Contract signed with publisher!

I’ve just signed a contract with World Scientific Publishing to publish my Applied Analog Electronics textbook.  They first contacted me on 2021 Oct 7 expressing an interest in the book, we met on Zoom on Oct 20, and they had a proposed contract to me by Oct 26, and we had a few back-and-forth rounds of negotiations.  The final contract was sent to me on Nov 19, I signed Nov 21, and they signed Nov 24. So the full process took about 48 days.

Here is the contract:

karplus agreement 11-17-21Download

The most surprising thing in the contract is that they are continuing to let me sell the PDF through Leanpub (and my own web site, if I ever create one).  The royalties per book for Leanpub sales are higher than I’ll get from World Scientific Publishing, and the price will most likely be lower.

I did not use a lawyer in negotiating the contract—I contacted 4 lawyers who specialize in book contracts, but even the cheapest of them was too expensive, as I don’t really expect to make much money on this publishing deal.  I did use two online books:

• Guide to Textbook Publishing Contracts by Stephen Gillen
• Understanding and Negotiating Book Publication Contracts edited by Brianna L. Schofield & Robert Kirk Walker

Now I just have to get the 250MB of source files to the publisher and fill out the promotional questionnaire.  They may want me to make some small changes (like changing the title page).  When they are ready to publish, I’ll have to register the copyright also.

I’ll post here again when the book becomes available in paper.