When that happens, writerly income will come from incidental sources
such as paid speaking engagements and commissioned articles. No, it's
not "fair" that novelists who are good speakers will have a better deal
than novelists who aren't, but neither was it fair that the era of radio
gave a boost to the career of artists who played well in the studios,
nor that the age of downloading is giving a boost to the careers of
artists who play well live. Technology giveth and technology taketh
away. I'm an sf writer: it's my job to love the future.
My chances of landing speaking gigs, columns, paid assignments, and the
rest of it are all contingent on my public profile. The more people
there are that have read and enjoyed my work, the more of these gigs
I'll get. And giving away books increases your notoriety a whole lot
more than clutching them to your breast and damning the pirates.
So there you have it: I'm giving these books away to sell more books, to
find out more about the market and to increase my profile so that I can
land speaking and columnist gigs. Not because I'm some
patchouli-scented, fuzzy-headed, "information wants to be free"
info-hippie. I'm at it because I want to fill my bathtub with money and
rub my hands and laugh and laugh and laugh.
#
Developing nations
A large chunk of "ebook piracy" (downloading unauthorized ebooks from
the net) is undertaken by people in the developing world, where the
per-capita GDP can be less than a dollar a day.
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