
Scribd Invites Writers to Upload Work and Name Their Price - robg
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/18/technology/start-ups/18download.html?hpw
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patio11
How to phrase this as gently as possible: I do not think people have been
enthusiastically embracing the flash document viewer in the hope that one day
they will be able to use the integrated Buy This Copyrighted Content button.

That said, I wish Scribd and their writers the best of luck.

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mahmud
They don't have to sell the content. Writers can seek vendors and produce
"sponsored content". This is likely to skew and fuck up free literature as we
know it, but it's done routinely, and for free: people write tutorials for
vendor's services and products with no commission (how much effort has gone
into "teaching" Google Adsense by SEO professionals who only wanted to pad
their resume? would be nice if google sponsored the texts, but they wont, so
it's time for authors to look into less known vendors and introduce their
products to the reading masses for a fee.)

Or get a better advertising company: [Shameless, but very muted plug] :-)

[Edit: this is strictly for the non-fiction trade publications, the sort of
stuff that you typically see on Scribd. Fiction might have a better future in
ebook readers and their associated online shops]

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8plot
For fiction, <http://StoryMash.com> is doing exactly this. Writers earn over
50% for their collaborative content. Today it all comes from advertising, but
when the first great internet novel is re-published, the participating authors
will see a real payoff.

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anuraggoel
Amazon pays Kindle authors/publishers 35% of the list price (which is set by
the content owner). The _retail_ price is set by Amazon. Scribd's margins are
clearly more lucrative. Smashwords (<http://www.smashwords.com>) operates a
similar model and pays out 85%. I think this is a great move - high traffic
alternatives to Amazon can only be good for the self-publishing ecosystem.

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oski
Let's see how long it takes Apple to open up the iTunes Store to PDF
documents.

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quizbiz
On iTunes, Yale (and I assume others) already distribute a free PDF with most
of their educational lectures. The system is there, not sure if anyone has
thought to sell just the pdf though...

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rokhayakebe
Internauts have to come to the realization that paying for content is only
going to help us get the best. Nevertheless every company integrating their
own micro-payment system is not going to work. There needs to be a unified
platform that will allow us to pay for content on all the different websites
we use from one single account.

