Copyright for ebooks

This seems to be a real sticking point for some of the authors I’ve talked to. They have a real fear that their work will be pirated the very second it becomes available then broadcast round the world as a freebie.

Firstly, if someone is really determined, you won’t stop them. No matter how many electronic locks and tricks you try to use, anyone with a decent scanner and OCR (Optical Character Recognition) software can soon lift a copy, then convert it to the format of their choice. Having gone to that trouble, I suggest that they are more likely to pass a few copies about.

Secondly, the lower your initial price, the less likely it is that someone will bother to pinch it. The pragmatic reason of 'not worth the hassle' will combine with the fact that the vast majority of people are honest, and will respond to you making the first move to establish trust.

When I first decided to offer a full money back guarantee on all our performance bookings (I also work as a musician and entertainer), a local rival predicted that it would bankrupt me by the end of the year. Instead, sales went up by 27%, and there have only been two instances of people taking advantage in eight years. Set your price too high, and you will make it easier for anyone wavering over pinching a copy to justify thinking of them self as a modern Robin Hood.

Don’t get hung up with trying to turn your product into an electronic Fort Knox. Concentrate on getting the best possible book out to the widest possible audience at the lowest price you can live with. Forget about the minority of scamps, cads, bounders and other riff-raff out there, just stick a few pins into a clay doll when the mood takes you.

And thirdly, do make sure that you do at least have a few links and some blurb about yourself in every book so that any ripped off copy has the potential to bring you a benefit in some way. Bill Gates, although unhappy that his software was being ripped off in China, was a lot happier that it was his product rather than that of a rival that was attracting the attention.

Lack of exposure is a much greater threat than piracy. Attempts at Digital Rights Management (DRM) tend to be heavy handed and intrusive. Punters quite rightly expect to be able to view purchased books on whatever format they damn well want, I know I do.

Finally, before having a go at 'kids nowadays', recent research has shown the biggest pirates to be 'ladies of a certain age...!'