Grautious Tips on Tips and Gratuities.
Jun. 27th, 2009 08:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alexandraerinThere's a nice mention of me in a piece on io9.com about the new trend, reproducing my advice to ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
tim_pratt about patronage. As happy as I am to see my predictions coming to pass and as much as I just plain want to see other authors succeed, it feels good to get some recognition.
I've been a prophet shouting in the wilderness for a while... granted, it's mostly a wilderness of my own making as I'm fairly shy about talking to people and I'm more interested in writing than networking, but I've been working to change that.
I responded to some of the comments on the article. They haven't shown up yet... I guess they have moderation. But some of the responses boiled down to this:
1. Screw donations, these people should work for a living. If they're not making money at what they're doing, they should find a new job.
Despite the surly tone, the basic premise here is correct - there's a reason all my posts about money are tagged "what it takes to get along", and we've all got to do what it takes to get it.
But those who adopt this model are taking the essential core of the commenter's advice - taking a new approach when the old one doesn't work. If Cat and Tim fail to make money in the long run with their projects, I'll be surprised if they don't try something else.
As for the distinction between "donations" and "working for a living"... they produce work, people give them money. Everything else is details.
2. The reason people use the donation model is because people on the internet don't want to pay for things. Therefore they need to get used to the idea that they're working for free.
Again, part of the premise here is true - the internet, by and large, is about free content. People are reluctant to pay for even professional level slickly produced content. Company after company and creator after creator have tried and failed to convince audiences to stick around and pay in sufficient numbers to justify the hype this whole Brave New World has generated, even if some of them have managed to make enough to stick around.
And this is why the donation model can work. It plays to the strengths of the web. It uses how people already "shop" for content online. A serial or regularly updated short story site also plays into that, by giving people a comfortable chunk of content and getting them to come back.
3. The internet is a vast graveyard of sites that have tip jars and never make any money.
True! And the publishing industry is a vast graveyard of books that will never be published. And the TV and movie industry are full of careers that never take off and scripts that will never be produced. And even books that are published can fail to turn a profit for their publishers, just as TV shows can be shot and never picked up or unceremoniously canceled.
The strength of no other medium or genre is judged by the number of failures. The internet is only different in that those "failures" can stick around. I don't necessarily think of them as failures, myself. They're hobby sites. Maybe the creator is a dedicated amateur. Maybe the creator has a professional talent but lacks the drive to make anything happen. Either way, it's not like the web is robbing them of the success that would fall into their laps if they'd gone somewhere else with their work.
Making a living with your content online is work, and you have to work at it. You have to let people know it's out there. You have to let people know you're doing it for a living. You have to let people know that being compensated for your work makes a difference as to your ability to keep producing it. If you don't do those things... in particular if you think it's terribly uncouth to ask people for money... then you're not actually trying to make money off donations and you can hardly count your empty tip jar as a failure for the model.
4. Sure it can work, but why would an established author bother not charging? If they're a known quantity, won't people pay a subscription or charge to read?
What's "established"? A year ago I'd never heard of Cat Valente. Six months ago I'd never read her. I've heard of Tim Pratt, but I've never read him. Cat's well-known in certain circles, but a virtual unknown outside of them. That's why I make a point of mentioning her so often. An awful lot of my readers have never heard of her.
I'm not saying I should be the benchmark of who's "established". I'm just saying that there are no authors out there who are universally known. Even the biggest of big names will have people who've never chanced to open up a book of theirs.
And if you are "established", are all your fans following your every move? Do they all read your blog? Do they all follow whatever trade or genre zines and sites are going to report your new online venture? A comfortable percentage of every author's following only follows them in the loosest sense... they look for the familiar name on the bookstore shelves. How do you reach them?
Free content will get people who've never heard of you. It will get people who've heard of you but never read you. It will get people who've heard of and read you but are suspicious of paying for something online, where there's no physical product they can examine in advance and keep when they're done.
And... especially if it's the sort of content that keeps people coming back... they'll tell their friends. They'll blog about it. They'll link to it. It can go viral. It can become a meme.
If you make it clear that you have done work and you need some form of compensation for it, some of those people will pay you. If you look at the percentage, it might seem like a colossal failure, but it isn't as though all those "freeloaders" would have paid if you charged up front, and it's not as though all the people who paid would have ever heard about this work without the "freeloaders" to tell them.
I say this not as a slight against Cat... seriously, if I ever want to annoy you folks some day I'll make a twenty paragraph ramble explaining exactly why and how I love her work... but I don't believe she could begin to make a decent income if her ...Fairyland... project was depending on people who already know her work AND heard about the project AND are enthusiastic about paying for non-physical books on the internet buying into it and convincing a bunch of other people to buy into it. I think it would be a non-starter. Neil Gaiman and Warren Ellis would get a bunch of people to look at it, and go, "Huh. That sounds kind of cool." and move on. Fewer of her existing fans would feel comfortable enthusiastically link-spreading because they'd effectively be telling their friends and family to go buy something instead of telling them to go check out something groovy.
I just can't see that working.
Similarly, while the initial rush of publicity (and, one presumes, donations) came from people who heard of the dire straits that precipitated the project, I think the site will really gain legs as more and more people talk about it for its own merit... a hundred people who would never be interested in helping an author they've never heard of will still show up to read a free story that their friend told them about and one of them will donate. Lather, rinse, repeat.
tim_pratt about patronage. As happy as I am to see my predictions coming to pass and as much as I just plain want to see other authors succeed, it feels good to get some recognition. I've been a prophet shouting in the wilderness for a while... granted, it's mostly a wilderness of my own making as I'm fairly shy about talking to people and I'm more interested in writing than networking, but I've been working to change that.
I responded to some of the comments on the article. They haven't shown up yet... I guess they have moderation. But some of the responses boiled down to this:
1. Screw donations, these people should work for a living. If they're not making money at what they're doing, they should find a new job.
Despite the surly tone, the basic premise here is correct - there's a reason all my posts about money are tagged "what it takes to get along", and we've all got to do what it takes to get it.
But those who adopt this model are taking the essential core of the commenter's advice - taking a new approach when the old one doesn't work. If Cat and Tim fail to make money in the long run with their projects, I'll be surprised if they don't try something else.
As for the distinction between "donations" and "working for a living"... they produce work, people give them money. Everything else is details.
2. The reason people use the donation model is because people on the internet don't want to pay for things. Therefore they need to get used to the idea that they're working for free.
Again, part of the premise here is true - the internet, by and large, is about free content. People are reluctant to pay for even professional level slickly produced content. Company after company and creator after creator have tried and failed to convince audiences to stick around and pay in sufficient numbers to justify the hype this whole Brave New World has generated, even if some of them have managed to make enough to stick around.
And this is why the donation model can work. It plays to the strengths of the web. It uses how people already "shop" for content online. A serial or regularly updated short story site also plays into that, by giving people a comfortable chunk of content and getting them to come back.
3. The internet is a vast graveyard of sites that have tip jars and never make any money.
True! And the publishing industry is a vast graveyard of books that will never be published. And the TV and movie industry are full of careers that never take off and scripts that will never be produced. And even books that are published can fail to turn a profit for their publishers, just as TV shows can be shot and never picked up or unceremoniously canceled.
The strength of no other medium or genre is judged by the number of failures. The internet is only different in that those "failures" can stick around. I don't necessarily think of them as failures, myself. They're hobby sites. Maybe the creator is a dedicated amateur. Maybe the creator has a professional talent but lacks the drive to make anything happen. Either way, it's not like the web is robbing them of the success that would fall into their laps if they'd gone somewhere else with their work.
Making a living with your content online is work, and you have to work at it. You have to let people know it's out there. You have to let people know you're doing it for a living. You have to let people know that being compensated for your work makes a difference as to your ability to keep producing it. If you don't do those things... in particular if you think it's terribly uncouth to ask people for money... then you're not actually trying to make money off donations and you can hardly count your empty tip jar as a failure for the model.
4. Sure it can work, but why would an established author bother not charging? If they're a known quantity, won't people pay a subscription or charge to read?
What's "established"? A year ago I'd never heard of Cat Valente. Six months ago I'd never read her. I've heard of Tim Pratt, but I've never read him. Cat's well-known in certain circles, but a virtual unknown outside of them. That's why I make a point of mentioning her so often. An awful lot of my readers have never heard of her.
I'm not saying I should be the benchmark of who's "established". I'm just saying that there are no authors out there who are universally known. Even the biggest of big names will have people who've never chanced to open up a book of theirs.
And if you are "established", are all your fans following your every move? Do they all read your blog? Do they all follow whatever trade or genre zines and sites are going to report your new online venture? A comfortable percentage of every author's following only follows them in the loosest sense... they look for the familiar name on the bookstore shelves. How do you reach them?
Free content will get people who've never heard of you. It will get people who've heard of you but never read you. It will get people who've heard of and read you but are suspicious of paying for something online, where there's no physical product they can examine in advance and keep when they're done.
And... especially if it's the sort of content that keeps people coming back... they'll tell their friends. They'll blog about it. They'll link to it. It can go viral. It can become a meme.
If you make it clear that you have done work and you need some form of compensation for it, some of those people will pay you. If you look at the percentage, it might seem like a colossal failure, but it isn't as though all those "freeloaders" would have paid if you charged up front, and it's not as though all the people who paid would have ever heard about this work without the "freeloaders" to tell them.
I say this not as a slight against Cat... seriously, if I ever want to annoy you folks some day I'll make a twenty paragraph ramble explaining exactly why and how I love her work... but I don't believe she could begin to make a decent income if her ...Fairyland... project was depending on people who already know her work AND heard about the project AND are enthusiastic about paying for non-physical books on the internet buying into it and convincing a bunch of other people to buy into it. I think it would be a non-starter. Neil Gaiman and Warren Ellis would get a bunch of people to look at it, and go, "Huh. That sounds kind of cool." and move on. Fewer of her existing fans would feel comfortable enthusiastically link-spreading because they'd effectively be telling their friends and family to go buy something instead of telling them to go check out something groovy.
I just can't see that working.
Similarly, while the initial rush of publicity (and, one presumes, donations) came from people who heard of the dire straits that precipitated the project, I think the site will really gain legs as more and more people talk about it for its own merit... a hundred people who would never be interested in helping an author they've never heard of will still show up to read a free story that their friend told them about and one of them will donate. Lather, rinse, repeat.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
on 2009-06-28 07:28 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-06-28 07:30 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-06-30 02:08 pm (UTC)The guy writing Robert Jordan's last wheel of time books (3) has posted his latest hardback online, in pdf format.
David Brin posts some free content online as well.
And there's always Baen Free Books, which got started on a bet ages ago.
I think it's because there have ALWAYS been libraries, and books are great word of mouth things...
no subject
on 2009-06-28 08:07 pm (UTC)That one made me roll my eyes. You ARE working for a living. At it's very essentials, any job is convincing someone that the products of your labour are worth them giving you a certain amount of money.
no subject
on 2009-06-28 08:44 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-06-29 07:51 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-06-29 07:55 pm (UTC)