A giant BOO and HISS to Sony…first we have the whole DRM thing, which soured me greatly. Okay, I’m prepared to be big about this and forgive them because they backed off and made retribution. Stupid mistake on their part, but still, I have always liked their hardware. Had a Sony VAIO laptop for several years. I’ve always reccomended Sony laptops for folks that want to buy a PC platform.

But now, spending money on Sony–not so much.

I’m reading Gizmodo and ogling all the new gadgets at the Consumer Electronics Show, this item caught my eye.

It’s perfect, I think – you can buy e-books, you can download HTML files and PDFs (perfect for reading fic). So I try to go to the Connect Store to see if I can find out more info (e.g., what it’s going to cost, when it will be available, etc.

This is what I get:

Our Apologies

Thank your for your interest in the Connect music store!

Uh, so sorry – I don’t use IE for anything but testing stuff at work. My primary browser on a PC is Firefox. My primary browser on a Mac is Safari. So you won’t let me shop, huh? Well, then SO SORRY back atcha, no Sony products for this techie.

ETA:
This is what Publisher’s Lunch (a daily news e-mail from Publisher’s Weekly has to say):

Dear Santa, if I’m a Very Good Girl…

I’d really like one of these for Xmas. ::g:;

Follow me to the doctor

Okay – I promised myself I wouldn’t rant about my publisher until Wednesday – not until I saw for sure if he’d mailed out my royalty check (“Priority,” he said. “In the mail,” he said). But this just was the final straw.

This is a man, who by all accounts, is “too busy” and can’t keep up with projects and can’t keep up with demands on him from booksellers, authors, the printing house, Ingram’s, etc.

As per my question to him re: royalties:

Actually, I just took a quick glance and you’re absolutely right(it didn’t take much research to see I made a boneheaded mistake). I looked at all the wrong numbers (wrong months). I do this all manually, so human error does exist, one of the reasons I always tell folks to let me know if their numbers don’t add up with mine.

Uh, dude – I’m thinking that’s YOUR job to make sure the numbers work – b/c me, all *I* know is how many books there were at events, not what sold via online sales and such. I mean, really, am I totally off base here?

Today, I check his blog, because this is the *only* way I know that I made top 5 sales since debut. He never shares this in our author discussion group. (Not that he has to, but supposedly, he’s “in touch” with all of us; you know, more personal attention, yadda yadda – things I fell for when I signed the bloody contract – which btw, he’s never counter-signed.)

The part of his blog entry that totally made me run out of my office ranting:

So, this blog was supposed to be more than just our sales numbers but boy have I been busy lately. Just a lot of things all going on at the same time.

I also just received my next manuscript back from my editor. So, I’m torn. I want to get this new manuscript written during this month, but my editor offered some very exciting ideas for the already finished manuscript…leaving me in a quandry…what child do you take care of?

Uh – Dude – how about paying attention to your primary business – your PUBLISHING house? You have dozens of authors that have been neglected and aren’t getting their royalty checks because you (admittedly) are a bonehead. Last time I checked, *we* are the ones making *your* money – because you’re certainly not making it at NaNoWriMo or in your writing.

I’m furious. I’m frustrated and just tired of beating a horse that’s long since crossed over the Styx. My agent hunt is on full time again and once I land an agent, I’m getting out of the remainder of the contract and moving on. I’d rather not have any more books with him, because I can’t trust him to pay me what’s due, nor to concentrate on making a success of the publishing house.

I never planned to make a fortune at this, nor even a living wage, but I expect to be treated like a professional.