Tuesday, January 25, 2011

Steal My Book

Really, I don't mind. In fact, I encourage you to steal my book. The way I figure it--and I'm stealing the idea from Cory Doctorow, proving piracy of ideas is pretty common--anyone who steals my book wasn't going to pay for it in the first place.

What am I talking about? Well, I discovered (through the magic of Google Alerts...if you are an author and don't have one set to your name do it now) The Bottom Feeders is available through a file sharing site. Another site has it available for $1.99. Ha! Good luck selling it, folks. I'm not doing so hot at $.99. (5 sold in January so far...)

But I digress. Please, feel free to trade my book "illegally". Any of my books, actually. If it means more people read the books--awesome. The problem, see, is that most book pirates probably don't read all those files. Pirates pirate because they can--I'd say some are addicted to file downloading. I want to meet readers who are addicted to reading. So steal my book. Steal it all over the place. Just leave my name on it, okay, because not to do so would be the real theft.

Speaking of free things and reading, you can sign up for a free preview of The House Eaters. Just fill in the appropriate info off to the left. The book is coming. Soon.

In fact, it goes to print tonight...barring any major problems.

Excited?

Yes.


18 comments:

Lee Thompson/Thomas Morgan/James Logan/Julian Vaughn said...

Neat post, man! And congrats on the book! I still need to pick up Loathsome, Dark and Deep. It's on my list. I haven't forgotten about you. I hope sales pick up for you too, Aaron. Keep working hard. It will all pay off (or at least some of it will. And that's better than giving up.)

Aaron Polson said...

Lee - Thanks, Lee. The only payoff I really want is a handful of satisfied readers. My wife thinks I'm nuts.

Michael Stone said...

I put a google alerts on my name, which is when learned there are a helluva lot of active bloggers named Michael Stone out there!

Daniel Powell said...

Nice post, Aaron. It's inevitable that content will get swapped around. As long as folks are interacting with the work, that's a good thing, for the most part. After you score the huge book deal, though? Nah, leave it alone, pirates!

Digging Loathsome so far!

Aaron Polson said...

Michael - One of those times I'm happy to have a wonky name. Not the only Aaron Polson on the planet...but one of the few.

Daniel - The way I see it: why would I want to put roadblocks between readers and my work? Huge book deal? I hope you continue to dig Loathsome. It's a quirky book. All of mine are...

Cate Gardner said...

I don't think I've received a google alert for my name in ages...Gulp! The world is going to love The House Eaters.

K. Allen Wood said...

In my opinion, people who upload things are doing it all for ego.

These people want you to thank them, and get mad if they see fifty people downloaded something but only three thanked them. Some forum won't reveal the download link until you reply in the thread, preferably with a thank-you.

Another thing I see all the time, is the reference to "my releases." These clowns don't view this stuff as someone else's art, it's their work, not yours.

And I wholeheartedly disagree with anyone who thinks people that download would never have bought your work anyway. All you have to do is look at album sales to see how wrong that is.

Aaron Polson said...

Cate - I hope so. I hope so.

Ken - I've been out of the "file sharing" loop for years, so I don't have much to say about "my releases" and the "thank yous" and what-not. But Doctorow is pretty vocal about piracy not hurting his book sales. His original idea, I believe, went a little like: "A writer's worst enemy isn't piracy. It's obscurity." He went on to explain most pirates wouldn't have spent the money in the first place. I know he's right on the obscurity front...as for the rest? He's been offering most of his content for free for years and seems to do okay.

Ricky Bush said...

Going to print tonight! That's gotta be exciting.

Unknown said...

Dammit. Anonymous took the words right out of my mouth. METABOLISM!

Anyway, I get what you're saying. Steal books. Got it. Thanks for the tip, Cory Jr. :)

Robert said...

I'm really curious to see whether Doctorow changes his philosophy as more and more people are moving toward e-books. You have to figure in the past, most of his readers bought the actual book, so he was able to make a living. But now? If he keeps making everything available online that you can easily download to your e-reader for free, where's that extra income?

Aaron Polson said...

Ricky - Thanks--it is.

Gef - Damn that Anonymous!

Robert - Good point. Where's the income for any writer in the future? I'd like us all to agree that cheap is the new free. How about that?

Fox Lee said...

Great cover : )

K.C. Shaw said...

You could always release it as a creative commons licensed work, if you haven't already.

I'm not sure how I feel about releasing my stuff for free. I don't think it'd help me, and I loathe book pirates (so not cool, guys, go write your own books), and I also sometimes think people value stuff more that they had to pay for. But I hope it works for you!

Aaron Polson said...

Thanks, Natalie.

K.C. - I think you're right about the value of something which is paid for--absolutely. I'll never release a book for free-free again (I did with the short, Smashwords version of The Bottom Feeders, but those stories were all reprints). But pirates will pirate--and they're real asshats for doing so, but I can't stop them. I'm going to post again on this topic...I feel it coming...

Barry Napier said...

I have a "feeling" that the House Eaters shall be awesome. ;)

Danielle Birch said...

Great post and congrats on the book. Can't wait to order it. fabulous cover.

Anthony Rapino said...

One thing I don't get. How are they *selling* your book, and who's getting that money?

It's one thing if your book turned up free on a file sharing site, but someone else is selling it?

Unless I misunderstood...

Either way, congrats on your book. I've still got Loathsome, Dark and Deep queued up on my Kindle. I was reading some of Cate's stories from Pinstripe, and I want to jump to yours and read a few stories, then back and forth. :-)