Print-on-demand and LightningSource

Factual Questions
1

I’m the author of a number of technical books, but all my recent proposals have been turned down. Given the economy, established publishers are nervous and understaffed.

So I’ve been considering DIY publishing. I’ve looked at a number of micropublishers, and they all go to LightningSource for their printing. As I understand it, books printed with LightningSource are automatically listed with Amazon.com and other retailers.

I’m prepared to take on the headaches of book layout and hiring editors/artists/etc., and now I’m thinking of becoming my own micropublisher. But there’s a problem. I like to include CDs/DVDs in my books, and LightningSource doesn’t do that.

Here are my two questions: Has anyone tried this kind of thing before? If so, has anyone worked with a good alternative to LightningSource?

2

This doesn’t exactly answer your question, but if the CDs contain a relatively small amount of data (e.g. all the sample code from a programming book), one alternative might be to just avoid the whole mess and publish the supplemental files on a website instead of glued into the back cover.