's AI.
40:05
SPEAKER_02: I'm like, mm-mm no, we're not talking about the same thing.
40:08
SPEAKER_02: And I also want to mention, um, and I'm sure you guys have heard this, Grammarly has a very long contract, and a lot of people use Grammarly.
40:16
SPEAKER_02: And you have to specifically opt out, nobody reads contract, otherwise, they that you're giving them permission to use your training, train their system.
40:25
SPEAKER_02: Yep.
40:27
SPEAKER_04: Okay, guys, I'm gonna give each one an opportunity.
40:30
SPEAKER_04: Uh, last little wrap up here.
40:32
SPEAKER_04: Um, advice you would give to authors to avoid scams.
40:38
SPEAKER_01: Troy, you want to go first?
40:40
SPEAKER_00: Oh, sure.
40:41
SPEAKER_00: Um because I mean, it really boils down to a lot of the things that we've said in this episode, boil down to one thing.
40:48
SPEAKER_00: Educate yourself.
40:50
SPEAKER_00: There is no way that there's no easy button.
40:52
SPEAKER_00: You can't just go on the writer writers weekly website, search a database, and find out if something is a scam or not, right?
40:59
SPEAKER_00: It could be new last Tuesday.
41:01
SPEAKER_00: Okay, we just it's just not possible.
41:03
SPEAKER_00: You have to educate yourself on what a scam looks like, and one of the ways you do that is by like Stacey was talking about, is learn what legitimate professionals look like, and then you can spot a scam a million miles away.
41:17
SPEAKER_00: So educate yourself, educate yourself.
41:20
SPEAKER_00: It is your job to be savvy and to set aside that ego for a minute and to take a hard look at what is this person actually offering?
41:29
SPEAKER_00: Does this make any sense?
41:31
SPEAKER_00: Is this real?
41:32
SPEAKER_00: And don't respond to those things that aren't.
41:34
SPEAKER_00: But educate yourself.
41:36
unknown: Yeah.
41:37
SPEAKER_01: And and my advice is about your ego.
41:40
SPEAKER_01: Like, really, just like I love all of you authors.
41:44
SPEAKER_01: This is why I spend my world here.
41:46
SPEAKER_01: This is you people are just as weird as I am, and I love it.
41:49
SPEAKER_01: I love every single one of you.
41:51
SPEAKER_01: But you have to understand that all your little egos are very, very fragile.
41:56
SPEAKER_01: And you need you to put them in the back pocket for a minute and ignore it for just a second and remember what it's like to be a little bit more like a child and and want to learn from people that maybe have come before you.
42:08
SPEAKER_01: And, you know, it's one of the reasons why I love going to conferences because I love going and meeting other professionals that have been around longer or have done certain things or specialize in other things that I don't specialize in, so that I can add them to my my Rolodex for those of you who are in that kind of age rate, age group.
42:27
SPEAKER_01: You know, we all remember the Rolodex, right?
42:29
SPEAKER_00: If you remember what that was, take your Ibuprofen, your over.
42:32
SPEAKER_04: Go ahead and Google it.
42:33
SPEAKER_04: You'll you'll see an image.
42:34
SPEAKER_04: It's add you to my contact list.
42:35
SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
42:36
SPEAKER_04: Uh yeah, it's not that.
42:37
SPEAKER_01: It's like I had like dudes, guys, I had the big Rolodex on my desk.
42:42
SPEAKER_01: I loved spinning that thing.
42:44
SPEAKER_01: Um, but anyway, yeah, I love my Rolodex.
42:47
SPEAKER_01: But honestly, like that's what I, you know, what what helps me be a better person is the people that are behind me, the people, the shoulders that I get to stand on, like Angela and like Troy, like the like you, Brian.
43:00
SPEAKER_01: Like I love putting you people in my toolbox and going, well, I don't know the answer to that, but I know somebody who might.
43:08
SPEAKER_01: And going to that person.
43:09
SPEAKER_01: And that's what's beautiful about networking.
43:12
SPEAKER_01: And and as an author, you should do that.
43:15
SPEAKER_01: You shouldn't think that you have to know it all by yourself.
43:18
SPEAKER_01: You don't have to know it all by yourself.
43:20
SPEAKER_01: The pe the authors that are the strongest are the ones that have a team with them.
43:25
SPEAKER_01: And that's what I my advice is get yourself a team so that you're not doing this business by yourself so that when you have the underwear showing or the toilet paper hanging off of your shoe, you're welcome, Troy.
43:38
SPEAKER_01: You can, you can, you can have somebody to tell you, uh, honey, sweetie, I love you.
43:44
SPEAKER_01: Um, your lipstick is on your teeth.
43:47
SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, like you got food between there, you know, like that, those, those are your people, right?
43:53
SPEAKER_01: And um, that's what we want.
43:55
SPEAKER_01: We want to feel secure and safe.
43:57
SPEAKER_01: And you're only gonna feel secure and safe when you have.
44:00
SPEAKER_01: You have a gang with you.
44:01
SPEAKER_01: And so get yourself a gang.
44:03
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
44:05
SPEAKER_04: Angie, can you wanna throw anything out there before we go?
44:08
SPEAKER_02: I I can't say this enough and I will keep saying it over and over again.
44:11
SPEAKER_02: If somebody contacts you unsolicited through your website, through social media, through the phone and email just assume it's a scam, because 99.9% of the time it is.
44:24
SPEAKER_02: If everybody followed that rule, the authors would stop being scammed.
44:28
SPEAKER_02: Also, if you do get scammed, or if you think you're about to get scammed, reach out to me, ridersweekly.com, the contact us button, I'll help you out.
44:36
SPEAKER_02: I won't charge you a penny to do it.
44:38
SPEAKER_02: If you have been scammed, please check your ego at the door and let people know you got scammed so other people will get that information and post the name of the company and the website.
44:57
SPEAKER_02: Even if you go on Facebook and put the name of the company, the website address, and I got scammed, be sure and click so the website doesn't pop up under your post.
45:05
SPEAKER_02: When people Google the name of that company, oftentimes that post on Facebook is going to pop up in the top of the search results.
45:12
SPEAKER_02: And we're not talking about it helps educate others.
45:14
SPEAKER_01: We're not talking about cancel culture here, like, oh, this editor pissed me off.
45:18
SPEAKER_01: We're talking like scam.
45:19
SPEAKER_01: Right.
45:19
SPEAKER_01: So like real scam.
45:20
SPEAKER_01: I mean, I really think that it's important that you understand that you're part of that small community, that elite group.
45:26
SPEAKER_01: Gosh, guys, own that.
45:27
SPEAKER_01: Like take care of each other.
45:29
SPEAKER_01: We're not, you know, you're gonna be stronger as a united group.
45:34
SPEAKER_01: So just keep that in mind when you're sharing that information.
45:37
SPEAKER_01: It's not just you're helping, you're doing a community service and you can wear a nice little badge.
45:43
SPEAKER_01: The more you know.
45:44
SPEAKER_01: Um, so yeah, you know, that's what I think you guys should be doing, helping each other.
45:49
SPEAKER_04: Stacy, how can people reach out to you and uh get you in uh oh you can find me, yeah.
45:54
SPEAKER_01: You can find me at print to pro dot com, P R P R I N T T O P R O dot com.
46:02
SPEAKER_01: You can also reach to me, uh reach out to me at Stacy at Printerpro.com.
46:05
SPEAKER_01: You can reach Troy at Troy at Printer Pro.com.
46:09
SPEAKER_01: Um, we um we are we have a podcast called Pros Talking Pros.
46:14
SPEAKER_01: Um you can you we're just Google us, you'll find us.
46:17
SPEAKER_01: I I can't hide on the internet.
46:19
SPEAKER_01: You know, it's I gave up a long time ago to try and hide.
46:22
SPEAKER_01: Um, so you just google us and you'll find us.
46:24
SPEAKER_04: Um that podcast is pros pro s talking P-R-O-S-E.
46:30
SPEAKER_04: Right.
46:30
SPEAKER_04: Exactly.
46:31
SPEAKER_01: There is another gal out there with that that podcast name, but uh we've got about 150 videos and she's got five.
46:39
SPEAKER_01: So like it's not gonna be hard to find us.
46:42
SPEAKER_04: And I I I highly recommend everybody uh go go go watch that.
46:46
SPEAKER_04: The these these two uh really really get into the nitty-gritty of a lot of stuff and the and y'all are funny in your oh thanks, Angela.
46:54
SPEAKER_04: So entertaining they're easy to watch, and so yeah, yeah, it's it's uh it's a good experience.
46:59
SPEAKER_04: I think you can learn a lot from these folks.
47:01
SPEAKER_04: Troy, how can people reach out to you if they don't want to go to Print to Pro Troy?
47:08
SPEAKER_00: You can find me at theplotabides.com if you're not a big Lebowski fan and you don't understand that, spend two minutes on the website and you will suddenly understand that.
47:18
SPEAKER_00: Um anyway, uh yeah, and that's really between them and print to pro, that's the easiest way to find me.
47:26
SPEAKER_00: Um, but I always tell people you can Google me, I am not hard to find around for a long time, and everything about my life pops up everywhere.
47:37
SPEAKER_04: So um, you know I I saw where uh you even um I I I guess you had a son that lived not too far from the from the uh apartment with those uh stepson, my those students were killed.
47:52
SPEAKER_00: My ex-wife's son was there, and yeah, so I so and I accidentally so it's kind of accidentally you stuck yourself right in the middle of a crime scene.
48:02
SPEAKER_00: I did not the the way the whole thing started, I ended up in the middle, but the way the whole thing started was we were up there in December picking him up again.
48:09
SPEAKER_00: Ex-wife, so you know, don't want to get get too detailed, but anyway, but so but there were some people that wanted to talk to parents and you know stuff like that, and they were down, you know, and so I'm like, Yeah, I'm I'm a step parent, but I'm also a crime novelist, you know, and stuff like that.
48:25
SPEAKER_00: And so I just go down to talk to these people, they have no badges, no nothing, but one of the gals has a British accent.
48:31
SPEAKER_00: I'm like, that's kind of cool, whatever.
48:33
SPEAKER_00: And so I just talked to them.
48:34
SPEAKER_00: And then my friend in the UK called me and said, By the way, you were on Sky News, and I was like, Yes, I was what?
48:42
SPEAKER_00: She's like, Yeah, you're on Sky News.
48:44
SPEAKER_00: I'm like, Oh my goodness.
48:45
SPEAKER_00: Well, next thing I know, a couple big, you know, true crime broadcasters contact me.
48:49
SPEAKER_00: Hey man, you willing to talk to us?
48:51
SPEAKER_00: Hey man, you willing to talk to us?
48:52
SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, sure.
48:54
SPEAKER_00: I don't know how much I have to say, but sure.
48:57
SPEAKER_00: Um, I'll talk to you.
48:58
SPEAKER_00: And so it was so I was I've been on those podcasts, a few of them I've been on a number of times.
49:02
SPEAKER_00: So it's just kind of funny.
49:04
SPEAKER_01: It was funny too, because one of the times he told me, I'm like, You get to talk about Coburger?
49:07
SPEAKER_01: Oh my gosh, I've been following this case for months.
49:10
SPEAKER_01: Like, and I was like, I was so mad at him.
49:13
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, Did you know that there's a copycat?
49:15
SPEAKER_01: I went down this room.
49:16
SPEAKER_01: I said we should probably do a crime, a crime podcast because it would be so fun.
49:20
SPEAKER_01: Uh anyway, that'd be cool.
49:22
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, anyway.
49:22
SPEAKER_04: Okay, well, we really appreciate you guys coming on.
49:25
SPEAKER_04: You were a lot of fun.
49:26
SPEAKER_01: Oh, great.
49:27
SPEAKER_01: It's been great.
49:28
SPEAKER_01: I love talking to you and Angela.
49:30
SPEAKER_01: Like, you it's just we have so much fun with you guys.
49:32
SPEAKER_01: We really appreciate it.
49:33
SPEAKER_01: And yeah, we we love it.
49:35
SPEAKER_01: We'll we'll come back anytime and we'll have you guys on ours.
49:38
SPEAKER_01: It'll be great.
49:38
SPEAKER_01: Awesome.
49:39
SPEAKER_02: And we're going to post all these links underneath this episode at writersweekly.com slash podcast episode 52.
49:45
SPEAKER_02: Excuse me.
49:46
SPEAKER_02: And uh y'all definitely want to listen to pros talking pros because you laugh every single episode.
49:53
SPEAKER_01: Oh, again, thanks again, guys.
50:01
SPEAKER_04: Glad to have you.
50:02
SPEAKER_04: And uh if you don't want to get scammed, come on over to booklocker.com.
50:07
SPEAKER_04: We're gonna treat you right.
50:08
SPEAKER_04: Been in business 27 years.
50:10
SPEAKER_04: Our prices are competitive.
50:11
SPEAKER_04: We've got uh five-star ratings in a lot of places.
50:14
SPEAKER_04: We got an A plus rating with the Better Business Bureau.
50:18
SPEAKER_04: And how many publishing companies do you know that when you write them an email, it's gonna go straight to the CEO and president of the company, not some person in the Philippines talking on the phone to you who's gonna pass, you know, next time you call, you're gonna be talking to another person in the Philippines that's gonna have to look at a bunch of notes.
50:35
SPEAKER_02: Well, the nice thing is since I'm answering those emails, I don't have to do formatting or book cover design anymore.
50:40
SPEAKER_02: We've grown.
50:41
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, we have lots of employees now.
50:42
SPEAKER_02: Well that's true.
50:43
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, we have I'd much rather just talk to people all day.
50:46
SPEAKER_04: So we've been growing and and and Angela gets to talk to the uh, you know, Angela gets to be a boss more than a worker nowadays.
50:53
SPEAKER_04: Oh, that's fun.
50:54
SPEAKER_04: Oh yeah.
50:56
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
50:56
SPEAKER_02: So Brian, it's time for you to make my lunch.
50:58
SPEAKER_04: Well, we're gonna we're gonna wrap this up.
51:01
SPEAKER_04: Brian's gonna heat up a frozen pizza.
51:08
SPEAKER_04: We got some leftover steak from last night.
51:10
SPEAKER_04: There you go.
51:11
SPEAKER_04: There you go.
51:11
SPEAKER_04: Something.
51:13
SPEAKER_04: All right.
51:13
SPEAKER_04: Well, that that wraps it up.
51:15
SPEAKER_04: Thanks for listening to the Writers Weekly Podcast.
51:18
SPEAKER_04: We will see you all next time.