Quote:
Originally Posted by Xenophon
Actually, in practice the Baen people are OK with you reselling the e-books you bought through them... as long as you don't keep a copy yourself. They're quite OK with the 'first-sale' doctrine. And in a few special circumstances, they've even given permission to have one purchased copy turn into two. A couple of divorces, and some kids-leaving-the-house come to mind, for example. Those are things where you certainly don't have the right through first-sale or any other legal theory; they were asked how to do it and granted permission to make the copies when they could equally well have said no. Nice folks at Baen.
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Based on what Eric Flint said in the latest Baen's Universe, they mostly look at these types of transfers as "opportunities to get our work in front of someone else's eyes". Baen may not make any money off that one, but gets someone else to try the author out.
"Try before you buy" is a tried-and-true sales technique - especially when it comes to items that are very much based on personal tastes.
At Penguicon a few years ago, John Ringo was there talking about Baen. What they were doing at the time was releasing volume 1 of a series for free as an eBook. That generated interest in the rest of the volumes - which they sold. Authors who thought that their books were done were (happily) surprised to get sizable royalty checks.