Publication Spam/Scam

[robot_hamster]

I received an email today regarding my senior thesis. This company called LAP Lambert Academic Publishing wanted to publish my thesis into a book. I was suspicious since they had my first and last names turned around when addressing the letter. What is scary is that they knew the name of my undergraduate institution and what I majored in. I googled the company and found that it is a "legitimate" company that publishes people's theses and dissertations on Amazon and then charge people some inflated price to buy it. I also read that the company asks for your bank account information so you can receive "royalties" from the publication. Still sounds like a scam to me, even if it is an actual company. Has anyone else received this email? The personalization was actually kind of disturbing. Especially since the email came to my email address at my current institution. How do they find this information?

Edited September 30, 2011 by robot_hamster

[robot_hamster]

Hmm, maybe I am just special.

[lewin]

I've received that one too, twice. So have a few other grad students I know. I don't think it's an outright scam, but it's certainly worthless. Actually, telling people that you self-published might be worse than worthless because it reeks of desperation.

[robot_hamster]

I totally agree with you. The publication wouldn't be peer-reviewed, so it would essentially be worthless. I was just creeped out when I first got the email because I couldn't figure out how they knew these things about me. I didn't think my thesis was posted online anywhere. I didn't go to a large school for undergrad.

[lewin]

Okay yeah, that's strange. The first email I received used some lines from my MA thesis that was posted online, in the second they cribbed some lines from my school website listing my research interests. In both cases they were just slightly wrong enough that I knew immediately that they didn't really get what I do.

Edited October 3, 2011 by lewin00

[runonsentence]

I've gotten similar emails before. I think they honestly just go down a list of graduate students listed at an institution and spam them with whatever they can find from a Google search. They had slightly wrong information about me; they thought a paper I'd presented at a national conference was a thesis and offered to publish it.

[lyonessrampant]

I got a Facebook message from a publisher at this company. They had the title of my BA thesis and said they wanted to publish it. Same deal as OP. I thought it was odd because my name is super common, I went to a tiny liberal arts school, and my thesis is not online, but I decided not to do it because it isn't peer reviewed. I would agree with others. It might not be a scam exactly, but it isn't really advantageous either.