Doctorow: Ebooks Neither E Nor Books 190
xanderwilson writes "Author Cory Doctorow has released his paper/speech for the O'Reilly Emerging Technologies Conference this year into the public domain. A very interesting read about his experience with Magic Kingdom (which he is soon re-releasing under a more lenient Creative Commons license), the failure of e-books, and filesharing as a tool for creators."
Ebooks (Score:5, Informative)
More info on Cory (Score:5, Informative)
Also, his book is actually titled Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom. More information about his original release of the book, and re-release with the Creative Commons license can be read on his blog, and give good insight into what authors can expect when they release a book with a less restrictive license.
Re:More info on Cory (Score:5, Informative)
The first was so successful, that he's releasing this one the same way - free to download, or buy the printed version.
Rewrapped courtesy of html and /. (Score:3, Informative)
Paper for the O'Reilly Emerging Technologies Conference, 2004
February 12, 2004
San Diego, CA
Cory Doctorow
doctorow@craphound.com
--
Forematter:
This talk was initially given at the O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference [ http://conferences.oreillynet.com/cs/et2004 ], along with a set of slides that, for copyright reasons (ironic!) can't be released alongside of this file. However, you will find, interspersed in this text, notations describing the places where new slides should be loaded, in [square-brackets].
This text is dedicated to the public domain, using a Creative Commons public domain dedication:
> Copyright-Only Dedication (based on United States law)
>
> The person or persons who have associated their work with this
> document (the "Dedicator") hereby dedicate the entire copyright
> in the work of authorship identified below (the "Work") to the
> public domain.
>
> Dedicator makes this dedication for the benefit of the public at
> large and to the detriment of Dedicator's heirs and successors.
> Dedicator intends this dedication to be an overt act of
> relinquishment in perpetuity of all present and future rights
> under copyright law, whether vested or contingent, in the Work.
> Dedicator understands that such relinquishment of all rights
> includes the relinquishment of all rights to enforce (by lawsuit
> or otherwise) those copyrights in the Work.
>
> Dedicator recognizes that, once placed in the public domain, the
> Work may be freely reproduced, distributed, transmitted, used,
> modified, built upon, or otherwise exploited by anyone for any
> purpose, commercial or non-commercial, and in any way, including
> by methods that have not yet been invented or conceived.
--
For starters, let me try to summarize the lessons and intuitions I've had about ebooks from my release of two novels and most of a short story collection online under a Creative Commons license. A parodist who published a list of alternate titles for the presentations at this event called this talk, "eBooks Suck Right Now," [eBooks suck right now] and as funny as that is, I don't think it's true.
No, if I had to come up with another title for this talk, I'd call it: "Ebooks: You're Soaking in Them." [Ebooks: You're Soaking in Them] That's because I think that the shape of ebooks to come is almost visible in the way that people interact with text today, and that the job of authors who want to become rich and famous is to come to a better understanding of that shape.
I haven't come to a perfect understanding. I don't know what the future of the book looks like. But I have ideas, and I'll share them with you:
1. Ebooks aren't marketing. [Ebooks aren't marketing] OK, so ebooks *are* marketing: that is to say that giving away ebooks sells more books. Baen Books, who do a lot of series publishing, have found that giving away electronic editions of the previous installments in their series to coincide with the release of a new volume sells the hell out of the new book -- and the backlist. And the number of people who wrote to me to tell me about how much they dug the ebook and so bought the paper-book far exceeds the number of people who wrote to me and said, "Ha, ha, you hippie, I read your book for free and now I'm not gonna buy it." But ebooks *shouldn't* be just about marketing: ebooks are a goal unto themselves. In the final analysis, more people will read more words off more screens and fewer words off fewer pages and when those two lines cross, ebooks are gonna have to be the way that writers earn their keep, not the way that they promote the dead-tree editions.
2. Ebooks complement paper books. [Ebooks complement paper books]. Having an ebook is good. Having a paper book is good. Having both is even better. One reader wrote to me and said that he read half my first
Re:Paper manuals (Score:2, Informative)
Because Firefox wraps, and you don't... (Score:2, Informative)
February 12, 2004 - San Diego, CA
Cory Doctorow doctorow@craphound.com
--
Forematter:
This talk was initially given at the O'Reilly Emerging Technology
Conference [ http://conferences.oreillynet.com/cs/et2004 ], along
with a set of slides that, for copyright reasons (ironic!) can't
be released alongside of this file. However, you will find,
interspersed in this text, notations describing the places where
new slides should be loaded, in [square-brackets].
This text is dedicated to the public domain, using a Creative
Commons public domain dedication:
> Copyright-Only Dedication (based on United States law)
>
> The person or persons who have associated their work with this
> document (the "Dedicator") hereby dedicate the entire copyright
> in the work of authorship identified below (the "Work") to the
> public domain.
>
> Dedicator makes this dedication for the benefit of the public at
> large and to the detriment of Dedicator's heirs and successors.
> Dedicator intends this dedication to be an overt act of
> relinquishment in perpetuity of all present and future rights
> under copyright law, whether vested or contingent, in the Work.
> Dedicator understands that such relinquishment of all rights
> includes the relinquishment of all rights to enforce (by lawsuit
> or otherwise) those copyrights in the Work.
>
> Dedicator recognizes that, once placed in the public domain, the
> Work may be freely reproduced, distributed, transmitted, used,
> modified, built upon, or otherwise exploited by anyone for any
> purpose, commercial or non-commercial, and in any way, including
> by methods that have not yet been invented or conceived.
--
For starters, let me try to summarize the lessons and intuitions
I've had about ebooks from my release of two novels and most of a
short story collection online under a Creative Commons license. A
parodist who published a list of alternate titles for the
presentations at this event called this talk, "eBooks Suck Right
Now," [eBooks suck right now] and as funny as that is, I don't
think it's true.
No, if I had to come up with another title for this talk, I'd
call it: "Ebooks: You're Soaking in Them." [Ebooks: You're
Soaking in Them] That's because I think that the shape of ebooks
to come is almost visible in the way that people interact with
text today, and that the job of authors who want to become rich
and famous is to come to a better understanding of that shape.
I haven't come to a perfect understanding. I don't know what the
future of the book looks like. But I have ideas, and I'll share
them with you:
1. Ebooks aren't marketing. [Ebooks aren't marketing] OK, so
ebooks *are* marketing: that is to say that giving away ebooks
sells more books. Baen Books, who do a lot of series publishing,
have found that giving away electronic editions of the previous
installments in their series to coincide with the release of a
new volume sells the hell out of the new book -- and the
backlist. And the number of people who wrote to me to tell me
about how much they dug the ebook and so bought the paper-book
far exceeds the number of people who wrote to me and said, "Ha,
ha, you hippie, I read your book for free and now I'm not gonna
buy it." But ebooks *shouldn't* be just about marketing: ebooks
are a goal unto themselves. In the final analysis, more people
will read more words off more screens and fewer words off fewer
pages and when those two lines cross, ebooks are gonna have to be
the way that writers earn their keep, not the way that they
promote the dead-tree editions.
2. Ebooks complement paper books. [Ebooks complement paper
books]. Having an ebook is good. Having a paper book is good.
Having both is even
Re:This guy doesn't know what he's talking about. (Score:2, Informative)
It's a text file, and I assume the server sent text/plain as its type. Worked fine in Firefox, I thought maybe the OP meant "IE" when they said a standard browser, so I checked in IE6. Looked fine there as well.
At about 12 words per line, it's even easy to read as well, so I have no idea what they're whining about
Re:This guy doesn't know what he's talking about. (Score:2, Informative)
Creative Commons/GFDL helps (Score:2, Informative)
I wrote the O'Reilly book XForms Essentials [dubinko.info] and released it under the GFDL. I can say from experience that freeing the text has helped promote the book to audiences that would not have otherwise heard of it.
In order to deal with the rapidly changing technology, I launched a companion web site XForms Institute [xformsinstitute.com].
Particularly with technical books, "multimodal" publishing is smart. I'm glad to see Cory try it with fiction. -m
Making money by giving things away (Score:3, Informative)
I'm convinced that the gift economy can generate returns. Cory is right.
Re:The big problem... (Score:5, Informative)
Dude, 1999 called. It wants its information back.
Seriously. I've got a Zaurus. It weighs 7.1 ounces (comparable to a paperback), fits in my pocket (unlike a paperback), has 96KB of memory and a(n aftermarket) 512 MB SD card for the books. It's not a brick, but I've dropped it from four or five feet to wooden and carpeted floors too many times, and it's fine. It's true it's not as easy n the eyes as paper, but it's full (65,536) color and 320 x 240 with several anti-aliased fonts. It's not read only, in fact it has a thumb keyboard built in, and the ebook reader software (opie reader) allows annotations.
With the Wifi card plugged in, I can read ebooks on the net, on my PC (via samba mount) or copy them to the SD card. I'm currently reading Doctorow's latest, in fact.
Its battery life is a little low (4-6 hours), and it costs $400-$500. An alternative is a $100 Palm Pilot, with a longer battery life and a lower, black and white resolution; you can find after-market fonts for a Palm too. (I read books on a Handspring before I got the Zaurus).
Re:Off Topic, but I'm curious (Score:5, Informative)
While releasing his books under a creative commons license worked well for him I wonder what would happen if a normal (read unfamous) person attempted the same thing. Would a CC license help an unknown writer or hurt their chances of getting a book deal?
IIRC, Cory was relatively unknown prior to the publication of Down and Out. He was known within circles of SF readers, but not so much in the coveted "mainstream."
By doing this crazy thing and releasing his book -- for free! -- online, he made some very big waves in the publishing world, and people started paying attention to him. As a result, Down and Out sold tons of dead tree copies, and I think the downloads are into the millions.
When I tried my hand at publishing, I wondered the same thing. Sure, some people may have known me because of my acting work, or because of my weblog, but I didn't know if it would translate into mainstream sales. While I didn't offer Dancing Barefoot for free download, it was mostly online already, scattered across two years of weblog entries. When my book was first shipping, I would get e-mails from people who said "I just read your site, liked what I saw, and consequently bought your book." Sure, it's not the same as giving away the whole book, but I think it's similar.
All those people who bought it (over 3000 in just under four months) caught the attention of O'Reilly, and now I have a three book deal with them. None of that would have happened without the Internet, so I think a CC license will definately HELP an unknown writer.
Re:Just not there yet (Score:2, Informative)