JA Konrath has written another helpful article telling authors to calm down and let people steal their books. Not that I'm at all experienced with the ins and outs of digital rights protection, but purely as someone who's been watching the publishing industry with interest for a couple of years now, I agree with him. He makes too much sense not to.
He lists four good reasons not to worry - mostly born from knowing how much of his work is being pirated and then looking at his rising sales figures - and then elaborates on them in great detail. He's not the first author from whom I've heard this advice either.
My only caveat to adopting Konrath's point of view is that I also endorse Tom Spurgeon's that - while popular - file sharing is wrong and that just because people are going to do it doesn't mean that I have the right to tell another creator how she should feel about it. I should also point out that Konrath's article seems to be much more about helpful advice that will make writers more productive and possibly prevent some heart attacks than it is a damning judgment of anyone's particular attitude.
Marketing with comp copies
BookEnds Literary Agency has a useful post on what writers can do with galleys (advance review copies, etc) that they receive from the publisher. While I'm not quite there yet in my career, there have been a couple of times when rather than being paid in cash, I've been paid in copies of my book. Usually, I just put those out at conventions to sell, but now I'm realizing that there may be a better use for them.
Web sites for writers
BookEnds also has a post on creating an online presence. This isn't the first article on that topic that I've seen, but I always stop for them when they hit my Reader. This one, for instance, has some helpful advice about using Facebook.
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