A royalty share is an agreement between collaborators where earnings from a project or product are shared between everyone involved according to their contribution.

In the blog Understanding Royalty Share: A Win-Win Revenue Model, it is described like this: “Think of it like splitting a pie. Everyone who contributed to baking the pie—whether it’s the author, narrator, producer, or investor—gets a slice proportional to their involvement or agreement.”

iNous has chosen Royalty Share because apart from ensuring fairness, it is a way of fostering collaboration and ensuring everyone reaps the benefits according to their unique skills and particular contribution. We understand that independent content creators who are focused on community building through sharing their uplifting, healing and empowering content may not have the time, financial resources or technical skills to create a unique product like this on their own – even though they may have a deep desire and calling to do so.

In the case of our collaborative Print & Box decks, digital editions, and Intentional email journeys, royalties are expressed as a percentage of the revenue generated per unit sold, after deducting printing and production costs.

No Large Upfront Costs: In the case of our royalty share agreement, you won’t have to pay the artist upfront for artist’s commissions fees on the original artworks used in the design of your cards. Similarly, you won’t be paid upfront for the themes and messages you generate during the SoulSong process. You also won’t be required to pay a hefty upfront fee for design and publishing. Instead, you, the artist and the content curator, will share future earnings on the product or service created for your shared contribution to the market value of the product. 
Shared Risk: Everyone involved has a stake in the success of the product or service and will contribute the highest quality of their input during the creative process. Equally, the more effectively that the collaborative product or service is promoted and shared on completion of the SoulSong process, the more all collaborators will feel recompensed for their creative efforts and input of time.
Long-Term Earnings: The timeless value of a Wisdom Deck, and the nature of print-on-demand, means that collaborators can expect to generate revenue for years. Even during time periods when collaborators are unable to be in direct contact with their community through their social media platforms, the dedicated shop page, hyperlinks and website buttons will remain active.

When you create a Wisdom deck through embarking a SoulSong Journey, the artworks you engage with on a daily basis are original paintings sourced from the LightCatcher Chronicles. They are digital in format but are not AI-generated. They are handpainted by our resident artist in a process of mindful creativity. The LightCatcher Chronicles has been vested in iNous for use as sources of contemplation, creativity and illumination.

When you are creating a deck for Personal Benefit only, you and others who are embarked on a SoulSong Journey at the same time will be engaging with the same artwork in daily Serious Play. These artworks may also be used in other iNous products and promotional material. iNous retains copyright over these LightCatchers, as well as over the design templates that are used to create your specific deck. Neither you, nor iNous, has permission to reprint the deck you create through the SoulSong Journey for commercial purposes – unless a written agreement is in place. 

If you want to collaborate with iNous and intend selling the deck you create through the SoulSong Journey to your community through our print-on-demand offering, then up to 48 artworks will be sourced by Curator and exclusively dedicated for inclusion in your deck. In other words, for as long as a written agreement between iNous and a collaborator remains in force, and the deck remains available for purchase through our POD shop page, these LightCatchers will not be used for the creation of any other collaborative (commercial) decks.

In general, iNous always retains copyright over any and all of the LightCatchers used in a Wisdom Deck or Intentional Journey, and you retain copyright over the content (themes and messages) you generate during the SoulSong process – which means that on the event of the print-on-demand agreement lapsing, both parties may reuse their portion of the content in their own way for their own benefit.

The finer details determining the duration of copyright and the royalty share agreement will be negotiated and agreed upon when you choose this option and enter into communication with Curator.

Print-on-demand (or POD) allows a designer or creator to self-publish their printable offering in an online shop and sell it to a worldwide audience without the large-scale printing and storage requirements usually associated with mainstream publishing or retail companies. A custom product is only printed, packed, and shipped when a customer places an order. 

POD is a cost-effective business model for independent creators and community builders who want to illuminate and share their unique wisdom with integrity in a niche product for a loyal audience .

There are numerous online companies and smaller publishing companies that offer print-on-demand services but there are differences in quality, cost and customer service.

Printing a single copy, or less than 50 copies, is not possible or financially feasible with most publishing companies – and iNous has researched quite a few. Consider Acelion Printers where 200 decks is the minimum you can print. Most printers set their minimum order quantity (MOQ) at a few hundred, or even a few thousand.

Some POD companies, such as Vervante, offer printing of less than 50 decks; however, they have fairly high production costs (specifically for card deck components) and although they offer fulfillment services (storage and shipping), you would need to cover this cost on a monthly basis.

In the case of POD marketplaces such as Shopify or Printify, you have less control over building and maintaining your customer database – so you won’t know who your customers are, or have a way of communicating with them in a personal and transparent manner. Most popular POD marketplaces have a large range of white label products but do not offer custom designed Oracle or Card card decks.

Essentially, print-on-demand means any third-party platform that offers a print run of small amounts of a customized item – but each POD has its own production, shipping, management and handling fees which need to be taken into consideration.

The Game Crafter is our preferred POD plafform for many reasons – the single most important one being that there is no minimum order size when publishing a deck. Someone in your community can buy a single copy for personal use, or you can buy 3 or 4 copies – to sell to friends and colleagues, to sell at a small local studio, or to use for promotional purposes. Bulk discounts apply for orders of 10 or more copies.

The Game Crafter (TGC) was founded in 2009 by JT Smith, Tavis Parker, and Jamie Vrbsky as the world’s first web-to-print game publishing company. Over the years, its print-on-demand service has extended to include custom Tarot and Oracle decks with booklets and packaging. Using the latest web technology, TGC’s online platform simplifies the design, manufacturing, and retail processes related to custom card deck creation.

TGC supports indie designers by allowing them to keep full rights of their creation and offering the high quality online resources needed for selling to a worldwide audience. The layout of their dedicated shop page – a multimedia showcase available for each Wisdom Deck that we create – ensures that buyers can see exactly ‘what’s in the box’. It also gives us the opportunity to share details about the creative process, the collaborators involved, the intentions behind the collaboration, and how best to work with a particular Deck. 

As a long-standing designer, iNous has established a solid reputation with TGC which has also resulted in a production discount – meaning that TGC takes only a small amount for the use of their POD services. 

The production components on TGC – such as card size, types of packaging, booklets – are sufficiently diverse for us to offer options for individuals in a niche audience (such as Deluxe or Standard Editions). The components are also well priced for their quality.

For these reasons, as well as for excellent customer support, iNous has chosen The Game Crafter as their print-on-demand platform.