Sorry if this doesn't belong here, but I thought this did concern writing and it'd be better if I categorize it rather than put it in The Lounge. I'd probably get more writers' attention if I posted it here anyway, but feel free to move it if it's really necessary.

Anyway, I almost got scammed by the International Library of Poetry (www.poetry.com) and this is how it happened...

I had found poetry.com a long time ago when someone had sent me their poem they had displayed on there. I decided to pay a visit and ended up entering my poem, thinking, what have I got to lose? It was a few months later that I received mail from them saying that I was selected "semi-finalist" in their contest to winning $10,000 dollars and I could get it published in a book. This book costed $50 plus $25 if I wanted to put my biography on the page opposite of my poem.

Well, of course I was excited (and gullible), but there was a doubt in my mind that this was even real. I would've purchased the book if my dad hadn't told me to check it out online. So I looked online and found out 99.9% of the people that send in their work get accepted. This scam had been broadcasted on ABC's 20/20, other news shows, and several internet websites.

If you've sent in a poem here, you've probably already found out that they want your poems to be 20 lines or shorter (which prevented me from sending in some of my poems). Why? So they can cram in all the poems (6 per page) that they receive/accept.

They tell you, there are 200 poems in the book out of thousands of people that send in their poems, but in reality, you're not special. They are not interested in your poem or your reputation; they are interested in the MONEY you pay to buy the book. EVERYBODY IS IN THIS BOOK!

Go here to sign the petition against this horrible scam.

Thanks to Ravens Rants for saving me 50 bucks.

You can get a VALID poetry source from that site And...

DO NOT FALL FOR THE WWW.POETRY.COM SCAM

Edit// Here are some more scams:

AmericanLiteraryPress.com
famouspoets.com
freecontest.com
friendlypoets.com
noblehousepublishers.co.uk
poetry-contest.com
poetry.com
poem.com
poetryamerica.com
poetrynet.net
poetrynet.org
poets.com
raketheweb.com
watermarkbooks.com

Visit: http://www.poetryscams.com/

Yes, I heard about this. I sent a few poems there in high school. They accept everybody. I took a poetry class my freshman year of college and my professor was telling it was just a scam for money. You can write just about anything and call it poetry and they will put it there. Its a shame too.

That's horrible! :O I think my teacher sent in my poem there, but who cares, because she never told me. Ehhh. That's just sad how people want money like this. T_T

Aww, and I thought I was special! No, actually, I did get a poem accepted by them, but it was in my creative writing class. Mrs. Hall had the great idea... why not have everyone in the class submit? Big oopsies when everyone got accepted. Everyone in the class. Even the guy in special ed. Aww! We were all so disappointed, lol. but thanks for the heads up

This is why I like to use www.poets.org ;] I'm sorry about what happened to you, though. Those scams suck.

I actually bought my book.

Mine was the only poem on the page?

And it is a scam, their still sending me crap. (This was 2 years ago)

Don't be fooled.

Didnt Heathasm get a reward from this site?

Everybody gets an award.....includung me....

Lol, yeah. There's nothing wrong with the book itself, but the information they send you is all false. Because they accept 99.9% of the people who enter, so you can't really argue with that.

Glad I was able to help you save some money and keep poetry.com from stealing at least a few bucks. Thanks for the link to the site!

i got nominated for poet of the year. I've got that invitation for a few years now. The weird thing is i am a really decent poet and im not sure if this thing is legit. I've yet to buy anything, but still i get personal emails not just ones with my name at the top. I think they just scam the mediocre poets to help pay for the prizes of the really good poets.

Did you ever win 10,000 dollars?
..I'm sorry. I'm always slow at these things. ><

oh man. yes i actually submitted one of my poems to that site! and got somethan in the mail, saying, you won blah blah blah and you get your poem posted in this special book and all that. And at first i was all excited, and then...i was like wait..lol. One of my friends did the same exact thing and got the same results, and then they ask you to go to their poetry convention and "accept" your award, and pay a certain amount of money. lol yah it's def a scam, i'm glad you looked into it, instead of just going along :)

I'd never heard about that. But thanks for the warning =)

what a bad scam. the idea sucks; because it can easilyy be found out..

Oh, hells no.
Oh, hells no.
OH, HELLS NO.

I submitted my poems in there 2 times, &both times, they were accepted. I'm glad I never pruchased their crappy poetry book.

well duckii i gues you're proof. You can barely grasp the english language and yet you're a semi-finalist.

^ Yeah, I guess I am proof. Haha. My brother is also proof, too. He never capitalized anything in his poem, &yet, he made it in the semi-finals. What a coincidence.

...Wait, I have a great idea. We can all enter poems saying stuff about poetry.com &its scams, &it'll most likely will get submitted &printed in the book.

That's exactly what I was going to do, but they said they accept 99.9% and that .1% might be the bashmail. So I'm going to write them this poem and see them send it back:

cheese bologna
monkey feces
llama toys
fat cooking lard
umbrella man
airplane crash
undead cheese
bologna in my pants

aw im sorry for you. THE INTERNET THESE DAYS! i'll remember this and thx for telling us

^^ Haha, niiiiice. =)

Me too....Definitely fell for the scam about four years ago. Thanks so much for posting about that because I had just forgotten about it and told myself to never fall for that kind of thing again, but I'm sure you've helped to prevent, if not a hundred, than at least several people from falling for the scam just because you passed on the word.

Thanks
.::Eria

Once I read a topic with this girl who talked LyK dI$ and she was so excited her poem got accepted there and all the other people who were commenting were saying stuff like, "Yeah, me too! I was so proud!" :( Suckas.

wow, that stinks! have you found a new place to get your poetry published?

ROFL. Guys, check this page out:

http://www.winningwriters.com/wergleflomp/flubblebop.htm