Self-Publishing/PODs

I am wondering how many of you have published work and if so how many decided to self-publish from your own home or use a Print on Demand service, such as Lulu? I was looking at the price listings for paperback publisher grade paper and was surprised to find that it is really affordable, which has me a bit concerned.

For those of you who are experienced in these matters, I ask this: Are publishers such as Lulu capable of delivering a good print or are you better off making it yourself from your own printer and just binding it by hand?

Second question: What is a decent page count for the books? Digest preferred, not the large standard size.

Please help if you can.

I am not an expert in any way. Nevertheless in the internet circles that I travel I know that Lulu and CreateSpace are very highly regarded. Just dont go with any of the cheap ripoffs because thats exactly what they are.

Lulu is a great choice--the YWS literary journal comes from there, and it's great quality. =)

Hm. I remember reading heaps on this but for the life of me can't remember any of it right now. It's too early, I guess.

Check out www.authonomy.com

Aside from being an innovative way to get exposure for your work, it has heaps of talented individuals who've been at it for decades in some cases, and they know all you can ever need to know on self-publishing, publishing, etc. Just check out the forum 'On Publishing'.