MyMediaMusings

TorrentFreak has a bunch of interesting comments from authors about the value of having their books “available” on bittorrent sites.

“More and more authors seem to recognize the power of BitTorrent as a means to generate more sales, and actually upload free copies onto BitTorrent themselves.

Best selling author Paulo Coelho posted several of his books on BitTorrent, which boosted his sales significantly. The success of Coelho later inspired Leander Kahney, the author of “The Cult of Mac” and “The Cult of iPod”, to do the same.”

My anecdotal evidence - talking to an eBook publisher and a lit agent in the past few days - leads me to believe that, much like the music industry, it seems to be everyone BUT the authors who are afraid of the pirates.

Of course, all parties have a lot at stake in the next few years and it would seem foolish to believe that the ways in which publishers and agents make their moeny (or IF they make money at all) will be changing drastically.

For the authors there are lots of changes ahead, too.  Already, there is an arm of a major publisher that is simply not offering an advance - a trend likely to grow.  We are also seeing more authors find ways to make money without a publisher at all, taking advantage of all the web has to offer.

Big changes ahead for all.