Bloggers Beware: VSP Publishing

My fellow bloggers,

I would like to say a word on VSP PUBLISHING.

A little more than a year ago, I joined the book tour on The Seduction Expert, whose publisher is VSP Publishing, organized by Book Unleashed. In good faith, I helped promote the book.

Recently, I received an email from Book Unleashed, nicely asking me to take down the previous post that I did on the book, because the publisher wanted to release a new edition of the book. Which I did. I appreciate the email and would gladly remove any post I had done, whether on my blog or those cross-posted to Twitter.

At that time, though, I didn’t remember to delete the cross-tweet that I did.

So today, I received a DMCA notice from Twitter issued by the publisher, that they had removed the concerned tweets. Okay, fine. However, get this–the publisher reported, and I quote, “Description of infringement: This user do not have the right to use our picture without our permission.”

What!

There are no words. Truly. I have been rendered speechless.

I am angry and upset. I had done nothing wrong! Who complains to Twitter or Facebook without first emailing a blogger, when they (the publisher and author) are the ones who wanted us to promote their book on our social media platforms in the first place? And what kind of author or publisher reported such false and patently untrue statement when the material came from them, and when they contracted a book tour, they’re implicitly giving permission for bloggers to use the materials, which includes the book cover??

Here is a pic of the email that Twitter sent me, which includes the above untrue statement. Oh, and they also targeted other blogs, and my link is toward the bottom, so there are 2 pics. Click on the pic to enlarge:

 

And this part encircled below just disgusts me:

Not authorized?? Let me tell you, VSP Publishing, when you contract a tour organizer for a book tour and you give them all your book materials, like the book cover, summary, buy link etc, you are giving them permission (read: authorization) to use said materials to promote your book! What you said above is a total lie, and Twitter should sue you for misrepresentation.

Here are my thoughts:

1.) I appreciate what Book Unleashed did. They were professional about the entire matter. All authors and publishers should try writing the blogger a nice email first before sending her threatening letters of takedown and involving FB and Twitter. Oh, and giving her ample time to take down said posts and tweets. We’re not robots. We’re humans and blogging is but one part of our lives. We need time to comb through everything, especially if it’s been more than a year since the post concerned was posted.

2.) I will never ever promote a book by VSP Publishing again. Once bitten, twice shy and all that. Plus, I don’t want to work with anyone so unprofessional as what they’d done to me and other bloggers.

At the bottom of the email I received from Twitter (before the portion detailing the DMCA filed by VSP Publishing), it says: “Please note that repeat violations of this policy may result in suspension of your account. In order to avoid this, do not post additional material in violation of our Copyright Policy and immediately remove any material from your account for which you are not authorized to post.”

Now, why would I promote this publisher’s book again and invite trouble for the future?

RECOMMENDATION:

So my fellow bloggers, promote VSP Publishing’s books at your own risk! You have been warned.

***NOTE: The opinions and emotions on this post are my own. Please do not disturb other people if you have complaints about this post.