I found a competition under 'Writing Jobs'to be run by Red Telephone Books. When I took a look at their site I found they are about to publish their first book! The entry fee for their competition is £10 - which strikes me as a good way of financing a new company. However, I'm not sure I'd consider it ethical, as they have nothing to offer to the competition winner in terms of distribution or publicity. What do other people think?
Suzanne
www.sue-stokes.co.uk

I think in such cases one should take a tip out of the carpentry handbook: 'measure twice, cut once'.

Yes, quite!

I think for a £10 entry I'd expect some decent prize money, and an established publicity channel for the prize anthology to have some notice and credibility.

Emma

Hi, I spotted the Red Telephone Books competition and my 'Scam Radar' went wild... I did some background checks on the company, see this related thread:
http://www.writewords.org.uk/forum/49_293737.asp

It sounds very much like they are using the competition to fund their first publication. We could all do the same thing of course - but some of us have morals!