Dandelion whine
For those as care, Neil Gaiman is putting his money where his mouth is re digital rights management. He's long been a proponent of Cory Doctorow's information distribution gospel*, and he appears to be making the whole of his upcoming novel The Graveyard Book available online before it's available in the UK.
He's doing a signing/reading tour of the USA, and reading a chapter in each venue (roughly one per day). So far, so normal (especially as it seems that the chapters in The Graveyard Book may, to some extent, stand alone, in the same way as the chapters of The Jungle Book), but more the fact that he's making streaming videos of all the chapter readings available on his website for free. I have no idea how long these links will stay up for, and I'd be interested to see if there's any effect on sales of the book.
Gaiman recently did something very similar with his novels American Gods and Neverwhere, making them available for free download for a month at a time. I believe sales of American Gods rose appreciably during and after the month that it was available; I haven't heard anything about sales figures for Neverwhere, as it was put online relatively recently. This experiment sounds different, for a couple of reasons: firstly, The Graveyeard Book is newly released in the US and currently unavailable elsewhere in the world so, rather than providing a boost of novelty to a book that's been around for a while, and that many of its target readers will already have bought, this is providing Gaiman's fans with a way to jump the queue and read (or, in this case, listen to) the book before it's released. There's a chance, then, that it may hurt sales; will people who've been anticipating this book for months still be willing to pay ten quid or so for a copy when they can get it for free?
Secondly, the medium is different. I've never read a whole book on a computer screen, and chances are, I never will. Ebook reader technology is knocking around, but is still very much in its infancy, and I'd be surprised if readers ever spread to the same level of ubiquity as the iPod; thus it seems unlikely that anyone would have read the whole of American Gods on their PC. More likely, they read a couple of chapters, decided that they liked it and went out to buy a copy. Audio recordings are different, as I could quite easily listen to 30 minutes or so of someone reading every evening, and then only buying the book if I enjoyed it sufficiently to want to re-read it. For these reasons, I'm not quite sure that this is the same kettle of fish as the American Gods/Neverwhere thingummy. It's an interesting idea, though, and I'm keen to see how it works out.
Having said all of the above, I have listened to the first chapter, thoroughly enjoyed it, and not listened to any others, as I'm holding out for the book. Partly this is because I enjoy reading more than listening; partly it's because the version Gaiman has been reading is the American version and I found the Americanisms jarring and partly it's for reasons I find difficult to articulate. I like owning books, and form an attachment to the physical object (as anyone who's ever borrowed a book from me and been berated for a crumpled spine will attest); in particular, Neil Gaiman's books are something I (sort of) collect. If I downloaded a copy, or just listened to it once, or whatever, I wouldn't be able to put it on the shelf with the others. Having said that, I've never bought Coraline or Neverwhere, read all of the Sandmans from the local library and my copies of Smoke and Mirrors and Anansi Boys have unaccountably gone missing, so my "collection" is looking a bit gappy.
* "Information Distribution Gospel" may possibly be a tautology of sorts.
He's doing a signing/reading tour of the USA, and reading a chapter in each venue (roughly one per day). So far, so normal (especially as it seems that the chapters in The Graveyard Book may, to some extent, stand alone, in the same way as the chapters of The Jungle Book), but more the fact that he's making streaming videos of all the chapter readings available on his website for free. I have no idea how long these links will stay up for, and I'd be interested to see if there's any effect on sales of the book.
Gaiman recently did something very similar with his novels American Gods and Neverwhere, making them available for free download for a month at a time. I believe sales of American Gods rose appreciably during and after the month that it was available; I haven't heard anything about sales figures for Neverwhere, as it was put online relatively recently. This experiment sounds different, for a couple of reasons: firstly, The Graveyeard Book is newly released in the US and currently unavailable elsewhere in the world so, rather than providing a boost of novelty to a book that's been around for a while, and that many of its target readers will already have bought, this is providing Gaiman's fans with a way to jump the queue and read (or, in this case, listen to) the book before it's released. There's a chance, then, that it may hurt sales; will people who've been anticipating this book for months still be willing to pay ten quid or so for a copy when they can get it for free?
Secondly, the medium is different. I've never read a whole book on a computer screen, and chances are, I never will. Ebook reader technology is knocking around, but is still very much in its infancy, and I'd be surprised if readers ever spread to the same level of ubiquity as the iPod; thus it seems unlikely that anyone would have read the whole of American Gods on their PC. More likely, they read a couple of chapters, decided that they liked it and went out to buy a copy. Audio recordings are different, as I could quite easily listen to 30 minutes or so of someone reading every evening, and then only buying the book if I enjoyed it sufficiently to want to re-read it. For these reasons, I'm not quite sure that this is the same kettle of fish as the American Gods/Neverwhere thingummy. It's an interesting idea, though, and I'm keen to see how it works out.
Having said all of the above, I have listened to the first chapter, thoroughly enjoyed it, and not listened to any others, as I'm holding out for the book. Partly this is because I enjoy reading more than listening; partly it's because the version Gaiman has been reading is the American version and I found the Americanisms jarring and partly it's for reasons I find difficult to articulate. I like owning books, and form an attachment to the physical object (as anyone who's ever borrowed a book from me and been berated for a crumpled spine will attest); in particular, Neil Gaiman's books are something I (sort of) collect. If I downloaded a copy, or just listened to it once, or whatever, I wouldn't be able to put it on the shelf with the others. Having said that, I've never bought Coraline or Neverwhere, read all of the Sandmans from the local library and my copies of Smoke and Mirrors and Anansi Boys have unaccountably gone missing, so my "collection" is looking a bit gappy.
* "Information Distribution Gospel" may possibly be a tautology of sorts.