Quote:
Originally Posted by Lemurion
I agree with the point that it's very complicated, and that as with music illegal downloads can lead to future sales. They don't always, but they can. However, many people only read a book once, but they listen to albums many times.
What this means for illegal or other free downloads is that a person may read one book and get hooked, but rather than buying a copy of the one they have already read, they will go out and buy the author's other works. This is wonderful, and the author does get paid for those purchases. The problem is that these numbers aren't going to the current book, which is the one the publisher is counting when figuring the author's next advance.
So while I completely agree that saying that some downloads will lead to lost sales is not the whole story, but it is part of the story, and for an author's career it can be an important part.
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I imagine it is usually that way - you only read once. I have had the other experience - reading downloaded copies of a book made me want to buy the book in some original format (especially the good ones), because I felt like I wanted to give something to the author. Buying used books did not have this effect on me (I paid, right?), and the author got exactly nothing from me in return for some used books I enjoyed very much. This may be a corner case, though.
I think the sales numbers are a big deal, though, for contractual as well as direct financial reasons.