The Yaoi Review is offering different prizes in their latest contest. Half a page of Bastard King (upcoming sequel to Dark Prince) is one of the strips available for captioning. Have a look. CONTEST #4: Funny Dialogue Contest

This post is a follow-up to Deb Aoki's great iPad article on About.com. I gave this quote: "I'm not as hopeful about the iPad as I was this morning. The iTunes store just rejected Zesty, our tamest graphic novel, without citing a reason. We thought this could be a bright spot for us akin to our sales on Amazon Kindle, but we're very discouraged right now."

I would be the last person to sneer at any digital method that gives our readers a way to purchase our books. I've been lauding how wonderful Kindle has been for Yaoi Press for some time now on Twitter. We've had great success offering our titles online with Netcomics and Digital Manga.

I will continue to pursue all platforms for digital distribution because that's where the business has been going for years now. It makes sense for publishers. The archaic book store returns model is crippling the industry. Printing costs continue to rise. Shipping and warehousing physical books is an enormous expense both for the publisher and the consumer, and limits access geographically. All these ancillary expenses takes away income that could be given to writers and artists who desperately need it.

It's true that the Kindle app store gives us defacto iTunes distribution, but this has been for tiny-screened iPhones. The iPad may change things, but it was just released and most of our audience (under 26 and living with parents) don't have the money to run out and buy one.

What they all have is cell phones, because it's considered a necessity. Their cost tolerance is very high for cell phone technology. For instance, a college student I knew who lived with her parents earned $200 a month at a weekend job. She spent $90 a month for her cell phone plan.

We still have the tiny screen to contend with. I don't know how the Kindle app works on the iPhone, but full pages where people have to zoom in and out to read it is what we were trying to avoid. I see someone buying one manga with this small screen hassle and then giving up on them.

We were reformatting our books for viewing on the iPhone. Our provider warned us Apple was strict. This is why we picked Zesty as our first title to launch.

Zesty is not yaoi as many people define it. There are no sex scenes. It's kisses and comedy.

People who've read Zesty may be saying, "I bet it was the 'strictly dickly' line." We took this line out for our submission to Apple:

Original Graphic Novel -


iTunes:


Our provider warned us they were fickle about what they accepted and rejected. He cited one book that was rejected because it showed a character smoking.

What he described to me was similar to my experience with Canadian Customs. One time they rejected a case of Cain vol. 3 (Mature Readers), the next day they allow in cases of Happy Yaoi Yum Yum (Adults Only). It depends on the customs agent on duty and how deep they dig.

I wish I had an iPhone so I could see if any gay themed media is accepted. Please comment if you have an answer for me.

I accept every restriction to keep titles out of the hands of children. I support these restrictions. They enable parents to be able to decide what their kids should have access to. New platforms need to enable parents to restrict their children's access to what content they choose. The medium itself should not act as parents for their users.

Labels: ipad, itunes, yaoi

Hello All,

Please consider bidding on one of these auctions supporting the Haiti relief effort:

Yaoi Merchandise Bundle

***New 1/20/10 Artwork Auctions for Haiti***

If you're not in the position to be spending money you can still help by spreading awareness. I'd appreciate promotion for the auctions, but there are other ways you can use your blogs, web sites, journals, or gallery pages to help.

Promote this Google link. People can donate to Unicef or CARE directly from that page, and they've linked other major charities supporting relief efforts. They offer a gadget you can embed in your site that will help victims and their families connect to a central hub of information:



This is Yamila. I've very been extremely busy with launching a new imprint. I heard a little bit of news about the earthquakes in Haiti here and there, but hadn't stopped to learn about anything first hand. This morning I received emails from two European studios that work for Yaoi Press asking for me to help promote their charity efforts for Haiti.

Haiti is in the United States front yard. It's closer to us than my mother's hometown in Puerto Rico. The Haitians are relying on the USA to help them right now. I'm ashamed that I had to get emails from KOSEN and Studio Kawaii in Spain before I made an effort to help.

The UN says earthquakes in Haiti are the "Worst disaster we've ever dealt with." 200,000 people are estimated dead. Three to five million were caught in the epicenter, which is the capitol of Haiti and it's most populous area. The suffering there right now is unimaginable. I hope we can rally for the plight of these people.

Please go here to read the free preview of Incubus Master part 1:

http://www.everythingyaoi.com/Incubus_Master_Part_1.htm


The erotic illustration is obscured in the file above, but you can have it revealed to you by one of two ways:

Make a purchase of any amount at http://www.everythingyaoi.com from now until January 15th.

~OR~

Show Maria from Everythingyaoi.com that you deserve your free smutty image! We know you're a devoted yaoi fan, and a supporter of Yaoi Press. We'll reward you for that. Show Maria how you've helped us get the word out about Yaoi Prose.

Did you comment on a blog about us and give the link to this site? Were you able to put our banner up on your site or give us a text link? Did you give Yaoi Prose a blurb in a report you posted? Did you tweet about us with a link? Did you mention us on Facebook? (Will you?)

We need promotion. It's easy right now. Were giving free yaoi erotic here. People will want to know about that. Help us get this info to them.

Then Email maria at everythingyaoi dot com with evidence of your pro Yaoi Prose activities to get your free erotic image.

Part 2 of Incubus Master shall launch on January 12th! We're looking into the best ways to offer delivery of our ebooks. We know PDFs are the standard, but do you have other formats you want or need? Please comment.

Jinady was forced to be a sex slave to a tribe of winged incubi for a year when he's rescued by the regal demon Figaru. Figaru brings Jinady to a settlement of mortals. Jinady learns that Figaru is the king of this settlement, and that he's been looking for a mate.

Figaru's adoring subjects start to match-make the two. Jinady finds himself falling for the noble demon king. He senses his feelings are being reciprocated.

Then Jinady discovers Figaru's former love interest Rowan is locked in a dark cabin with a magical 'blood chain' connecting his throat to a wall. Several demon allies are rallying to help Rowan, including Scor, the demon Figaru almost beat to death.


Jinady seeks the truth about what happened between Rowan and Figaru, while trying to resist the strong seductive lure of the demon king.

Part 1 of Incubus Master will be available free for adults to download on January 7th. You can get it right now by making a purchase of any amount at Everythingyaoi.com.

Incubus Master is an erotic ebook written by Yamila Abraham (Winter Demon, Dark Prince) and illustrated by Barbara Apostolico (Cain, Winter Demon).It will be serialized in eight parts over the coming weeks. Each section will have 6,000 to 7,500 words and a color illustration.

Sign up for the Yaoi Prose mailing list to get updated when new fiction is available.

Yaoi Prose ebooks will help fund future Yaoi Press graphic novels. A portion of the money earned on Incubus Master will go toward the creation of Bastard King, the upcoming sequel to the Dark Prince series.

A Smarty Pig account has been set up for public view here, and has been linked to our main Twitter account. We hope with every new update we'll be closer to our goal of financing the art work for Bastard King.

The Kindle is fantastic. I have held one of these nifty gadgets in my hand and been blown away with it's clear paper-like screen, long battery life, and amazing light weight.

I no longer have the Kindle I mentioned. I bought it for an Australian customer. She bought a Kindle DX and had it shipped to our worker Maria. Maria bought all the yaoi available for the Kindle and shipped it back to her.

Now the Global Kindle has come out, and my Australian friend wishes she had waited. (But we're helping her sell her old one for her, no prob).

The need for a Global Kindle is more pressing than the USA-only one that was originally launched. I only see the world in shades of yaoi. The UK and Australia have a great demand for English yaoi, yet little supply. I suggest that we make the Kindle the solution for our overseas yaoi fans. Let's make the Kindle investment twice as good for these starved yaoi and manga fans.

Digital Manga, I'm talking to you guys since you've put yaoi on the Kindle with me: Let's offer a Yaoi Kindle Deal. If someone from overseas is willing to pay $259 plus the $18 for Airmail shipping let's sell it to them with $200 worth of free yaoi manga preinstalled.

It won't be difficult to pull off. Akadot Retail and Everythingyaoi.com could become resellers of the Kindle and buy them wholesale. Then we offer them for sale with a selection of yaoi manga the customers can choose from, up to $200. The Kindle attaches to a computer with the same cord it uses to recharge. You can install PRC files on it without registering the Kindle on Amazon. I installed Winter Demon on the Australian girl's Kindle as a free gift to her before I registered it.

Even after loading 30 titles on their Kindles there will still be plenty more for them to buy for it. We will be seeding customers with the ability to buy our books where they can't usually do so. We can't count on these customers to buy a Kindle without this sort of incentive. It's a big investment. But when you offer them such added value I can see two girls pooling their money together to get one. (Then getting sick of sharing and buying their own).

Publishers should do this with the Kindle. Think of it as a video game console. Super Nintendo wouldn't have sold without that copy of Super Mario Bros. 2. Sega Genesis wouldn't have sold without Sonic the Hedgehog. (I'm dating myself, aren't I?). A dictionary or some public domain stuff doesn't sweeten the deal enough. The Kindle should have book bundles preinstalled to give fans of different genres the incentive to buy.

I'm willing to offer the Yaoi Press library as the free books they can select to get with the Kindle. I can't do this by myself, however. We don't have enough books! I need DMP or another Kindle-enabled publisher to join with me on this.

Why am I blogging about this instead of emailing them directly? I would have to commit ritual suicide if I got DMP to invest in this idea and it was a total flop. Consider this post my first step in market research.

Do you want to see this happen? Would you buy a yaoi-loaded Kindle? Then comment!

The Yaoi Press web store Everythingyaoi.com Has been upgraded for PCI Security compliance.

You could always checkout securely through Google Checkout. Now you can checkout directly through the site with PCI compliant SSL security. Nothing is safer for credit card transactions on the internet!

Yaoi Press titles are on sale at 43% off at our store. Most other books (June, Deux) are on sale too. Our clearance area has some amazing deals, like $2 anime DVDs. It's worth checking out!