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Topic: Should Book Reviewers Sell Their (Un)Used Copies?
| Author | Message |
| GalleyCat | Posted – 5/28/2007 5:32:39 PM | show profile A recent GalleyCat item discusses the varied reactions of authors who discover that people who receive "advance readers copies" of their forthcoming novels are turning around and selling them on eBay—or, in the case of one reviewer, printing an entire inventory of books for sale on her website. Publishers discourage such resales, especially when it comes to uncorrected galleys, but do they really have a case? Or are these sales a necessary consequence of releasing books to even a highly limited segment of the public? Should reviewers feel free to do whatever they like with books that come into their possession, or do they have an obligation to keep "unfinished" books out of circulation? |
| candylilacs | Posted – 5/28/2007 9:53:51 PM | show profile I'd say that was pretty unethical. At my publication we have a twice-a-year sale inhouse that goes to charity. The other is no better than selling CDs received by labels. It's not supposed to be a side business. And if the publication you work for discovers you doing that, they're in their rights never to work with you again. ------ http://www.mswritesguide.blogspot.com |
| nika | Posted – 5/29/2007 12:33:47 AM | show profile I'd have to agree with Candylilacs. If I ever caught anybody from my pub selling review copies of books or cd's for personal profit, they'd be blacklisted in 2 seconds. |
| pleiades | Posted – 5/29/2007 10:07:37 AM | show profile I agree. I believe it's unethical to sell the copies. However, I'm curious: Do you think it's unethical for reviewers to keep the copies for their personal library? |
| DHernandez | Posted – 5/29/2007 1:08:02 PM | show profile Most of the "official" advances are stamped "Not for Resale." |
| Vox-o | Posted – 5/29/2007 2:10:17 PM | show profile Unethical, sure, but it happens all of the time. By next Monday, ebay will be flooded with them. With the exception of a few books special enough to have a lay down date, it isn't worth losing sleep over it. |
| Patricia Wood | Posted – 5/29/2007 2:44:17 PM | show profile ARCs on ebay I had to laugh again! My dream to be on GalleyCat and it's to do with my ARCs on sale on ebay. ARCs of LOTTERY have gone for a high of $68 to a low of $26. My editor was amazed. "This just doe not happen with a debut author," she said. I am torn. I'd rather see them sold than tossed out with the trash. I hear that some reviewers get nearly 100 ARCs a week. What are they going to do? I think it's great that they can be donated to charity though. I will say I have been trying with little success to score an extra one of my own. Maybe after BEA! My offer still stands! I'll sign 'em if you send 'em! http://pkwood.blogspot.com |
| nandy | Posted – 5/29/2007 5:11:36 PM | show profile I'm in the Educational pub business and this happens all the time. It's a boil on the ass of all publishers and respected authors. Resale of textbooks is a hard fact that we live with and try to overcome by publishing new editions every few years, but the scum educators who REQUEST review copies because they are potential adopters, then turn around and sell them, should be ashamed of themselves. And how cheap their schools must be with their salaries if they have to supplement them by reselling a free book. |
| bjoconnorfla | Posted – 5/29/2007 7:04:18 PM | show profile It's a firing offense at most newspapers. At least, those that still have book reviewers. Policy at most places is an in-house sale with proceeds to charity and/or donation to local libraries, hospital libraries or othr charities. |
| maryalice | Posted – 5/30/2007 1:27:50 AM | show profile | email poster Selling review copies and ARCs We get so many in our store and save them up for our birthday celebration on Halloween----17 years in 2007. At 9PM there's always a mob ready when we uncover the tables, with some folks in fetching costumres, to "buy" seven books (arcs and reader copies) at 10 cents each. Usually, folks make a bigger contribution as it goes to an award-winning children's literacy program (Beginning with Books) to kick off our Angel program which donates our contribution of a new book to every kid in the program and goes on into New Year's Day. Great fun and good feelings abound with free Cappuccinos for all------there's just not enough for grown-ups to do on Halloween. maryalice@mysterylovers.com |
| jcpatterson | Posted – 5/30/2007 10:06:16 AM | show profile Then Nandy, cover your ears, because you may not want to hear this one. I was working as a registrar for a professional school and got a call from an educational publisher, asking me how many people were going to be in Dr. Smith's class this coming term. I asked why he needed to know this, and he said Dr. Smith had said she was considering adopting a text and he wanted to send her a free desk copy if the enrollment was high enough. I explained that there were 100 students in Dr. Smith's class, and she was one of them. She was a faculty member in another department who was pursuing a degree in our school, and she had decided to work the system to get all of her textbooks free. I very much enjoyed the dark look she gave me the next time she saw me. |
