Quote:
Originally Posted by Steve Jordan
No, you're right... If I ask a consumer to pay $2.50 for a book, I expect them to pay $2.50 for the book... not to give me a dollar for it, and be satisfied that both sides made out.
But a Creative Commons license isn't just a "copy and hand out my book for free" card. CC allows the author to specify how their book can be used. If that includes my deciding that anyone buying my e-book can copy it and give a dozen copies away to others, I can say so in the license, and that's what people can do. I could also specify that the book is free to the first customer, and he can copy and distribute it as far as his ISP will let him.
But I am also within my right to specify that purchasers can not make more than one copy, or that they must delete their copy if they give a copy away. The author has a choice in what he will allow. (The consumer, as always, has the choice to adhere to the author's wishes, or ignore them as he wishes.)
The value of CC licenses generally comes in with the print-published author, who is expecting print book sales to follow his CC e-books, and make his profit that way. Again, I'm not print-published, so the CC license does little for me. It would be equally as effective if I simply picked a few books and give them away for free under a standard copyright (and it would probably result in exactly the same behavior among users, at any rate), and hope to garner more attention to my other books.
The only concern I have there is the fact that I am already making The Onuissance Cells and The First Expedition available for free, expressly for the purpose of allowing people to sample my wares, spread the word, and buy more books... so the question is, How many books do I give away? Two? Four? All but the best two? All but the worst four? What combination will produce that magical moment when a boatload of people all discover me, and start buying my material like there's no tomorrow?
And oh, yeah: How does giving books away solve copyright concerns with the other books?
|
Ok, so I was mistaken but I understand your position on that specific point now.
I wasn't aware you had any book available for free. If neither your writing style nor the genre you write in has seen a major change, I'd guess two books ought to be enough to promote your work. The next question is:
where are they available? Have you considered sending copies to some prominent bloggers (Doctorow comes to mind) to get a bit of exposition?
In short, do you feel you've used the internet to the best of your abilities to get word of mouth?
As for CC, I feel they're very interesting because although I just can't bring myself to see anything wrong with somebody
giving a copy of an ebook he happens to have (which, considering the medium, I pretty much feel is essentially the same as handing over a copy of a pbook), I am very much against anybody making a profit out of copyrighted work without the author getting his share. CC permits exactly that.
As a side note, I hesitated a bit before writting down that last comment, but it does cover my philosophical viewpoint on the whole copyright/filesharing issue.
Well, I guess I've now made mortal ennemies out of some people on the forum...
