Jan 13, 2012 |
Nearly two weeks ago, I published a book I haven’t finished writing. In fact, I’m probably only about 15% of the way through it, if I’m honest. But I’ve been experimenting with a website called Leanpub that lets you do that, and people can get the book right up front, and then receive updates as you write them.
What’s interesting – apart from the feedback which has been broadly encouraging and positive – is that people actually seem to be paying for it, even though they don’t have to.
I’ve just posted the first major update to Music in the Digital Age and people should be getting emails about now that tells them how to get the new version. It’ll be interesting to see what people think of that bit of the process, and whether that was enough of an update.
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Jan 4, 2012 |
I published my ‘work in progress’ book Music in the Digital Age yesterday and had a bit of a play around with the recommended price. The minimum, however, was zero from the outset and I was quite keen that this be the case.
On average, about a third of the people checking the book out have paid money for it. Most of them have paid $5 as suggested, though a few have paid $10 and a couple only $1. Everyone else has downloaded it for free and they’re more than welcome to. The fact that people have paid me money to make this – any amount of money at all – and have devoted their attention to the words that I’ve written so far – is incredible motivation for me to complete it, and to do whatever I can to make it as good as it can be.
I ended up having conversations about price yesterday. One centred around psychological theories about why $5 seemed to be the right ‘suggested price’ point. Nobody paid anything when the suggested price was $7.99 – but many did when it was lowered to a round number – even though at both times, you could simply type in whatever number you thought was fair and appropriate. Other conversations varied between ‘why would you give something like this away for free?’ to ‘how can you justify charging money for something you haven’t finished?’.
It’s been an interesting process and it’s challenged my own thinking about online commerce and the pricing of digital creative works. But this morning I received an email from someone who more or less encapsulated for me exactly the reasons why I wanted my book to be available for nothing – and (with permission, and anonymised) I want to share some of that email with you.
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Jan 3, 2012 |
I’ve been working on and off for the past few months on a book I’ve decided to call ‘Music in the Digital Age‘.
My intention is to finish it this year – and because the year is going to be a busy one (not least because of my commitment to writing another book called Radio in the Digital Age), I’ve decided to give myself a bit of an extra incentive.
So I’ve published the book. Launched it today. It may not be finished – but it’s available here now. You can go and download it whenever you feel like it. Pay whatever you want (including free). It’s available as a PDF, and in iPad and Kindle-friendly versions.
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