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

Sometimes we must go with the flow, or at least distract our mind from really, truly, horribly bad almost-pop music while waiting for the next operator (our call is really important to someone, just not entity we’re calling). Thus we bring you yet another story about women and book sales. It’s our last one this week, we swear*. As it turns out, women are buying and reading books by women. We’ll let you take a moment to absorb this news. Done? Good. Duh. But it’s the fault of bookclubs (and here we thought those evil institutions were responsible for increased

Sometimes, stories make the rounds on the Internets and we just sit back and wonder what people are thinking. Or perhaps these are cases where we should worry that people are thinking at all. Sometimes it’s better to disengage the brain. Print-on-Demand publisher Lulu.com has scored a nice bit of publicity by issuing a press release suggesting that the end of the male bestseller is nigh and all that. Also, the sky is falling. In some quarters, the story is being given straight treatment, so much so that when we read the following quote, we simply cannot tell if reporters