Quote:
Originally Posted by DiapDealer
That is what he started out saying. Yes. The more you paid, the more of a patron you were.
Exactly. But that seems to be in direct conflict with Lee's opinion:
That last seems pretty crystal-clear to me: the more money you pay, the more the author gets. About then, he began his transition to paying at all vs not paying at all (when you could afford to).
If he wants to conflate purchase window with purchase price in determining what benefits an author more, that's up to him. But I know better. You (rhetorical) want to do the author the absolute most good? Pre-order. Whether it turns out to be cheap or expensive, you've done the most good you can for an author (not that I think people are obligated in any way to support an author's freely chosen vocation). But that still doesn't entitle anyone to believe the rest of the reading world are slackers for trying to save a few bucks on the things they spend hundreds of dollars or more a year on.
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I suspect that I'm a bit closer to what he actually means than you are, but I'll let leebase clarify his own statements.
Moral judgements aside, I think that anyone who is focused on minimizes the price they pay for an item, tends to enable a race to the bottom on that item. Of course, one person generally doesn't make that much of a difference, but if the mindset is wide spread, then you end up with cheap, low quality items rather than high quality items that are a bit more expensive. The point isn't that such a person is bad, the point is that actions have consequences.
There are those on this forum who consider books a commodity and interchangeable. For them just buying a generic book because it's in a price range they prefer makes sense. That's fine. It's a choice. I choose to do differently because I prefer specific authors when it comes to books, so I act in a manner which is more likely to result in more books that I like. If enough people agree with me about an individual author that I like, that author is more likely to keep writing. I think it counter productive to express this idea in moral terms rather than in terms of simple cause and effect. Now, one can debate if one's actions are more likely or less likely to result in the outcome they desire.