Book People Archive

RE: OCW as System of Electronic Books

> An interesting point is how to publish some work
> on the web openly and at the same time convince a
> paper book publisher to print it and sell it and
> make money.  Even O'Reilly and Associates has
> not quite figured out how to make money on the
> print books that way.  However, Abelson tells me
> he has discussed the project with MIT Press, so
> we will have to be patient and see how this
> grand experiment works out.

  Dear Eric, (& company),

  Philip Greenspun has managed to do this;
  http://philip.greenspun.com/wtr/dead-trees/story.html has an anecdote
about it.
  I'm not so sure this will work for everybody.
  When Philip Greenspun gave a presentation in Milibae, CA, he frequently
remarked to the effect that publishing both online and in print is highly
effective, but that publishers are fearful/lazy and authors
greedy/fame-seeking, and thus don't allow it. He seemed to believe that it
would be very easy, useful, and profitable to have online copies of many
books.

  While I am not convinced that this will work for all books, I *am*
convinced that it will work for far more books than publishers will let
themself credit. In particular, I believe that publishers are terrified of
anything that could shake the public conscience into re-evaluating the
conventional wisdom that if you are reading something without paying for it,
you are stealing from someone's family.

  I'd be interested in reading what O'Reilly has to say about making money
on print Free (liberty) books. I recall hearing that they were burned at
some point, but I don't know any of the specifics. Does anyone have a good
link?

  One of my most trusted companions of late, GTK+/GNOME Application
Development by Havoc Pennington, is a Free/OpenSource book. It's rather
popular, and also appears online in many places. Of particular note, it
appears on Andamooka. I own a copy which I have used rigorously (the pages
are all dogeared and marked), and I have seen several other people's copies
as well. Thus, I conclude that it is selling. Furthermore, I must note that
I have never seen a duplicate published by another company. I imagine that
the book is selling, and, making money. (The publisher is New Riders Press
http://www.newriders.com/, the book info is at
http://www.newriders.com/books/title.cfm?isbn=0735700788).

  I would welcome more information; in particular, I am interested in sales
figures and incomes, not only for books that are available online, but also
for books that are published/printed traditionally.

  (Hmm, I think I'll ask Havoc Pennington, the author, if it made money...)

  Take care,
    Lion {:)}=