Copywriter and editor Emily Seuss has uncovered a set of social media accounts sharing the same stock photo picture, all credited to an Author Solutions employee named Jared Silverstone. UPDATE: Author Solutions will remove these accounts and has issued an official statement about the matter.
Silverstone is identified as an “Awesome Publishing Consultant at Author Solutions” in his bio on various social media sites, but his photograph can also be found as “Nerdy Mustache Guy Portrait” from iStock Photo. You can visit his Google+ page, his Facebook page and his Twitter page. We have reached out to Penguin (the new corporate parent of Author Solutions) for commentary and we will update when we have a response.
Here’s more from Seuss: “Aside from the fact that he’s posted only a handful of ASI-centric posts since March 2012, Jared looks just a little too hipster to be hipster, doesn’t he? That’s because—surprise!—Jared Silverstone isn’t real. Click through a few pages of istockphoto.com search results for ‘mustache,’ and you’ll find our precious Jared, sans the green filter makeover and the slightly off center crop job. Before Author Solutions paid for his likeness, Jared looked a little something like (okay, maybe EXACTLY like) the watermarked guy on the right.” (Via Victoria Strauss)
We also found 12 articles attributed to Silverstone online, including this biography: “Jared Silverstone is born in Bloominton, Indiana but has since relocated to the Philippines, running his own indie publishing consultancy. He has over a decade’s experience helping writers publish independently through self-publishing. He advices authors on matters of writing, editing and marketing books independently.”
For the record, we have preserved screenshots of the three social media accounts for this mystery worker. Here is a screenshot from his Google+ page:
Here’s a screenshot of his Facebook page:
And here’s a screenshot of his Twitter page:
