eBook - File Sharing a problem?

[MarkRoX]

My target buyers are basically 15-25 year old boys/men. My muse would be an eBook that they'd seriously be interested in.

My main concern is that this group is really into file-sharing A LOT, and ANYTHING.

So would an ebook actually be a good option for my muse or regular print? figure 80-100 page paperback. I just feel that with this group, ALL of them would have it after a week on the market if it was an ebook.

Hypothetically I would initially profit only $10-15 per book and then more as orders went up and I could buy in larger quantities.

I know about ALL of the Pros for e-books, I'm just really worried about this group I'm targeting and their tendency to file-share ANYTHING they find.

Any comments would be appreciated.

Thanks.

[MiniBlueDragon]

If I purchase an info product I definitely don't fileshare it... Why should someone else get what I've paid for for free? :(

One of the info products I've purchased comes zipped-up with a README file in the zip directory. This README file has the password for the main eBook and the author has told everyone who downloads that should the pass become public knowledge their membership will be revoked. This is one option.

Another option would be for you to release a "snippet" version of the book with partial chapters and links to your squeeze page (where people can buy a paperback version of the fill product) so that the viral element takes hold, people spread it around and you make sales from it.

[MuseMojo]

MiniBlueDragon,

I've been looking at DesktopAuthor
http://www.dnaml.com/

They claim that the copy protection is robust. I like the presentation of the product. Very much a visual depiction of a page turning book. It looks like there's enough tools there to make a professional looking publication. Its not cheap, it costs $138 for no free upgrades or $204 for 2 major upgrades included.

[MiniBlueDragon]

Nice, I'll definitely have a look into that for my next eBook venture... From a sales perspective it's the cost of less than 5 sales for the no free upgrade version so by using profit to purchase you won't be losing-out on any of your own money.

Nice find if it's as good as it looks! :)

[amuse-ing]

As for preventing someone from spreading your book around the internet and sharing it with people, there isn't really a way to do that. Even if you do password protect your file, there are always ways to get around a password. If you look around the file sharing scene, you'll find that passwords and serial numbers are always included with the file they are pirating anyway.

What you need to concentrate on is that you yourself don't contribute to making your ebook easily accessible on the internet. When you host the ebook on your site for people to download it from, put it in a password protected directory. This password can be changed as little as you want or as often as you want. The tradeoff is that if you change it often, it takes more work on your part and if you change it less, you don't work as much but your ebook will be less secure.

If you leave your ebook hosted on your website without it being in a password protected directory, people who bought the ebook can just post the link around the internet so that others can download it. By password protecting your directory, someone who clicks on the ebook download link will have to put in a username and password to download it. By changing the password often, this will prevent people from having access to it without buying the ebook in case the link to the ebook gets passed around the internet. The best way to give people the password is to include it in their payment receipts with a link to the file to download it.

Hope that made sense. :D

[MarkRoX]

Thank you everyone for your responses!

Now I must ask those of you who have already produced and sold ebooks... have you seen yours on file sharing networks to find out if they're there?

I suppose the easiest way would just to go to any major bittorrent search site and search for your ebook's title... such as going to piratebay.org or torrentspy.com or something.

Please understand I'm not trying to promote file-sharing by listing those sites, they exist and illegal file-sharing is a reality. Just wondering what you guys thought of the amount of loss that this may or may not (has or has not) affect your own sales.

One that sticks out in my mind that I see on the file-sharing sites is Tom Venuto's - Burn the Fat, Feed the Muscle!

Although, I must admit MBD that I will probably use your 2nd suggestion and release a good exerpt that gets passed around and directs people to purchasing the full hardcopy.

My target of 15-25 year old males who play video games are just too hack savy and file-share happy, compared to other markets.

Thanks Everyone!

[MuseMojo]

oh, I forgot, DesktopAuthor has a feature that allows you to set a number of pages or chapters that can be viewed for FREE as a teaser and then prompts for payment. It's already built in.