Quote:
Originally Posted by elcreative
At various times in my career I come from a solid retail background and giving a freebie out means that it is an item that won't sell to anyone who has the freebie... simple accepted meaning in retail... if the eBook community wants to give it a new meaning then so be it but, if the meaning of the english language is changing in a specific group, you can hardly blame those using a term that has always previously been crystal clear...
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In physical retail, a freebie is an item that won't be sold. In digital retail, an "item" can be sold or given away an infinite number of times without diminishing stock.
A physical freebie has lost production costs; a digital freebie doesn't. A physical freebie can be called a "lost sale," because that *specific copy* could've sold to someone else, who'd cover the production costs + profit. But a digital item doesn't work that way; giving one away (or a hundred) doesn't increase the production costs that the sales have to cover. Physical freebies can be lost sales because you can run out of them before you run out of potential sales; you don't run out of digital copies before you run out of buyers.