Jane at Dear Author wants to know about Elibron.com, and I’m curious, too. The site is down; the phone, unanswered. Anyone having trouble getting paid?

Update: The site is back up.

RELATED ARTICLESMORE FROM AUTHOR

51 COMMENTS

  3. My sympathies, Roderick and Rolf. I’d encourage both of you to return to this comment here–this exact spot–and keep us posted on your efforts. Publishers and readers used the TeleBlog as a watering hole to discuss the mess at eBookAd, and I invite them to do the same to discuss the current ones. Best of luck. David

  4. Do any visitors have insight into the MOSCOW end of this enterprise?

    After all, the bulk of Elibron’s amazing offerings were drawn from a large-scale Russian digitalization project intended to produce funds for the Moscow State Library, and they may have another print-on-demand or e-book outlet for their product even if Elibron has really flown the coop.

    On the other hand, Elibron’s computers have been down for extended periods without explanation in the past.

  7. Well, I have personally bad experiences with Elibron. They sent me a score with pages missing. And, as always, I got no answers to my emails.
    Still, silly of me, I made another order few months ago. I have got no confirmation email though the order is visible in my “account” page. And, of course, the goods I ordered have not arrived.
    I suggest everybody avoid Elibron. It’s no good.

  9. It seems I am one more victim of Elibron. Having paid for a book over three months ago, quickly got a message from them telling me they would dispatch it within a few days and never heard from them any more. They ignore messages, do not refund the cash I have paid and do not deliver the book. So, fellows, the second best* thing to do is to help other people staying away from them. Best luck next time with a reliable seller.

    * The first best thing is having them responsible for cheating people. Should anyone learn how to accomplish this, please tell us.

  10. Yes, folks, similar experience, ordered a swag of books in August with instant reply stating that books would be sent “within 28 business days”. Since then, no books, no charges and order still on web page – which was up a couple of weeks back. Emailed customer support thrice and thrice-times no response. Went to web page and… yes its down. Hence a Google search and voila! This magnificent web-page. And there I was feeling all alone and lost. Goodonya mine host, you have made my day

  11. There is a sliver of hope that all is not lost. After waiting for full 6 months and not getting any response from the company, I filed a complaint with Better Business Bureau. Books arrived quickly thereafter. I don’t know if it’s serendipity. BBB has not heard back from them either. I wish Elibron would survire despite such a poor reputation, because of simply what they can offer. But the act needs to be cleaned up!

    So……. here’s the Address for the BBB in MA.

    http://WWW.bosbbb.org
    email: info@bosbbb.org
    Phone; 508-652-4800
    235 W central st, Ste1
    Natick MA 01760-3767

  12. I have been wailting for a book from Elibron for since 23 October 2006 now 8 December. They took my VISA payment saying the book was on its way. No site or answer to email, nice to find this site and hear fellow sufferes. Will contact BBB

  14. Me too! Ordered about 6 books back in June. Order displayed on site etc. Waited 2 months; no books. Waited another few weeks, sent an email. No answer.

    Suddenly template Elibron email showed up saying (again) – ‘books will arrive in 28 days’ etc.

    That was October. Now January 2007. No books.

    Like others, having looked, I cannot find any contact details of any sort. The only thing noticeable is that it is the “Adamant Media Corporation” – that takes/receives the money. Who they are I have no idea.

  15. On October 30 order status changed to “shipped” via USPS Economy M-Bag, but the tracking number was not informed. Three months past, no book. Customer service continues non existent. I tried USPS: they were very kind but told me that, in the absence of the tracking number, nothing could be done. A few days later, I tried BBB, following GD’s advice. Again, I was treated very kindly … and the case was immediately closed! I asked for an explanation, and that was promptly given: BBB let me know that Elibron (which is their database) refuses to take any message from them. Next step ? Any suggestion ? I believe that the least we all can do about this is to spread these news so as to help other potential victims to fall into this trap.

  16. PROBLEMS WITH ELIBRON: DO NOT GIVE UP!

    After six months waiting, I finally got the book bought from Elibron. While struggling with this unreliable seller, it was good to learn that I was not alone trying to make them respond for their acts. So, fellows, do not give up, keep trying: e-mail them one thousand times, file a complaint with Better Business Bureau, the same with USPS, tell other people about them etc.

    ELIBRON: NEVER AGAIN.

  17. Do not ever deal with Elibron – if not actually dishonest they must be totally incompetent. I ordered about $300 of 8 facsimile books in August 2006 – paying a premium for priority mail delivery because they were for a research project. Received promise that they would be sent within 29 business days.

    In November started sending emails. No replies until early December, when they charged my credit card account, stating that the books had been sent. This was a great example of Sod’s law because, in frustration, I had ordered the books from Amazon about three days beforehand. The Amazon books arrived before Xmas 2006. The Elibron books did not arrive until late January (turned out they were not posted when Elbron said they were) – AND ONLY 6 OF THE 8 BOOKS ORDERED WERE IN THE PARCEL! Repeated emails elicited no response. The matter is now in the hands of my credit card company.

    DO NOT EVER DEAL WITH ELIBRON – THEY ARE DREADFUL

  18. I am glad I am not the only one although I would not wish this experience on anyone! The music score I ordered is available from nowhere else on the web as far as I can ascertain so I was pleased to find it on Elibron. I should have trusted my instincts when the “problem with this site’s certificate” warning came up but it’s not alone there. So I placed my order and, just like you fellas, I got an email saying 28 days to despatch. That was 1 Feb, so maybe this is just a normal delay. However, my account says “Order received” not despatched!
    Ho-hum; good job it’s not an urgent matter and they haven’t debited my card yet … I shan’t use them again. Good luck everyone.

  19. I placed an order yesterday and tried to phone to confirm the order as it is quite urgent. The phoneline is disconnected. I now see the Adamant address, 50 Cutler Lane is on sale for $2,000,000. Its not looking good.

  21. I served as website editor and music consultant at Elibron’s American offices from 2000-2002.

    Elibron (a.k.a. “Adamant Media”) was the brainchild of Russian entrepreneur Andrei Volgin. He envisioned a series of kiosks (in malls, coffee shops, etc.) where one could order a book printed on demand as one might order a chai latte. It sounded, and sounds, like a delightful idea.

    Of course, very little came of the notion. The digitization project in Moscow proceeded smoothly if a bit indiscriminately (as I saw during a trip there in 2000). During my brief tenure, I doubt if we sold even a hundred books. Never once did I see the site advertised. A planned pilot kiosk in Boston came to naught.

    Funding problems led to the termination of my employment in mid-2002, at which point Volgin told me he believed the company would probably be sold. I have no idea what happened after that.

  22. Chuck Guzis made some comments that vanished during a database problem. I’m restoring them below.

    For months, I have been trying to download one of the online musical scores. Each time I, or anyone else tries to purchase it, the web site simply returns to the original page without doing a thing. If one attempts to put one into the shopping basket, the message comes back “unpurchaseable e-book”. Numerous support request messages to elibron have gone unanswered.

    For what it’s worth, I did succeed in downloading a music score back in December, 2006. Once.

    Today I note that the elibron.com website returns only a series of hashmarks. I wonder if they’re gone for good.

  23. is the elibron thread still active? i really, really, really want some books elibron publishes. 3 to be exact. i don’t give my c.card details via the internet. i telephone the seller direct..i’d rather pay my dime to talk, than risk a stolen number via a hacker.

    anyhow..IS elibron still in business? has anyone ever found out how to access them? i submitted a query to them via their contact/feedback form about 3 days ago. should i stop holding my breath? will they ever reply? they do carrry some very unique titles..i really hope they have not gone out of business.

    if anyone knows anything, anyway to contact elibron pls let me know.
    put elibron in the subject line..i get loads of spam..i’m fast on the delete button.

    roslyn
    quest_of_rachel@hotmail.com

  24. Oh dear! I ordered a copy of an old document from Elibron about two weeks ago. I have not heard a thing from them and am thinking of cancelling my PayPal payment. Furthermore their site is down! It is hard to believe that they could be deliberately out to rip people off, as they have some very obscure titles on offer, and it appears by correspondence on this page that some people are eventually receiving their orders. But it is a worry that they should be so SLOW and incompetent. Maybe it is a one-person operation and the owner gets completely snowed under?

  26. I would recommend simply ordering the book through Amazon.com, assuming it’s available there. I ordered a title published by Elibron several months ago through Amazon and had no problems whatsoever — the book arrived quickly, just like any other book I have ordered through them. The problem seems to come when trying to order directly from Elibron itself.

  27. What a relief to see so many people saying the same things about elibron.com—I too ordered a score from them in July, gave my credit card number etc. and got a confirmation. I really wanted this score, and their price was more than reasonable. But no book, no explanation, no answers. You can see this is a year after the last post on this thread. I went to find the score elsewhere—a rental I will have to photocopy: I guess this means my elibron order will arrive any moment now.

  29. OK, my turn! Four scores and twenty-eight days I ordered some music from Elibron, now asking whether that company or any other company will ever endure and deliver those scores! Is they is or is they ain’t is business?

  31. O come now, Chris! Surely you know that my comments are really a play on words and not to be taken literally! While you may think it in bad taste, I was using the opening of the Gettysburg address as a basis for expressing my complaint about Elibron. I have ordered four piano quintets, that is “four scores,” (not four “score” as in the Lincoln address} and Elibron said that they would deliver them in “28 days.” I am aware that a “score” is twenty. I was using “score” in the musical sense, not the numerical sense.
    My first sentence is derived from the opening sentence of Lincoln’s Gettysburg address. Check it out!
    The second sentence is based on lyrics from an old “pop” tune. Check that out, too.

  32. Hi,
    Its a shame if they are out of business as they offer a number of obscure out of print books that I am after. (Mostly on the Caucasus – makes sense that they were based on a Moscow scanning project then; also explains why they were so good at providing a comprehensive bibliography in other languages as well as English.) That said, their website now (in the last few days I think) claims that they no longer take orders for books, but that ‘most’ are now available from Amazon. I don’t suppose anyone has any idea what that means. Have they been bought by them? Does Amazon now print on demand for them? Or is Amazon just selling off their old stock?

    I suspect the latter as for several of the books I’m after Amazon seems to be carrying only partial volumes of the sets – and those at a discount. As they don’t even list the other parts of those sets and it makes no sense to print only part of a set on demand, I fear that this may be stock clearance. What a shame!

    Would love to hear from anyone in the know, on what basis these books are being sold and reprinted and what hope there is to get ones hands on the missing volumes.

    All the best,
    I

  33. As of December, 2008, the ELIBRON website is down and the ADAMANT MEDIA telephone number has been disconnected. No further information is available as to when these sites will be operational. Anybody who has an order through the system is advised to contact heir bank and reverse the charge.

  35. I ordered one of their facsimile books via amazon in December – arrived without any issues, BUT the back page states that the book is printed by amazon.co.uk. I’d advise ordering through amazon in the future – with the added benefit that despite the slightly ebay-esque dodginess of the ‘marketplace’ they tend to be better at not taking payment before dispatch.

  37. Well this is interesting. Their site is up again. It appears to have been updated in 2009. And it no longer has the sign saying they don’t sell books. But I’m not sure whether I want to risk a large purchase. Has anyone had any luck with them in recent times? Amazon doesn’t stock the rather specialised books that I want – they’re pretty rare, or completely unavailable, which is why elibron retains my fascination despite the tales of woe above.

    Any thoughts or comments welcome.
    Ian

  38. A fascinating trail of events. I’ve been reading one of their Scott novels, purchased through Amazon Marketplace. The digitisation comment explains the very high rate of odd typos. Letters must be scanned incorrectly then forced through a spell check, so “son” becomes “zen”. Mostly the meaning’s easily worked out and as this is not one of Scott’s best it can be an interesting diversion…

  39. Dear Readers,
    thank you very much for your comments. We would like to let you know that as of January of this year there is a new company handling the Elibron books – Adegi Graphics LLC. For the time we do this (about 9 months) we do not remember leaving a customer e-mail unanswered, most of the books we ship within 1 business day, sometimes it takes us longer but never more than 4 days.
    Larger orders (15 books or more) we sent via courier services for no additional charge regardless what part of the world they need to be sent to.
    We also launched hardcover editions of our books.
    If you are looking for a title not available on our site, we will always try to find it for you. If your book got lost in the mail we will always replace it free of charge and send it to you again also free of charge. We were also replacing undelivered orders placed with Elibron before January 2009.
    We have to admit that occasionally we have server problems and we are working on it.
    We also admit about not being thrilled you calling us on the phone however if you need to talk to us we will answer the phone.
    We are looking forward to your new orders.
    Thank you,
    Elibron Team
    Adegi Graphics Support Team
    elibron.orders@adegi.com

  40. I successfully and easily purchased two Elibron Rimsky-Korsakov scores through Amazon in the past 2 months (Oct-Dec 2009). I simply went to Amazon books section and entered Golden Cockerel or May Night. The prices were so low (under $20) that I figured I hardly had anything to lose. Each came within 10 days of the order and was exactly as advertised (Golden Cockerel / Le Coq D’Or is a 366-page full orchestral score with Russian and French lyrics. May Night is the composer’s own piano reduction in Russian, French, and German). The publisher is the elusive Elibron, but the vendor is Adegi Graphics, 200 William St., Suite 308, Port Chester, NY 10573, (914) 712-7300. P.S. They are crisp, clear scores, much easier to read than the free scores you can download from the University of Indiana.

  41. I worked fairly closely with Andrei Volgin of Elibron for about three years. I ran VolumeOne of Chicago, and Andrei was interested in my print-on-demand platform. Or, so he always claimed.

    We had endless discussions over the phone and through e-mail, and after a time it became rather obvious that he was drawing heavily on my expertise and the connections I was making for him, without intending to finalize any sort of agreement.

    We were two companies among a half-dozen or so (including 3BillionBooks, Sprout, ODMC, InstaBook, and LightningPrint) who were seriously working on the on-demand book problem from 1997 to about 2002. I introduced Andrei to all of these people. ODMC and Jeff Marsh ended up refining Jeff’s machine and it is now called the Espresso BookMachine, after successfully settling with LightningSource on infringement of the late Harvey Ross’ patent 5,465,213 (eek, it’s all still there in my head, though I can’t remember what I had for breakfast). The rest of the companies are moribund or dead.

    Volgin was a shady and indiscriminate operator who had made a significant amount of money operating factories in Russia. One does not want to know the details of that. His arrangement with the Moscow State Library, he told me, was to rehab their front entryway in exchange for five years’ exclusive access to digitally scan their books. He claimed to be doing 1,000 books per day and therefore would have a million books online before anyone else (this was an astonishing claim in those days, and a kind of a race). His operation was well-funded, in an odd and shady way, but as you can see he has no qualms about mistreating others. I would steer clear of anything he does.

    If you are owed money by him, I recommend contacting your credit card companies and demanding a refund.

  43. I don’t know. Why don’t you start by telling us who you are, so that people may know you? How do we know that you are not Andrei Volgin, or a friend of his?

    After all, it appears evident from this page alone that hundreds or even thousands of people may have had money stolen from them by Elibron. Under those circumstances, I would think that it would be a very interesting story — I mean the story of who you are and how it is possible that you can be so wonderfully comfortable working with Andrei Volgin. Please enlighten us.

    I’ll tell you a related story to get us started: When VolumeOne stopped taking print orders, we had about 20 or 30 that we could not fill. I personally spent several weeks going through that list, bending over backwards, and ensuring that every last one of them either had their order filled or had the charge credited. It was a lot of work. Why hasn’t Elibron done that? Why would you (or anyone else) feel comfortable working with an individual that has caused so many people to suffer that they would complain like this online?

  44. Dear Peter Zelchenko,
    when we took over the business we took care of every single outstanding order. We left no unhappy customers. Instead of trashing our good name we suggest for you to check our consistent high customer satisfaction ratings at Amazon, AbeBooks and others.
    We understand some things did not work out in your business but we suggest that you send your frustrations to a proper address.
    Thank you.
    Adegi Graphics
    Elibron Support Team.

  45. I want to let everyone know that I had a very happy conversation today with Yuri Prazelski, owner of Adegi. Adegi is a very reputable company in New York City which has taken over Elibron’s book printing. Note that Mr. Prazelsky has no connection with Andrei Volgin or Elibron other than that they print Elibron’s books for them, along with the books of hundreds of other companies.

    Volgin’s part is only to keep Elibron’s servers running and selling e-books for download, which as you have seen may be reliable and unreliable as the case may be. This has no bearing on the quality of work done by the printing company, which, it appears from Steve Stellman’s message above from December, is doing a much better job than Volgin could do on his own. I was frankly worried that Adegi was controlled by Elibron, and I am convinced it is totally independent.

    As a longtime expert in this field, I’d send my own books to Adegi.com based on what I know about them, and I will be referring people to them.

  46. For the record, after the first two hits mentioned above, I got hooked on Rimsky-Korsakov scores and ordered (and received very quickly) Sadko and The Tsar’s Bride. They are incredible bargains at $16.95 and $15.95, respectively, especially since Sadko is a professionally bound paperback of 428 pages! Both are piano/vocal scores, as is May Night. Only Golden Cockerel is a full orchestral score, although the others have occasional indications of the instrumentation. Sadko is not quite as clear as the others. The music is perfectly legible except in a few faded spots that can still be read, but the Russian text is sometimes problematic, especially stage directions which are printed in very small type. I purchased all four scores through Amazon.

  47. Well After a long winter spring has sprung at Elibron!

    I ordered books yesterday and the website claims it’s been shipped yesterday. A remarkable feat considering a wait of six months on my previous order.

    If there’s not another post from this customer, all is well.

  48. Oh, I wouldn’t go that far. All is definitely not well, unless all of the above customers, and all others who lost money, have had their orders fulfilled or their cash returned by Andrei Volgin’s Elibron. These reports claim Elibron breached their contracts without any remorse and is continuing to operate without curing the problem.

    I wish Yuri Prazelski all the best success with Adegi, but until Andrei Volgin addresses the book fulfillment problem to the satisfaction of all of his customers, I would recommend people stay away from Elibron. An offense to one is an offense to all. By saying, “As long as I’m okay, I don’t care how others fare,” we are only encouraging continued exploitation.

  50. Elibron Fraudsters

    Elibron are an inept and belligerent MOB. I capitalise it because I used that term when they essentially stole $73 from me in combined book purchase and priority postage, and wow, did the real people show their hand because I dared to use ‘mob’ in my complaint. Perhaps it was too close to home!

    They became extremely abusive after I contacted them. Best of all told me they didn’t want to do business with a jerk (their word) like me and to return the book for a refund. WHAT A JOKE! THE POINT OF MY COMPLAINT WAS THAT I NEVER GOT THE BOOK … and they call me a jerk!

    My suggestion: DO NOT DO BUSINESS WITH THESE THUGS. Not only are they inept and belligerent as mentioned already, they are hostile and aggressive.

    It is now Jan 3, 2013, I ordered the book in November 2012. Now I have to research what legal avenues are available to get a refund for the money they took from me.

  51. You asked us where your book was. We checked and saw that the Post Office processed it later than it should have been. Obviously there was a delay (or maybe loss of the parcel) due the hurricane Sandy. We apologized profoundly even though there was no fault of our own. We asked you how and if we can make up for it for you. Instead of asking us for a refund (yes, you NEVER asked for one), or asking to resend the book or asking for a credit – you went on Amazon and gave us the worst possible rating. After we contacted you and asked you to remove the rating and let us work it out for you, you just ignored us.
    We are a good company. You can read excellent reviews about us on Amazon and other sites. And, yes, we are in business of selling books, not serving jerks.

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