[QuantumIguana]

Originally Posted by petrucci

Well apparently, Quantum Iguanas are disagreeable creatures. Even when you agree with them they disagree. Case in point is my post about the studies of freely available literature. In general the studies supported your contention, as did my summary of them. You then respond with:

You presented these studies as if they had something to do with the public domain, which they did not. You mentioned that many books did better when they were offered free for a time, but then chose to highlight those books that did not sell better after a free promotional period. What promotional pricing is used has nothing to do with the public domain.

I believe that your argument here is fallacious. People have a limited amount of time to read, as their lives are finite. In that time they choose books to read. If they choose a particular book, then they cannot read another book at that same instant. Thus, books may be thought of as being in competition to be read. If a person reads a work by Austen or Dickens, then he or she is not reading another book. This makes competition for the remaining reading slots more fierce.

My logic is solid. People don't read Austen or Dickens just because they are free. Before e-readers, their books had been public domain for well over a century, but people still had to buy them. They could copy them without paying royalties, but they had to buy the paper books. This did no prevent people from reading them.

This indicates that people would still read these books even if they had to pay to obtain them. If people would be reading them anyway, these books can't be competing with the readers time. It is simply a given that some people are going to read the classics.

I appreciate your point about obscure books. However, in many instances you take a capitalistic approach. If these books were valued then people would be willing to pay the small amount that they would cost. If not, then maybe they are not worthwhile.

Copyright is a deal between government and authors. In exchange for the work entering the public domain at some point, authors get an exclusive right to copy their books. During that period of copyright, I am all for authors being able to make money selling their books. Once that time expires, then anyone can copy it without paying.

I am not complaining about laziness. I am also not saying that people cannot make it big. What I am saying is that fewer people can make it big because part of the market is being taken up by free and out of copyright books.

It isn't credible that if Pride and Prejudice or A Christmas Carol was not available, that those people who had wanted to read these books would switch over to reading some marginal author. If they couldn't read the classics, they would in all likelyhood be reading books by a really good contemporary author. That really good author isn't going to be someone on the fringe barely selling anything.

There are authors who complain about non-public domain books being given away for free or for 99 cents. But it is their book, they can set the price to whatever they want. If they want to pay people to take it, that's their business. If you can't compete with a 99 cent book, then write a better book. There are 99 cent hamburgers on the market, but hasn't prevented anyone from selling hamburgers that cost more, they just have to produice a better hamburger.

I have no problem with fanfic, so long as the authors are earning a living doing something. However, if some rich guy, with nothing else to do, spends all of his time writing fanfic, and publishes it for free, then there is a problem. Such fiction, presuming it were good and there is no reason to think that it could not be, could decimate the profession of writing fiction.

Why in the world would it make a bit of difference whether the author of fanfic has something else tho to with their time? Fanfic doesn't compete with the original material, people aren't reading fanfic instead of the original, but in addition to it. Those who read fanfic tend to be the most loyal customers of the original material.