Hi Mobilism dwellers - I wonder if you could help me.
My book, The English Monster, was published on March 1 in the UK. At the beginning of this week, I got a Google alert which took me to a post on Mobilism where one of the members was asking someone to create an ebook for him of my book. I presume, for free. So I got into a bit of a conversation with him, and I asked him if he thought this was fair - that he get a free copy of my book, and I get nothing. And I did some digging around on Mobilism, which seems to me to be a big, friendly, well-organised machine for the generation of (among other things) free ebooks. People are friendly, are enthusiastic about books and reading, and it all seems very nice.
With one proviso, of course - that the people who create the content you're all consuming (people like me) don't get a bean.
So I wanted to ask - politely - what people on Mobilism thought about this. If you were to meet me in a pub, and we were having a friendly discussion, how would you justify this? And what would you say to the proposition that if people like me can't earn a living from creating content - if everything becomes free - then the content itself will dry up and the culture will suffer as a result?
As I say, I do not ask this aggressively. I am not a digital luddite - I worked for fifteen years at Yahoo, the Guardian and the BBC, and I have always been an advocate for an open, unregulated, free Internet. But I do admit to growing concern that creators like me are going to find it harder and harder to justify spending time making new stuff for people like you to read.
Please read the exchange I had on Mobilism earlier this week for some more thoughts on this stuff.
(link removed)
Really, I just want to understand the reasoning behind this. And I do want to keep things civil. Thanks.
My book, The English Monster, was published on March 1 in the UK. At the beginning of this week, I got a Google alert which took me to a post on Mobilism where one of the members was asking someone to create an ebook for him of my book. I presume, for free. So I got into a bit of a conversation with him, and I asked him if he thought this was fair - that he get a free copy of my book, and I get nothing. And I did some digging around on Mobilism, which seems to me to be a big, friendly, well-organised machine for the generation of (among other things) free ebooks. People are friendly, are enthusiastic about books and reading, and it all seems very nice.
With one proviso, of course - that the people who create the content you're all consuming (people like me) don't get a bean.
So I wanted to ask - politely - what people on Mobilism thought about this. If you were to meet me in a pub, and we were having a friendly discussion, how would you justify this? And what would you say to the proposition that if people like me can't earn a living from creating content - if everything becomes free - then the content itself will dry up and the culture will suffer as a result?
As I say, I do not ask this aggressively. I am not a digital luddite - I worked for fifteen years at Yahoo, the Guardian and the BBC, and I have always been an advocate for an open, unregulated, free Internet. But I do admit to growing concern that creators like me are going to find it harder and harder to justify spending time making new stuff for people like you to read.
Please read the exchange I had on Mobilism earlier this week for some more thoughts on this stuff.
(link removed)
Really, I just want to understand the reasoning behind this. And I do want to keep things civil. Thanks.