Thread: Baen Re-evaluating their Free Library
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Old 10-21-2012, 07:27 AM   #21
Nate the great
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Quote:
Originally Posted by starrigger View Post
As an author with a book in the Baen Free Library, maybe I can add a little information. I got a query from them, asking if I wanted to keep my book free, or pull it, or move it to the paid store. Here's the reason:

Baen is going to be making more of their books available in places like Amazon. Amazon has a price-matching policy. If a book is in the Free Library, and also on sale at Amazon, Amazon may make their edition of the book free also (regardless of whether that's what the author or publisher intended). Baen is giving the library authors a heads up on this, and letting them make up their own minds what to do.

In my case, the book in question is free everywhere (first book in a series), and it's working nicely as a loss-leader to encourage purchase of the following books. So I said I wanted to keep it in the library.

Regarding the Donate button in the library, as far as I know donations through that button go to support the library as a whole, and are not passed on to individual authors. I have no problem with that, as I think the Free Library is a fine thing, and I hope it continues to thrive. (However, there have been a couple of occasions when readers have told me they've tried to pay for my free book by making a donation there. I had to gently tell them that they were supporting the library, not me personally.)

Generally the way readers thank me is by buying some of my other books, which is cool.
Ah, so this was more complicated than simply authors not understanding the value of free ebooks. Baen is reevaluating their place in the ebook market, which is exactly what they should be doing given how much has changed in the past 5 years.

Good to know.
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