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USA Today on O'Reilly Covers
jbc writes "USA Today has an article on O'Reilly's animal cover art. If you're like me, and are an obsessive collector of these books, you'll find it interesting. If not, you probably won't. "
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For whatever reason that catchphrase, 'Information wants to be free' irks me. Maybe it's because everyone I know who proclaims this is annoying and a pirate, so they've lost major respect points by irritating me and flouting the socio-economic structure in existence in the US...
An interesting concept would be for O'Reilly to provide an online documentation center, all the while having a pane atop or to the left or something with advertisements/links(same thing) to their books and works, as well as for other companies...
IE, an information/documentation portal, with advertisements from hardware, software, internet service, and user support companies, among other things...
I don't think their sales of hardcopy books would drop, but would actually rise as more people are exposed to their site and their works... It may be tough to sell the concept to authors, however.
It's nice to have something free and available, but for a real reference, for example when on a slow connection, not online, or one doesn't want to spend hours staring at a monitor, or you just want to hold something in a comfortable chair...
The online documentation would be added value/service, I think...
AS
-AS
*Pikachu*
...so I wonder at what point the O'Reilly folks will realize they'll sell more books when they make online versions of the books freely available on the web. While it may seem a contradiction, it is not. Personally, I'm much more inclined to purchase a technical book after its value has been demonstrated: Show me the content is truely valuable, then I'm much more likely to purchase a hardcopy for my own convienience instead of going to a website.
That information can be free and still provide a living for those who bundle it is the big boon of computer/internet evolution. The trick is for those who bundle information to quickly realize that traditional marketing techniques, when applied to information, are often the incorrect path to profitability. Point: Don't try to convince your customers that your product has value via arguments and gimmicks (traditional marketing), but show them the goods so they can convince themselves of the value, then provide them with convienience and service -- it this case, a quickly referenced book.
Three cheers to O'Reilly for providing the Linux/Unix community with convienience and quality over the years: May you all prosper accordingly.
Everything in the Universe sucks: It's the law!