Author name: Booksquare

In our proposal for adding a small levy to every used book sale, we noted that other models for this type of fee exist. Many countries in the world assess a fee on blank media, assuming that these items will be used on copyrighted materials. The basic theory is that blank CDs or DVDs will be used to copy material from television, other CDs, or media. The levy mitigates lost revenue from this copying. And while it’s not exactly the same thing as selling a book on the secondary market, it is a model. Oddly enough, this is not our

There must be something in the Kool-Aid this week — all sorts of talk about used book sales and related issues are floating through the Internets. While we remain perfectly content with our proposal and our belief system, we feel it’s important to present another point of view. We believe you can never have too much information. A recent study conducted by Anindya Ghose of New York University and Michael D. Smith and Rahul Telang of Carnegie-Mellon suggests that used book sales benefit the publishing industry. The group studied sales of bestsellers on Amazon.com, and, on the surface, it appears

We have simples rules for buying used books: the author must be dead or the book must be out of print or unattainable through normal retail channels. While we rarely borrow books, we do loan them, having learned that all it takes is matching the right reader with the right author for future happiness. In our spare time, we fiddle on roofs. We do fully realize that our rules don’t work for everyone. As noted in recent comments, we believe that most readers do not understand the publishing business model. For some, there is a notion that they’ve purchased the

We have some bad news for the Boston Globe: the party shut down about three months ago. It is no longer appropriate to write a story about any subtitle relating to changing the world. We cannot be sure, but we believe we banned further discussion. Carry on. The story that changed the world – How a subtitle became a bestseller The Post That Changed The WorldK

It is an interesting thing that artists do not benefit from their works beyond the first sale. With certain notable exceptions — residuals in the motion picture industry and music publishing royalties come to mind — you get one chance to make a dime off your work. Thereafter, it can change hands, for profit, as many times as possible without additional compensation to the artist. And, you will say, that’s how it’s always been. The Financial Times takes a look at the expansion of the French law that imposes at 3% resale levy on works of art (not fully defined