出版与作家生涯2014blog.plover.com
为什么我的书可以免费下载
Why my book can be downloaded for free
导读
这篇短文解释作者为何把自己的书免费放到网上供人下载，并由此引出出版分成、读者获取门槛和作者定价等话题。对写作者来说，它提供了一个重新思考“作品如何触达读者、如何与出版方合作”的视角。
可以直接用的写作要点
- 01
免费公开作品能降低读者的尝试门槛，读者付出的真正成本往往是时间而非金钱。
- 02
传统出版给作者的分成很低（约每本 1 美元、总收入的 5%），自出版可保留九成以上收入，但要自己承担编辑、校对等成本。
- 03
把已在博客等渠道发表的内容整理成书，是低成本验证内容、积累读者的可行路径。
- 04
作者难以给自己的书定价时，可以线上免费、把渠道与定价交给出版商处理。
HN 评论精选
传统出版分成极低，自出版在分发和排版上已不再依赖出版商。
这条 2014 年的帖子讨论的问题其实已被后来的发展改变。有出版商找我写书，条件据说是行业标准：每卖一本作者约得 1 美元，约为总收入的 5%；技术书卖得好作者也就挣 1 万美元左右，而出版社靠它赚约 20 万美元，其余归渠道和书店。相比之下，像 Brennan Dunn 那样在线自出版、拿到 90% 以上收入的人已赚到 10 万美元以上。分发不需要出版商，排版也不需要，需要编辑或校对花约 1 万美元雇人即可。简言之，现代技术出版中出版商已无必要职能。
noelwelsh查看英文原文
It is surprising to see a blog post like this published in 2014. Admittedly is refers to a 9 year old book, but the point it makes has been rendered moot by developments since. A publisher recently contacted me to explore the possibility of me writing a book for them. The terms, which I believe are fairly standard, are you make about $1 for every book sold, or about 5% of the total revenue. A technical author can expect to make about $10'000 if their book sells well. The publishing house makes about $200'000 on this, with the rest going to distribution and book stores. Now compare to people like Brennan Dunn who have made $100'000 or more from their books, by publishing online and capturing 90%+ of revenue. You don't need a publisher for distribution. You don't need a publisher for typesetting. If you need an editor or proof reader you can hire one for maybe $10K. In short, publishing houses serve no necessary function in modern technical publishing.
免费能降低读者门槛，而定价难题可交给出版商解决。
这个想法很好：作者要打破潜在读者进入作品的门槛，虽然这并不总是容易或可行。另一种做法是把已发表过的内容（比如博客）结集成书。毕竟免费书的读者、开源软件的用户付出的是常被忽视的不可再生资源——时间。不过有些作者把书视为“毕生心血”，很难免费送出；心理上，人们又常误以为“便宜和质量不能兼得”。另一个相关问题是给自己的作品定价：成熟企业定价容易，作者却很难。线上免费、把难做的部分交给出版商，似乎是绕开这个问题的合理办法。
KedarMhaswade查看英文原文
This is a very good thought! It's important for an author to break the barrier to entry for the potential readers of his/her work. It's not always easy or practical. Another way of doing this is publishing something in book form what you have already published elsewhere, e.g. your blog. After all, what a reader of free books, user of free and open source software is spending is the often neglected non-renewable source of energy -- her/his time! Sometimes however, authors consider their book(s) as their 'life's work'. It's hard to imagine giving it away for free. Psychologically speaking, though best things in life are often free, some people think that something that is 'expensive' is 'good' -- they somewhat erroneously believe that 'cheapness and quality don't go together'. A related point that I have always wondered about is deciding the price of your creation. For stable businesses it is perhaps a straightforward thing to name the price of a creation, but I imagine it would be hard for an author to come up with the price of her book. By making it free on the website and leaving it up to the publisher to do the hard work seems like a reasonable way to get around this problem.
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