I've been thinking about the whole electronic vs paper book thing recently. There are the various DRM problems that just don't seem to be getting anywhere near sorted (and for the latest twist on this one see this article on Boing Boing about one publisher trying to bully authors).

Suffice it to say that as long as I have a say in things, my electronic books will be free of any sort of digital rights management and will also be licensed under a Creative Commons license.

To that end, one of the things I think would be a good thing to do is to offer different versions of the electronic version so that people who do not have a Kindle can still read it. Also, if you have bought a paper version of The Long Sleep ) and would like an electronic version, I don't think that you should have to buy it again. Obviously, I'm not going to stop you doing so, but I don't think you should have to (I'm afraid I can't afford to give you a paper copy of the book if you've got an electronic version but you can always get a pdf copy and print it out...). Once you've bought it in one format you should be free to port it from one version to the next.

Therefore, if you have bought a copy (either the Lulu version, the Amazon/Createspace paper version or the Kindle version)of the Long Sleep and would like a copy of the book in whatever electronic version takes your fancy, please email me a copy of your receipt, using the 'Contact Samarcand Books' link on the Samarcand Books webpage specifying what version you want (pdf, ebook, txt, rtf, whatever) and I'll send you another copy in return.

Obviously, this offer will also apply to Stories From the Corner of the Room, Ghostkin, Down Among the Yla and anything else that I write. (As far as I am able. If I get published by a 'real' publisher, it will depend on their contract, but I'll certainly push for it to happen like that - up to and including the no DRM bit. Hell, if Cory Doctorow can do it, I don't see why I can't.

The other option, if you have the electronic version, is to get a copy of Calibre which converts ebooks from one format to another. There is also an add-on for Calibre that allows you to remove DRM from all your electronic books. Frankly, if you've got any sort of e-reader, you should be using Calibre to back up your books, even if you don't worry about DRM...

(Originally posted on samarcandbooks on 5th Sep, 2012 at 1:02 PM)

For the last few weeks, there has been nothing in this journal but an increasingly self-referential list of the tweets automatically generated by LJ to say what I've been tweeting. Except I have been tweeting about as much as I've been writing posts. So, the only thing that has been tweeted has been the posts saying that I've tweeted something. See what I mean about self-referential? It's practically meta.

This has also meant that I have been totally remiss in trying to push Down Among The Yla. Which is a shame, because I am very proud of it - probably more than I am of The Long Sleep. It is, after all the 'difficult second album'. Basically (and, if I'm being honest, as ever), I need to get my arse into gear. I need to follow Warren Ellis's example.

But anyway...
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