Quote:
Originally Posted by Elfwreck
I'm not sure what authors think is going to fill that niche for them if they've got DRM to block it. Amazon's popularity lists, so they only get customers from one store? Sample chapters that only indicate if the author can make a good setting, not if they can tell a complete story?
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I need to play devil's advocate here.
Sharing is one way that authors get new fans, not the only way, and sharing of pbooks does not result from the easy duplication afforded by ebooks which legitimately does raise the likelihood of negating a sale because getting an infringing copy for free was the easiest of all options.
Customers from only Amazon could be enough to let any author retire comfortably, and Amazon's shopping experience, samples, recommendation, one-click buying, etc, could easily make up for the losses from sharing.
Plus add in B&N, Kobo and (blech) iBooks.
"How can I get more people to buy my books?" can potentially be answered in part with "By not letting quite so many of the customers get it for free quite so easily."
It is a fact that many authors who sell ebooks with DRM, even some with Amazon exclusives, do very well. The Kindle ecosystem is working. It's bringing in readers and selling books. Same with the Nook. The arguments in your post above will not sway authors, in the face of that reality. I fear they may even do more harm than good.