Comments on: News about Jim Baen’s Universe http://www.ericflint.net/index.php/2007/05/31/news-about-jim-baens-universe/ News announcements and snippets by Eric Flint Fri, 10 Feb 2012 22:52:30 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 By: john so http://www.ericflint.net/index.php/2007/05/31/news-about-jim-baens-universe/comment-page-1/#comment-171517 john so Wed, 27 Jan 2010 11:20:20 +0000 http://www.ericflint.net/index.php/2007/05/31/news-about-jim-baens-universe/#comment-171517 After reading your article I decided to post a comment for once. I thought it was pretty interesting. First off, i like how you specifically mentioned how you were talking about authors, because in the example of baseball, where everyone already knows about it, I don’t think the same reasoning applies. Nevertheless, i agree with your argument. If you ignore best-sellers, who would have pirated copies of their book out regardless of DRM, pirated ebooks are beneficial to most unknown authors. The truth is, just like on the bookshelves, people have to know the author first before they even search for the pirated ebook. That is also suggesting that the person in question knows how to find pirated ebooks. Or that the author has had some books pirated. This would all really narrow down the number of downloaded books for most authors. My impression is that the people who download ebooks are the ones who just want to see if it’s any good, are downloading unknown books to burn time, or are too cheap to buy the book, so they probably all wouldn’t have bought the books anyway. However, in all cases they might tell friends, who might actually buy the books, or buy the sequels. Another thing I’d like to mention is that since it takes a while for pirated books to get out, the hard core fans would probably buy the books instead of waiting. There is also the simple truth that most people like reading books on paper anyway. As for checking to see how pirated books affect sales, if you have two spare drafts lying around, I’d recommend you publish two similar books under separate aliases, one with an ebook format and one without. Then contact the two major IRC channels, rapishare, and a torrent tracker, and give them copies of the ebook to distribute (would be interesting to ask them how many downloads they get). Next thing you know your comparing sales. After reading your article I decided to post a comment for once. I thought it was pretty interesting. First off, i like how you specifically mentioned how you were talking about authors, because in the example of baseball, where everyone already knows about it, I don’t think the same reasoning applies.
Nevertheless, i agree with your argument. If you ignore best-sellers, who would have pirated copies of their book out regardless of DRM, pirated ebooks are beneficial to most unknown authors.
The truth is, just like on the bookshelves, people have to know the author first before they even search for the pirated ebook. That is also suggesting that the person in question knows how to find pirated ebooks. Or that the author has had some books pirated. This would all really narrow down the number of downloaded books for most authors. My impression is that the people who download ebooks are the ones who just want to see if it’s any good, are downloading unknown books to burn time, or are too cheap to buy the book, so they probably all wouldn’t have bought the books anyway. However, in all cases they might tell friends, who might actually buy the books, or buy the sequels.
Another thing I’d like to mention is that since it takes a while for pirated books to get out, the hard core fans would probably buy the books instead of waiting.
There is also the simple truth that most people like reading books on paper anyway.
As for checking to see how pirated books affect sales, if you have two spare drafts lying around, I’d recommend you publish two similar books under separate aliases, one with an ebook format and one without. Then contact the two major IRC channels, rapishare, and a torrent tracker, and give them copies of the ebook to distribute (would be interesting to ask them how many downloads they get). Next thing you know your comparing sales.

]]> By: fcsuper http://www.ericflint.net/index.php/2007/05/31/news-about-jim-baens-universe/comment-page-1/#comment-81988 fcsuper Sat, 28 Jun 2008 05:06:52 +0000 http://www.ericflint.net/index.php/2007/05/31/news-about-jim-baens-universe/#comment-81988 Just would like to point out that it would be nice to have more books following the Course of Empire universe...not necessarily a series per se (new time frames and charactors are more than welcome)...maybe jump ahead a couple hundred years Just would like to point out that it would be nice to have more books following the Course of Empire universe…not necessarily a series per se (new time frames and charactors are more than welcome)…maybe jump ahead a couple hundred years

]]> By: Greg http://www.ericflint.net/index.php/2007/05/31/news-about-jim-baens-universe/comment-page-1/#comment-38677 Greg Mon, 11 Jun 2007 20:08:20 +0000 http://www.ericflint.net/index.php/2007/05/31/news-about-jim-baens-universe/#comment-38677 On the subject of Fair Use, Eric might want to check out this story where the NCAA kicked a reporter out of the championship baseball game for live-blogging it. http://blogs.knoxnews.com/knx/silence/archives/2007/06/reporter_booted.shtml On the subject of Fair Use, Eric might want to check out this story where the NCAA kicked a reporter out of the championship baseball game for live-blogging it.

http://blogs.knoxnews.com/knx/silence/archives/2007/06/reporter_booted.shtml

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