[Shaggy]

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

You say that... and you also say that the author/artist should give away his artistic product for nothing, and find a non-artistic way to make money, like selling pencils on the street. I maintain that this makes no sense for the artist who would like to make a living off of their work. They might as well give up the art, it's just dragging down their ability to make money.

I said they need to find a way other than relying on charging for distribution. The examples I quoted (concerts, t-shirts, posters, etc) where taken from other sources, they weren't my suggestions. As I mentioned, those are usually more meaningful to musicians than authors. Authors will need to figure out something that makes sense other than charging for distribution. I agree, selling pencils on the street would be rather silly.

Actually, that's where the money is lost... those are the overhead costs that take away from the actual source of money: Sales. An author is paid according to sales, not printing and distribution. Those are publisher's costs, and they either absorb that with sales income, or with the final amount they pay the author (or, perish the thought, both).

It's all part of the same thing. Yes, printing and distribution are costs to the publisher, but those are also things that the publisher does which provide value to consumers. A large part of the revenue that they bring in from sales is based on the value they are providing by printing the books, shipping them to retailers, getting them put on the shelves. That's the distribution chain, and people pay the publishers for providing that service. The sale is a certain amount of revenue. From that you subtract the costs of printing/distribution, what's left is the profit. The more value you provide, the more revenue you can charge (which means more profit). With digital distribution, consumers no longer need a publisher to print books, ship items to brick and mortar retailers... etc. The cost to the publisher of those services is gone, but so is the value to the consumers. Because there's no longer any value, the revenue people are willing to give you for distribution is gone, so the profits are gone as well.

I'll grant that the old business model is being turned upside down by digital distribution. However, requiring the author to take on an additional (and essentially menial) job to make money is counter-productive, and will not encourage anyone to become an artist. Another method of payment needs to be found.

Absolutely. As I said, the examples of t-shirts and posters applies more to musicians. The biggest example for them though is the concert. In that case, the live performance is a service that they can provide which does have a lot of value to consumers. Authors will need to figure out what works best for them. Harry Potter (an extreme example, I know) probably makes a ton of money by licensing rights to other markets for physical items like t-shirts, costumes, toys, movie rights... etc. Rowling doesn't need to setup a table on a street corner and sell t-shirts personally, but the companies she licenses the rights to will make a lot of revenue that way.

I've suggested elsewhere either the patronage model (rich guy looking for tax deduction finances your artistic endeavors), or the advertisers model (a company pays you to add their advertising to your work, like a TV commercial or product placement finances a TV show), to finance artists. This makes much more sense, for it encourages the artist to work on their art, not selling pencils, while the patron or advertiser supports them.

And the added value of this is that it largely removes the concern about "piracy" of works, because consumers do not have to pay for the work... they just have to see it, to satisfy the patron/advertiser (who is banking on self-promotion or product sales based on the exposure in the artist's work). This would solve many of the issues that copyright attempts to satisfy, by taking it out of the consumer's concern, and making it the patron/advertiser's concern.

E-publishing can adopt an advertising model right now... publications are already essentially operating on a combination of advertising and subscription/counter sales (and some mags and papers don't even charge at the counter... they are solely supported by ads). The removal of physical printing and distribution should allow a significant lowering of production costs that can be absorbed by a combination of advertisers and subscriptions.

Yep, that's exactly the kind of thing I'm talking about. Advertising is one possibility, but there may be others that a creative artist can come up with as well.