Monday 10 October 2011

Tutis Has a Rival

It's been a while since anti-geniuses Tutis released a book, so I haven't had the chance to mock them. However, Brian Busby and Bookride have had a bit of a look at Alphascript and Betascript, a German-based print-on-demand publisher of tens of thousands apparently randomly packaged Wikipedia articles (all at great expense: would you like a bound copy of the 487-word article on the Pet Shop Boys single 'One More Chance'? It's yours for US$54!). What's especially wonderful about these books, which I assume are produced with little or no human involvement, is that most of them come with various other, often unrelated, articles jammed in to bloat the page count, and the covers seem to have been similarly designed without heed to sense or relevance.

Here are some examples...

Conscription really did pull in some terribly young soldiers

Young Conservative

Lithuanian nobles like comfy chairs as much as everyone else

If this is was Brazilian spy's idea of field research, I can't say I'm surprised the agency was disbanded.

It's always a sign of publishing quality when you steal a watermarked photo for your book cover

It took 3 editors to put the wrong building on the cover of this book.

The politics of Egypt are surprisingly London-centric

Domingo was always wrecking 'Three Tenors' concerts by doing sax solos.

Australian government outsourcing scandal!

It goes underwater if you leave the cargo bay doors open.

To be fair, she really doesn't look very aggressive.

I just... what.. hang on...

They're just really excited about dangerous, toxic carbon fuel schemes

He/she looks good for his/her age.

Though the 1790s were a horribly racist time, all credit to the Marylebone Cricket Club for letting a underage black girl play for them in the 1790s. Of course, they did use the cunning ploy of calling her 'Robert' so that the half-blind imperialists in the audience would be fooled into thinking she was just another white man with amusing facial hair.

Both naval vessels and hands can carry guns--near enough.

This image is actually probably more apropriate than was intended.

Fucking European cultural imperialism, keeping all of the Bangladeshi debaters out of their own federation

This is a book about a single from a Swedish death metal band. That is a picture of some pretty flowers.

I consulted the Wikipedia article for the 'rear of the Year' competition to see how the two other articles were connected, but I still remain in a state of pure, blessed ignorance. However, it was gratifying to learn that 'There is only one, genuine, Rear of the Year award and a list of contenders is never supplied to bookmakers so that their suppositions about the outcome are pure conjecture.' Take that, Swedish Academy!

6 comments:

Unknown said...

Oh, dear lord… this is AMAZING. Having trouble getting my mouth to close again, however.

JRSM said...

And there are a lot more where those came from. I had to stop somewhere, but they're just berserk...

Anonymous said...

I don't know if anything's made me feel so deeply sad before.

Anonymous said...

Did I read the covers correctly: the same 3 editors for all of these volumes?

JRSM said...

Yes, though how much actual editing is involved is debatable...

Anonymous said...

I'd love to be the editor there: copious quantities of mood-altering substances, no quality control standards, and no repercussions for not meeting the non-existent standards. With benefits.