Tips for Self Promotion, Sales, and Advertising discussion
Book piracy
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Are Your Sales Affected By E-Piracy?
Thanks for the heads up, Rowena. I'll make sure to check it out.
I mentioned in another group I don't mind if people pirate my books and I got yelled at by old men.
you can google track your book and author name and google automatically sends you updates when it sees your name or book. That's how I've found several pirating sites. It's one thing to go to yahoo groups and learn about it, but it's another to follow each site's 'laws' to get your book taken down. Get familiar with biting your tongue and sending emails to random domain owners :)
Rowena wrote: "Do you know?
Are you mystified? Outraged? Resigned?
Piracy is a rude awakening for a lot of authors, until they join the Yahoo Group "AuthorsAgainstEBookTheft" or else the Yahoo Group "Author..."
Dear Rowena! Thanks for always coming up with some great tips to check out. I have been following the priracy discussions. My book has only been out 5-6 weeks. I am pretty green as published author, so I always appreciate some willing to share.
Does any one beside me have concern about people printing off the selected preview chapters? How much of the book can they manage to get for free? My book is copyrighted, as all our books are. Don't people understand that distributing copyright material is illegal? Printing off someone's copyrighted works and passing it around probably costs more in ink jets and paper then it would ot just click, order the book and leagally pay with a debit card. So my book is being read. But what 'non existant library' didn't buy a copy for its patrons to read? What is someone's responce supposed to be? I was caught off guard when I found this out.
Are you mystified? Outraged? Resigned?
Piracy is a rude awakening for a lot of authors, until they join the Yahoo Group "AuthorsAgainstEBookTheft" or else the Yahoo Group "Author..."
Dear Rowena! Thanks for always coming up with some great tips to check out. I have been following the priracy discussions. My book has only been out 5-6 weeks. I am pretty green as published author, so I always appreciate some willing to share.
Does any one beside me have concern about people printing off the selected preview chapters? How much of the book can they manage to get for free? My book is copyrighted, as all our books are. Don't people understand that distributing copyright material is illegal? Printing off someone's copyrighted works and passing it around probably costs more in ink jets and paper then it would ot just click, order the book and leagally pay with a debit card. So my book is being read. But what 'non existant library' didn't buy a copy for its patrons to read? What is someone's responce supposed to be? I was caught off guard when I found this out.
Mod
Preview chapters are okay. You want those shared. Normally, a publisher limits an author to sharing two or three chapters.
If you share more than one-fifth of the book as preview chapters, you are shooting yourself in the foot.
A certain amount of sharing is permitted (Fair Use) as long as it is not the entire novel, and as long as it is for defined purposes, and does not affect the author's ability to sell the novel.
And... no. A lot of people do not understand that copying books and sharing them is illegal.
Thanks for the great info, I had no idea!
I tried looking up AuthorsAgainstEBookTheft and Yahoo says it doesn't exist.
And this is precisely why I back proprietary formats like Amazon uses for the Kindle or B&N uses for their Nook. You can pretty much guarantee that those will not get copied once sold. Unfortunately, sites like Smashwords, whom like many authors, I use as well, gives the user the ability to download the ebook in many different formats which are very easily copied from one system to another.
Tom Wiseman
"Solid mysteries with a techno edge."
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AuthorsAgainstE-BookTheft-subscribe@yahoogroups.com
My error, Selena. I apologize. I omitted the hyphen.
Mod
Presumably you have seen this tutorial? On the third page someone asks how to remove Kindle DRM and is given a variety of suggestions.
http://astatalk.com/thread/5982/1/%3A...
It is legal to crack DRM for private use on your own equipment, therefore, the sharing of this information is also perfectly lawful. Alas.
Piracy is inevitable and a consequence of the digital age.Adding things like DRM only increases the work factor for those intent on piracy, it can never stop it from happening.
Indeed, I believe it’s the introduction of technologies like this that breeds piracy. Adding protection to your work is a big neon sign to all those script kiddies out there who want to show off to the world that they could break the encryption, and the only way to prove they have done it is to post it to the world. It’s a self perpetuating problem.
In my view, and I think the music industry is starting to wake up to this idea, it is better to make your work accessible but at a price that makes it a no brainer decision on buying versus the risks with piracy ( a lot of these piracy sites are there purely to inject malware and Trojans onto peoples machines). We are seeing a massive move towards the sub dollar price bracket for e-books. Only last week I read about a self publisher who just made his first million dollars selling his book for $0.75. The cost of the book was so low that people were buying it as a throwaway purchase.
Tom wrote: "And this is precisely why I back proprietary formats like Amazon uses for the Kindle or B&N uses for their Nook. You can pretty much guarantee that those will not get copied once sold. Unfortunat..."
Not strictly true Tom, both .azw and .epub formats are easily converted to a multitude of formats using tools like Calibre. Removing the DRM that amazon put on their books takes less than 10 seconds.
Jim wrote: "Piracy is inevitable and a consequence of the digital age.Adding things like DRM only increases the work factor for those intent on piracy, it can never stop it from happening.
Indeed, I be..."
Piracy is a huge problem. I recently saw a publishing trade story that said 25% of all EBooks have been pirated. However, I disagree with regard to the price point. This is less about greed on the part of hackers than about the "prestige" that accompanies such a hack. Personally, I feel that what should accompany such a hack is about 10 years in a federal prison - no parole. That more than anything else will discourage hackers while saving tens of millions of dollars in lost revenues for authors.
Rowena wrote: "Do you know?Are you mystified? Outraged? Resigned?
Piracy is a rude awakening for a lot of authors, until they join the Yahoo Group "AuthorsAgainstEBookTheft" or else the Yahoo Group "Author..."
Not sure how well the GoodReads group will work. When I politely suggested piracy was illegal, I was summarily tossed from the Amazon Kindle Group. Apparently there, piracy is a way to get free books. Some even object to $0.99 cents!
I honestly don't think my eSales are affected by piracy. That doesn't mean unauthorized copies of my books aren't out there. I really have no idea.So if folks are finding and downloading pirated copies of my book how can my sales not be affected?
The truth of the matter is, I highly doubt most individuals searching for a pirated copy would have purchased a legit copy in the first place. If they can't find a free copy of my book, they'll move on to the next author's pirated copy.
Personally, I think targeting each place which decides to pirate my work is a waste of time and looks at the little picture. Perhaps what Larry said about raising the penalty would be a more viable solution.
Also... I talk to quite a few people online, Larry. From time to time, I'll virtually meet an individual who'll say to email him a copy of my book. I think there are quite a few people who do not respect the title of novelist as a profession. To me, it would be akin to meeting someone on the street who is a game developer and saying, "email me your latest game."
It's insane in a maddening way.
Larry wrote: "Jim wrote: "Piracy is inevitable and a consequence of the digital age.Adding things like DRM only increases the work factor for those intent on piracy, it can never stop it from happening.
Inde..."
I certainaly would not like to suggest in any way shape or form that piracy is a trivial matter, however I do think we need to keep things in perspective. Piracy has existed in one form or another for decades, I challenge anyone on these forums to hand on heart say they have never recorded a song off the radio or recorded a movie from the TV. This was at one time considered Piracy, but as technology allowed this to become commonplace, the industry realised it was an impossible task to try and prevent it. Does this effect DVD or CD sales, you bet your bottom dollar it does, but it hasnt destroyed the industry.
With the invention of the internet and the ability to digitise video and audio, sharing of copyright material exploded. The music industry spent nearly a Decade trying to stop it, and they failed, but artists are not destitute because of it, indeed, the music industry has now embraced the technology and we have Itunes, Spotify etc which has now given them greater access to people who "do" want to buy/rent music and in reality has probably generated more revenue than they would have with shop sales alone.
Now were digitising our books and an unfortunate, but nonetheless inevitable side effect is piracy. It does not matter what penalty you dish out, it will not prevent it. And who would you prosecute? The person who first supplied it? What about the thousands/millions of people that shared it from there? You would not be able to build prisons enough to cope with demand, trust me. Better to accept it and provide a Unique selling experience at a cost that makes it a no brainer for the person who is debating buying or downloading.
Rowena wrote: "Tom,Presumably you have seen this tutorial? On the third page someone asks how to remove Kindle DRM and is given a variety of suggestions.
http://astatalk.com/thread/5982/1/%3A......"
I disagree. While there may be no law preventing cracking the encryption, the U.S. Copyright Code prohibits distribution of ANY copyrighted work without prior permission from the rights holder.
Larry wrote: "Rowena wrote: "I disagree. While there may be no law preventing cracking the encryption, the U.S. Copyright Code prohibits distribution of ANY copyrighted work without prior permission from the rights holder."
I think Rowena was talking about the sharing of the information on how to remove DRM not the sharing of the copyright material itself.
Larry wrote: "Jim wrote: "Piracy is inevitable and a consequence of the digital age.Adding things like DRM only increases the work factor for those intent on piracy, it can never stop it from happening.
Inde..."
Larry> do you know of any way an author can imbed tracking in an ebook, to find out whether or not it has been illegally copied?
Priscilla wrote: "Larry wrote: "Jim wrote: "Piracy is inevitable and a consequence of the digital age.Adding things like DRM only increases the work factor for those intent on piracy, it can never stop it from hap..."
There are stories this week about new methods being implemented in various countries to track those downloading illegal copies from ISPs. From what I read, each time such an illegal download occurs, the recipient, at least in the U.S. and (I believe) England, will receive notification of the violation. Repeated violations will result in action against the recipient. Unfortunately, the articles I read failed to disclose exactly what those penalties will be. Perhaps loss of Internet service (that's a guess) but could also include fines. Theft of intellectual property (in all digital realms) has become so bad that the entertainer, Prince, is refusing to record any further music until enforcement comes into being.
According to one of the articles, some countries are refusing to cooperate with international conventions banning such piracy. Sweden was one of the countrie named. The UN has even weighed in on the matter, but that could well proved to be a paper tiger.
Rowena wrote: "Oops. Did no one answer?Preview chapters are okay. You want those shared. Normally, a publisher limits an author to sharing two or three chapters.
If you share more than one-fifth of the book as..."
I must slightly disagree. While some people don't understand that it's illegal, many take the attitude that intellectual property is free and shouldn't be protected. Not sure who they expect to produce quality works gratis. I read a piece this week by the manager of the singing group U2 who's been active in lobbying for digital copyright protections. It's at: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/o...
The reader comments were totally nasty and vicious. Rather like the comments I received from the Amazon Kindle group on GoodReads. Several of those members were pro-piracy and anti-author.
Stephanie wrote: "you can google track your book and author name and google automatically sends you updates when it sees your name or book. That's how I've found several pirating sites. It's one thing to go to yahoo..."I'd be suspicious of anything Google. That company has been the subject of a years' long lawsuit brought by the Authors Guild and the Association of American Publishers (hope I have the names correct) because Google is in an effort to publish content of copyrighted books online with no compensation for authors in cahoots with some major libraries. Actually, without even seeking permission. I've read in trade pubs that apparently thousands of books have already been subjected to the alleged copyright infringement.
The result, I suggest you trust Google for nothing except its search engine.
Larry wrote: "Priscilla wrote: "Larry wrote: "Jim wrote: "Piracy is inevitable and a consequence of the digital age.Adding things like DRM only increases the work factor for those intent on piracy, it can neve..."
thanks, Larry, for the info re tracking through ISP reports. I'm involved in a national intellectual properties rights movement and will pass on that information.
i've removed all my artwork from the Internet, and regularly check for residual theft of my creative work. In the past, i have found violators of my copyright, via Google searches.
Priscilla wrote: "Larry wrote: "Priscilla wrote: "Larry wrote: "Jim wrote: "Piracy is inevitable and a consequence of the digital age.Adding things like DRM only increases the work factor for those intent on pirac..."
Priscilla, hope the info helps. Best, ;-)
Christy wrote: "I mentioned in another group I don't mind if people pirate my books and I got yelled at by old men."Deservedly so. You're undermining the very system that protects those of us who are professional writers.
Larry wrote: "Christy wrote: "I mentioned in another group I don't mind if people pirate my books and I got yelled at by old men."Deservedly so. You're undermining the very system that protects those of us wh..."
Larry, I have the same perspective with people who give away their creative services in any genre - clients perceive that we creatives have no value for ourselves and our work. Then, by extension, the general public sees no value in our work. The circle comes 'round, no one will hire when they can get it for free, we can't get work and end up giving it away, just to be able to do it - writing, art, music.... frustrating.
Absolutely. As I noted in Message 26, even Prince has refused to record any more music until property piracy protections are implemented. If people want things free, there's an abundance at the free public libraries and free books on Kindle. The weird part is I haven't heard of any overwhelming onslaught to download Shakespeare, Homer or James Fennimore Cooper to name but a few. Thus, I'm beginning to suspect that free is the new euphemism for: "I'm a thief and I like it!"
If you read the reader comments from the article I cited in message #27, it becomes obvious that theft of copyrighted works is the new cleptomania, perhaps with a goodly dose of paranoid schizophrenic added in. These people not only feel they have a right to steal, but are vicious about it.
I can't help wonder what these same thieves would do if all creative people stopped producing for a year or two. No more books, magazines, newspapers, motion pictures, television, paintings, photographs, etc. Would they attempt to force us to create?
Mod
search this way:
site:filesonic.com "Reena Reenaslastnamewhateveritis"
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http://biontrack.com/commercialapps/e...
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Metallica speaks out, too.
There are creators speaking out, but the vast majority of authors/musicians etc cannot afford the reprisals, and so, they either accept or ignore the plunder and pillage and thereby --very frankly-- are part of the problem.
Not sure if anyone has read the following before, but I think this author makes some valid points. Agreed this is about a game and not an ebook but I think the same conclusions are valid for both in terms of Digital Media :-"Large parts of the culture these days exists in a world where copies are free. Copying a physical book costs money, but copying a digital movie is free. In fact, simply moving a movie from one hard drive to another actually copies the movie first, then deletes the original. Copying games is also free. No resources are lost, nobody loses any money, and more people are having fun.
To people who want to get paid for their digital works, myself included, that is a bit of a problem. All of society and economics is based on an old outdated model where giving something to someone would rid the original owner of their copy, so everyone who wanted a copy had to buy one from someone else who would lose theirs, and the only source of new copies was you. There might be actual development costs involved in making these copies. For example, for every wheel in the market, someone had to make that wheel. With digital copies, you only need to make the wheel once.
I won’t bother analyzing why people copy games and other digital media, as that’s really a moot point. We’ve got an amazingly effective way of distributing culture that is extremely beneficial for humanity, but it clashes with our current economical models. Piracy will win in the long run. It has to. The alternative is too scary.
If someone pirates Minecraft instead of buying it, it means I’ve lost some “potential” revenue. Not actual revenue, as I can never go into debt by people pirating the game too much, but I might’ve made even more if that person had bought the game instead. But what if that person likes that game, talks about it to his or her friends, and then I manage to convince three of them to buy the game? I’d make three actual sales instead of blocking out the potentially missed sale of the original person which never cost me any money in the first case."
He then goes on to talk about how adding additional services to the game is the way to generate sales uplift, which isnt really relevant in the scope of this discussion but anyone who wants to read the full excerpt can do here http://notch.tumblr.com/post/11215960...
Something also that those who have print books only--they too can be pirated as eBooks? How? I seen it happened whn many NYC authors were not in eBook formats, but had theirs stolen like this. It doesn’t take much to scan a print book and upload to a pdf file or some reading file. I have three nonfiction ghost books in print only (Schiiffer swrtill funny about eBooks)but I found one(first one) scanned and downloaded to eBook and put out for free.Found out Schiffer's Marketing has been fighting this forum for a year on illegals downloads of Schiffer books.
You have a printer with a scanner/copier to it, right? So not really. Sometimes some of these illegals are badly done. All those taking these eBooks is it's free. "Large parts of the culture these days exists in a world where copies are free. Copying a physical book costs money, but copying a digital movie is free. In fact, simply moving a movie from one hard drive to another actually copies the movie first, then deletes the original. Copying games is also free. No resources are lost, nobody loses any money, and more people are having fun.
Mod
It has been improved, the wording clarified to make it clear that this Act only affects foreign sites which do nothing except infringe copyrights.
SOPA does not affect Facebook, YouTube etc. It does not affect the privacy of anyone except thieves.
Please find a few minutes today, Thursday, to leave a thank you note on at least one or two of the following op eds in support of SOPA.
Please share, comment on, and “like” the following pieces:
1.
http://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blo...
House Judiciary Chairman Lamar Smith (R-TX) has an oped in The Hill: Setting The Record Straight on SOPA
2.
http://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blo...
Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-VA) has an oped in The Hill: It’s Time to Protect America’s Entrepreneurs from Online Piracy
3.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sandra-...
Alliance Executive Director Sandra Aistars has a piece on the Huffington Post: OPEN Act Falls Short for Artists and Creators
4.
http://www.billboard.biz/bbbiz/indust...
Rich Bengloff of A2IM has a guest column in Billboard: Protect-IP and SOPA Acts Will Not ‘Break the Internet’
5.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael...
Michael O’Leary of the MPAA has a piece on the Huffington Post: Stop Protecting Criminal Behavior: Why the Critics Are Wrong About the Stop Online Piracy Act
6.
http://washingtonexaminer.com/opinion...
Colin Hanna, president of Let Freedom Ring, has an oped supporting SOPA and PRTOECT IP in the Washington Examiner: Internet should be free, but not lawless
7.
http://www.sesac.com/News/News_Detail...
Alliance member SESAC issued a “Call to Arms For Creative Community” urging members to contact their representative in support of SOPA
8.
http://popuppirates.com/?p=1454
Filmmaker and grassroots member Ellen Seidler has another post in her Who Profits From Piracy series: Googlenocchio?
9
http://musictechpolicy.wordpress.com/...
Chris Castle has a new post on MusicTechPolicy.com: Wolves in Sheeps Clothing Criminalizing All Who Oppose Them But for He Who Brings the Sunlight: The Troubled, Strange, Fearful, Frightened World of Gary Shapiro, the Diogenese of Anti-Copyright Lobbyists
With due respect, Rowena - while this thread is a great place for your post, my inbox is NOT. Can you show me on Goodreads where it says group moderators/creators may send unsolicited, political messages to others? If this is so critical, an open forum is a good place to discuss it, so I applaud you posting here. A debate is healthy. Cramming inboxes in one way, uninvited communication is not. Again, this is not about SOPA or about piracy, so please let's not conflate the issues. This is about your actions, not Congress's.
Thank you Gregory. That's how I feel. Reading the misguided and misinformed comments in here after seeing the emails has only made me more annoyed. Please stop sending me emails. I consider it spam.
I agree with Gregory and Troy. I'm not here to get political agendas shoved down my throat.
Mod
It's not exactly a political agenda, Ralph. If you are in favor of no copyright protection, you are free to make your work Public Domain or creative commons, but those of us who would like to earn a living and honor our contracts would perhaps rather that other people did not describe our work as public domain or creative commons behind our backs and without our permission.
Mod
What I distributed was not a tip about advertising, marketing, or promotion, so it was inappropriate of me to have taken advantage of the messaging function.
I beg your pardon.
Christy wrote: "I mentioned in another group I don't mind if people pirate my books and I got yelled at by old men."Obviously someone needed to yell at you. Also, I'm an "old man" who's been a professional writer all my adult life. Do you resent older folks just because they have more experience or is it something personal?
You obviously need to enhance your knowledge. This country used to have a thriving music industry until the pirates stepped in, now it's a small fraction of its former self.
Thanks, Rowena. I appreciate the apology. I think a debate about SOPA, not about piracy, would be interesting to have had. I suspect we'll get other chances to do so, on it or variants....
Ralph wrote: "I agree with Gregory and Troy. I'm not here to get political agendas shoved down my throat."Ralph, I think you're out of line with the phrase "political agenda." How is it political agenda for someone wishing to advise others that the intellectual properties they've created are in serious danger of being stolen. That's about on a par with yelling to someone to watch out for the runaway car bearing down. I.e., human decency -- unless you prefer being run down.
Larry wrote: "Christy wrote: "I mentioned in another group I don't mind if people pirate my books and I got yelled at by old men."Obviously someone needed to yell at you. Also, I'm an "old man" who's been a p...You obviously need to enhance your knowledge. This country used to have a thriving music industry until the pirates stepped in, now it's a small fraction of its former self. "
I think you should follow your advice on knowledge. To believe piracy is the reason why the music industry has faltered is a bit much. How about the fact that tastes have changed vinyl is gone, cds are gone, music is digital and way cheaper than it ever was, etc etc. Or does that have no bearing? I'm not saying piracy hasn't done it's part but to say 'until' piracy stepped in is a little much. The industry was on the decline for years. As for stressing myself out about piracy, I won't waste my time. It's not going to go away no matter what is done. Even if we gave up all our privacy and gave the government full control of the internet it would not go away. I've worked in the IT industry for near 20 years, and every method has been attempted. Technology simply advances too rapidly. Hell, China themselves had to take to hiring hackers, and still they cannot stop piracy, not that they really try that hard as it's a major income source for the Chinese and many other countries. As long as something is going to make someone money, it will be done. Stopping piracy is like swimming in the ocean against the current. You can only tread water for so long. Consider it akin to a new form of prostitution. It will be here long after you are dead and gone. But hey, if you want to give yourself an ulcer over it, have at it.
Larry wrote: "How is it political agenda for someone wishing to advise others that the intellectual properties they've created are in serious danger of being stolen. "Except, Larry, that's not what Rowena did. What she did was to encourage us to take action in favor of legislation pending in Congress. That's a very different thing than what you state.
I'm not sure "political agenda" is the right phrase, but when folks only link to people on one side of an issue and call folks on the other side liars (not in this public post, however, but in the email in question), there is definitely something more going on than simple human decency. I believe that is what many of us are reacting to. Rowena graciously and quickly apologized for the (mis)use of the email. No one should have any objection to her post on this board, whether they agree with her thoughts or not. There is a difference.
Piracy exists. It's a problem. Again, however, don't conflate issues.
Are you mystified? Outraged? Resigned?
Piracy is a rude awakening for a lot of authors, until they join the Yahoo Group "AuthorsAgainstEBookTheft" or else the Yahoo Group "AuthorsAgainstCopyrightTheft" or the "copyrightalliance.org"
All three are free to join. The AuthorsAgainst.... groups will tell you in confidence what to do if you discover that your print books have been scanned and "shared" or your ebooks "shared" on pirate sites such as Astatalk, Demonoid, Plunder etc etc.
If you are curious, we have a GoodReads group called "Authors Without A Yacht" which is a reader-friendly forum where authors and readers discuss copyright issues and current events, and also tell readers where they can LEGALLY buy ebooks for the best prices.
(Promo!)
Do join. Do share any piracy anecdotes.
Also, I'm "launching" the Authors Without A Yacht groups with a radio show next Tuesday, and brainstorming with literary agent Richard Curtis, also Brenna Lyons and Carly Carson about piracy.