The man behind Brit Writers is CEO Imran Akram, who prior to this current venture started the Muslim Writers’ Awards. This award is run in connection with "Innovate Arts", Muslim Hands and Birmingham City Council, but the link from the Council web site to Innovate Arts is no longer valid - so their website has been withdrawn. Muslin Hands is a based at 148 Gregory Boulevard Nottingham the same address as the Muslim Writers Awards. So it would seem Mr Akram is a serial entrepreneur.

Not a stranger to controversy in 2008 he defended Muslim Writers' Awards from criticism of censorship.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2008/aug/13/muslim.awards.malik

That took just 10 minutes on Google. The bits don't add up, but the sums do.

According to the guardian in 2009 there were 10,000 entries for the Muslin Writers' Award and 21,000 for the Brits. That 31,000 and counting. Plus 'winners' had to buy their tickets to the ceremony.

In the interview he gave to the freelance journalist (link above) he says: "Look, I’m not a writer, agent or publisher, I’m a strategist."

A strategist. Indeed.

Ben Yezir

Even the best of them can get it wrong, as Scott Pack and the Friday Project illustrated. For those who don't know the story, it had a very narrow remit - blogs to books - and over extended itself with too many promises of publication resulting in the company burning through tens (if not hundreds) of millions of pounds raised from venture capitalists, in just a few short years.
It seems this new publishing company thinks it too has a better business model than the traditional publishing houses. Only time will tell if that's true.

It's one thing to be a bad business man, but another to wilfully mislead the people you are trying to get money out of. That reply to Susie is just horrific - they obviously HAVE no answer to this question. I think I might contact the Society of Authors about this outfit.

I think what we're saying is that it all hinges around their claim, to writers who pay £1795, that they, 'Guarantee[d] to get your work published with a top publisher'.

Everyone knows that 'top' means a publisher like Random House. But if so, the rest of their promise makes no sense, e.g. to get your work published within 12 months; also, most of the services they give you for your money are redundant (because Random House would supply them anyway).

So, I don't think it's a case of a different business model. If it was, they'd detail it, e.g. that you'll get published by a non-traditional, e/POD, publisher. But we and BWA know that would be a much harder sell for nearly two thousand quid than promising what just about every writer wants: to be published by a top publisher.

Terry

I have emailed the Society of Authors to see if they know anything about Britwriters.

I don't know why people always pull the 'no comment' line. It just leads to more suspicion. And digging. S