BREAKTHROUGH: Publisher takes pity on author with shitty printer and offers to mail contract copies! Behold the power of the Whine! (Seriously, though, this pointless ordeal pretty much ruined my weekend. And I feel like a total loser for being the only writer whose printer chokes on the company's watermark.)
Well, guys, in spite of all your efforts to help, I can't seem to get that mangy Dell monkey to behave. After a full day of seeking help at my authors' loop and elsewhere on the 'Net, nobody seems to realize what a sack of shit the All-in-One printer is. You see, it can perform three tasks -- scanning, copying, and printing -- but can't do any of them with any degree of finesse. Normally, the AiO's borderline performance is acceptable -- I don't need to do a lot of scanning, copying, or printing and, when I do, the unit's output suffices. It's only this publisher's watermark that gives me major headaches.
What a total freakin' waste of time, effort, and ink.
9 comments:
Oh Crap. Is there anyway to use a friend's printer? Or PITA, but take it to a Kinkos or something... download the file to an external USB and let them figure it out at Kinkos?
Sounds so ridiculous that your books getting published hinge on a stupid watermark and an assumption by a publisher that everyone has a sophisticated printer. Still rooting for you.
Well, Leah, I'm nowhere near a copy center, since I live in the boonies. And I don't want to impose on a friend to print out 22 pages of contract that'll eat up their ink. Besides, most of the people I know have crappier computers than I do and don't even have printers because they don't need 'em.
This is just humiliating. Wish I could afford a better printer, but I can't. Ain't no sugar daddy in this household! ;-)
Thanks for your concern, sweetie.
Hey, KZ
Now's the time to share with the PTB and your editor.
Don't worry, you'll get it
Well that sucks. If the publisher is going to be a total dick-head and won't send you one e-mail me, really. The process will be slower but we can get it to you.
tammy.ames(at)rogers.com
Have to say it again: You guys are the greatest! Thanks again for your offers of help.
Jeanne, the reason I held off going that route was the initial response I got from TPTB, which was, in short, "adjust the settings on your printer." I figured the ball was back in my court and it was up to me to find a solution.
I still think this is simple.
If you have Word and they have Word which is typical even if the versions are different.
Then they send you an email with the attached Word document with their stupid watermark and you simply paste in a scanned image of your signature and re-attach it and email it back.
At no time should you really need to print out anything. Why? People fax legal docs all the time and it's the exact same concept.
YAAAAAAY!!! They have a soul after all. :-) I'm sure you can't be the ONLY person who has issues with that. Anyway, its over, you can breath and enjoy your release day.
I'm afraid that's not how they do things, TeddyP. The contract is sent as a secured Adobe .pdf document. Except for filling in the appropriate blannks, it can't be altered. Once it's filled in, it can't be saved, either--only printed.
This is called "lawyerthink." ;-)
But OTOH, I knew they'd take pity on you, KZ. My printer broke down the last book I wrote for them and they sent everything out no fuss, no muss.
Speaking of which I have to see if my printer is printing. The last time I used it was about two weeks ago.
Time to try and shake up cyan and magenta!
Word verification word: nosip
A nosip is someone who only gossips between sips of coffee.
;~D
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