Omniscriptum Publishing Group, formerly known asVDM Verlag Dr. Müller, is a Germanpublishing group headquartered inChișinău, Moldova.[1] Founded in 2002 inDüsseldorf,[2] its book production is based onprint-to-order technology.
The company publishes theses, research notes, and dissertations through itse-commerce bookstores.[1] TheNorwegian Scientific Index lists both Omniscriptum (as Verlag Dr. Müller) and its subsidiary Lambert Academic Publishing are designated as failing to qualify as academic.[3][4][a] Lambert Academic Publishing has also been described as the "most dominating" among "predatory publishers that seek out authors of new theses", avanity press which does "not apply the basic standards of academic publishing such as peer-review, editorial or proof-reading processes".[8]
The company also offers print-to order publishing for fiction authors. It previously specialized in publishing and sellingWikipedia articles, but has stated that the practice of publishing Wikipedia content ended in 2013.[9]
The group's firstpublishing house was founded inDüsseldorf in 2002 by Wolfgang Philipp Müller and relocated toSaarbrücken in August 2005.[2] The Mauritian office was established in April 2007 and was managed from 2008 up until May 2011 by David Benoit Novel,[10][11] followed by Reezwan Ghanty.[12]
Omniscriptum specializes inGerman,Russian,Spanish,[17]French, and Englishdissertations,theses, and research projects.[18][19] Its business model involves a team ofacquisitions editors who search the internet for academic authors and invite them to submit their manuscripts.[20][21][22] The editorial team sends emails to people who have written a master's thesis or doctoral dissertation and whose college library has a web-accessible catalog.[23]
Omniscriptum's business practices have been questioned for profiting from the sale of unacclaimed works. In November 2009, an article in the newspaperBerner Zeitung faulted Omniscriptum for not disclosing that the books it was publishing were academic dissertations and for charging high prices.[26] American writerVictoria Strauss characterized OMS as "an academicauthor mill",[27][28][29] whilePagan Kennedy notes that OMS's practices are comparable to a form ofkudzu weed proliferation in book publishing.[30]
In January 2011, German professor Debora Weber-Wulff, inCopy, Shake, and Paste (a blog about plagiarism and scientific misconduct), referred to OMS as a spam publisher.[31]
Branches of the company, includingAlphascript Publishing (April 2009),[32]Betascript Publishing (January 2010),Fastbook Publishing (July 2009),[33] andDoyen Verlag, have published books consisting of compilations of Wikipedia articles.[34] These books have been purchased or acquired by various libraries and academic institutions in Europe[35][36] and Asia.
History of Ghana: a collection of Wikipedia articles published as a book
The titles were published as edited by Frederic P. Miller, Agnes F. Vandome, and John McBrewster, who are listed as authors. As of 21 December 2011[update], 180,818 titles were listed on the OMS bookshop.[37] Betascript listsLambert M. Surhone [de], Miriam T. Timpledon, Susan F. Marseken, Mariam T. Tennoe, and Susan F. Henssonow as editors, giving an additional 356,765 titles as of 21 December 2011[update].[38]
Regarding its publishing, Alphascript asserted that: "There is hardly another platform for quick and better processing of information than Wikipedia" for customers "who want to be informed on a specific subject" in book form, though they can "have online everythingfree of charge".[39][40][41]
According to the company, the last compilation of Wikipedia articles was published in 2013. The company stated that it stopped the practice of publishing Wikipedia content in order to focus on "original academic (and) special interest authors."[9]
