(no subject)

[erastes]

Chapter 20. Pwned. Think we have about another 2 chapters. Maybe 3.

I've just "discovered" Google Books and I can't say that I like it much. It might be a good advert for novels and text books and the like but when it comes to short story anthologies it sucks.

My ENTIRE short story "Drug Colors" is available on Google Books, free and gratis for anyone who wants to preview the anthology. Similarly "Fire and Ice" from J for Jealousy - an anthology that's not even BEEN PUBLISHED YET. I've heard that Cleis are not happy about this and are working on it, but anyone else with anthologies might want to check it out too. Very displeased.

@={>..<}=@

That's steam coming out of my ears if anyone wanted to know.

Comments

[muroku.livejournal.com]

How strange. I know Google Books would scan books no longer under copyright in their entirety and would only provide previews of new works. I think with the case of the anthology the work must be short enough that it "catches" the entire story? (*_*)
In my own experience, previews are of only 2-3 pages or less and a notice pops up on the screen.

I don't think it's always true that once someone reads the entire story that they'll be inclined to purchase the real thing---a bit like getting free mp3s. So the notion that providing the entire story for free as being beneficial is just not going to fly.

I hope your representatives can tell google to stop right away.

[asphodeline.livejournal.com]

Doesn't sound ideal but I do know of a number of authors who are keen on the downloadable idea because it actually sells more hard copies. Of course, for a short story it isn't quite the same - novel length, most people get part through and then deicde it's easier reading from actual text.

I love your ears btw!!

[elisa-rolle.livejournal.com]

How strange... but is it legal? Elisa

[crawling-angel.livejournal.com]

*knits you new ears*

[fiona-glass.livejournal.com]

I think I'll be boiling a kettle on my head if I find any of my stories available for free. Grrr.

How on earth do they get past the copyright/royalties thing with the publishers, let alone us?

[gehayi.livejournal.com]

They've scanned in a hell of a lot of books that were just published within the past few years, from what I can see.

[gehayi.livejournal.com]

Tell Emily Veinglory that her story "Talamur" in the collection Eternally Noir (c)2004 is on there in its entirety.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_inbetween_/]

10 min ago I didn't even know of google books but - right now? Your story is definitely not online, it cuts off right before page 75. Either it's random or your complaint worked?

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Well both of my stories are there in total, and they are about 8-10 pages each. Grrrr. I don't kid myself that some people only buy an antho for just my writing but I would, for example if say - George Martin had a short story in an antho - if it was up on the net for nothing, and I wasn't interested in anyone else's story - why bother to buy the whole thing?

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Well this isn't downloadable - this is a preview of the book - RW Day's thaw is there - and nearly all of it. For short stories it sucks because certain of the stories are readable for nothing. Not that I get any royalties per copy, but it means that if someone WAS going to buy the antho for my story, why would they bother?

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Apparently, yes. Cleis are considering breaking their contract and good job too. I'm glad Standish isn't on there.

[erastes.livejournal.com]

You can knit! Whee! Ears please!

[erastes.livejournal.com]

I don't know. I don't get it. I do understand that people can go and sit in a library and peruse a book, and this is possibly attempting to emulate that, but with the actual store there's a little guilt factor and you generally come out with something.

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Is that you in Sigil? Most of your story is there.

http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=bhb6s8MD03gC&pg=PA97&dq=fiona+glass&lr=&ei=P4efR8iAJZKatAPI1JywCg&sig=qvW0hIwV3wAiP7PG798wMBLDfk0#PPA104,M1

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Maybe it is random - it was certainly all there earlier...

[http://users.livejournal.com/_inbetween_/]

Unless there are special accounts - I seem to be automatically logged in with my mail account though - yes. I randomnly clicked the different viewing options and scrolled around and then had blank pages even in the first 70 one - so I think it's perhaps less bad than you thought.

[crawling-angel.livejournal.com]

Omg...can I knit? Weee, I can! I haven't knitted for ages but I used to do all sortsa stuff. Loved doing Aran thingies. But they not be quite the thing these days...so I took up writing, lol..hehehe.

[crawling-angel.livejournal.com]

I looked earlier and could only see 2 pages of the Drug Colours. How can you see more?

Seriously, I would be buying all these pretties on my fl..but..yeah *sigh*

[erastes.livejournal.com]

I think it must be random, it was definitely all there earlier, unless it's because I have a gmail account?

[cassiopaya.livejournal.com]

And the Oscar for Best Emoticon goes to....

[fiona-glass.livejournal.com]

Yup, that would be me. Grrrr. Probably not much I can do about that one since I was paid a lump sum not royalties and the antho is several years old and past its sell-by date.... But I'm not exactly ecstatic.

Will pass on the bad news to Emily, Gehayi. Thanks.

[duskpeterson.livejournal.com]

I'm afraid it's Cleis that you need to be complaining to; Google Books's preview program is entirely opt-in (http://books.google.com/intl/en/googlebooks/screenshots.html).

As for your entire story being available online: It must be awfully frustrating for you to have a story online that you don't want there. I hope that you'll be able to convince Cleis to withdraw that anthology from its partnership with Google.

However, to balance out your post, let me offer another perspective on this matter:

I've bought exactly two novels in the past two years. One is Manna Francis's Mind Fuck (http://www.casperianbooks.com/catalog/1-934081-08-6.html) - I bought a copy for myself and a copy for a friend. The other is Jesse Hajicek's The God Eaters (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1847288650). I bought a copy each for two friends, and one of these days I'll buy a copy for myself. (This despite the fact that I can't read standard-sized print for nine months out of the year.)

I bought these novels because there were - and are - available online. I'd never have bought them if I hadn't had the chance to read them for free first.

In the years before the Web, I never bought a new book unless I read the book in the library first. I don't know how many other readers are out there like me, but they're the ones that are going to go straight from reading your stories online to buying the book that contains them.

Regarding Google Books: I use it as one of my primary research tools as a historical fantasy writer, because you can download thousands of public domain texts from them. Unlike Project Gutenberg and the Internet Archive, Google Books doesn't offer HTML and TXT editions (alas), but it has the best search engine of the three (not surprisingly). Among other things, you can narrow the search to particular publication dates - which is perfect for me, since I specialize in turn-of-the-century stories.

I'm not terribly interested in secondary sources, but if I were, I'd find Google Books's searchability of copyrighted books to be quite helpful to me in compiling a bibliography; trying to figure out which books in a library cover particular topics can be difficult, as I'm sure I don't need to tell you. So I'd highly recommend Google Books as a research tool for any historical fiction writer.

[duskpeterson.livejournal.com]

By the way, in case any of your Friends are interested, I've just added a feed (http://feeds.insanejournal.com/erastes_lj/profile) to your journal at InsaneJournal. (I still have an account at LiveJournal, as you can see, but I download my Friends pages to read offline, so I don't want to deal with LJ-cuts; the syndicated feed shows the whole entry.)