These Successful Writers Give Their Works Away for Free

By Georgy S Thomas

This is pretty cool stuff. I’ve discovered that there are several contemporary, mainstream authors
who quietly give away their books for free online even as the dead tree versions of these very
same books are sold by traditional publishers. Why do they do it? For one, they’ve found out that
having these free eBook versions out there hasn’t cannibalised sales of their print versions a
whit. In fact, they suspect that the free eBooks have actually spurred sales. Second, these writers
seem to believe that putting out free electronic versions of their books has helped them to expand
their sources of revenue.
To quote Matt Mason, whose recent book The Pirate’s Dilemma is available for free download
at the book’s website: “.... It didn’t cannibalize physical sales, it got the book to a lot more
people who wouldn’t have found it otherwise, and I get emails every day from people who found
the download somewhere and went and bought the real book. The amount of money the free
version continues to bring in in terms of speaking and consulting work is substantial, and the
number of influential people The Pirate’s Dilemma got to as a result of the free download was
crazy. No amount of marketing dollars could have spread the message of the book as well as the
free version. For me it was word of mouth marketing on steroids....’’ Got it? Just go grab the
book.
Paulo Coelho, best-selling author of The Alchemist, is another writer who encourages piracy of
his own books. At the 2008 Digital Life Design Conference in Munich, he spoke of a free,
Russian eBook version of The Alchemist helping to catapult sales from 1,000 per year to a
million-plus: “....So, I went to BitTorrent and I got all my pirate editions....And I created a site
called The Pirate Coelho.”
Here is the site. Explore and take what you like.

Cory Doctorow, a well-known digital thought leader and co-editor of the blog Boing Boing, is
another writer swearing by the power of free downloads, and that too with the permission of
print publisher Tor Books. In a much quoted 2006 article he wrote for Forbes entitled ‘Giving it
Away’, Doctorow has explained why free downloads were good for him: “....This ‘market
research’ of giving away eBooks sells printed books. What’s more, having my books more
widely read opens many other opportunities for me to earn a living from activities around my
writing, such as the Fulbright Chair I got at USC this year, this high-paying article in Forbes,
speaking engagements and other opportunities to teach, write and license my work for translation
and adaptation. My fans’ tireless evangelism for my work doesn’t just sell books _ it sells
me....’’ Great! So explore and zero in on what you like at http://www.craphound.com. Download
in a variety of formats.
Leander Kahney, a former Wired News Editor who runs the cultofmac.com website, has put two
of his books, The Cult of Mac and The Cult of iPod, in torrent sites with the permission of his
publisher, No Starch Press. He is testing whether giving it away will have an impact on sales.
You can download the books from the links given in the following page:
Dutch author Ivo Victoria is also reported to be giving out his works free online. I found one of
his works available gratis at this site. Language handicap prevents me from exploring further.
But that shouldn’t deter you. Sci-fi and fiction authors like Jeffrey A Carver, Steve Jordan*, Ed
Howdershelt, and Richard Herley are in the habit of providing a few of their works online for
free.
Of course, we are here talking about established writers. There are plenty of amateurs out there
who give their works for free in the hope that it will allow them to escape the punishment of
obscurity. They deserve an article by itself.
(647 words)

Further reading:
Cory Doctorow article in Forbes
*The website seems to be having some problems.
Caveat
Please exercise due diligence before downloading anything