I was just thinking, perhaps the people at mises Institute should allow anyone to copy, print, and sell the media on this site. Would not people do just that and get the ideas out even farther then they already are. Is this a bad strategy for achieving the goal?
I don’t know if this is a good idea. But shall we discuss the economics of it? I’d like to come up with a list of pro’s and con’s. Or if in fact this is already the case, please tell me.
what makes you think its not allowed?
The Creative Commons site only mentions copying and remixing. It says nothing of selling. The selling part is the part I’m wondering about.
I would bet money that JTucker and LRockwell would not sue you
I agree, but I think it if you want people to do it, you have to explicitly tell them that they have the right to do it, otherwise they won’t out of fear of repercussion that the owners are not willing pursue. If you tell them that they can sell it without having to compensate the owners, they will be certain of the lack of consequences.
I’m not talking about myself doing it, I’m talking about a publisher possibly printing enough of them to get them out to the public. If they see a profit opportunity in printing this, they’ll take it, and when you remove licensing fees and legal barriers, the margin goes up and they can make and advertise even more copies.
The anti-thesis of the entrepreneurial spirit really.
By the way, they essentially already have - made the whole site open source.
I think the better question would be: who’s gonna buy the stuff?
Anyone artistic could make book cover designs. Then, make them available with print on demand.
Haha, yes.
There are areas however, outside the US - that do have demand for the books - but are restricted due to transportation costs, tariffs on books and unreliable shipping.
The case is often that - the consumer would like to purchase the books, but is unable to due to high costs and risk.
Local production however would be able too service the demand.
Hope to do something along these lines down under.
ohhh please do conza ^^
Just to provide a further example to make the point:
The cost per item (book) purchased from the Mises Institute (including shipping) on average, for an Australian / South Hemisphere consumer is roughly $60 Australian dollars.
That’s the mark to beat… lol
A good POD service charges $.08 per page, say 300 pages… $24, plus $5 for binding.. $5 postage. it comes well under the mark. Half the price!
I gather the issue may be a slight reduction in quality? Which is always very high from the Institute.
I inquired about the stores process, do they do bulk buys or have their own POD service / machine? The response was they had signed a NDA (non-disclosure agreement).. which is a tad frustrating considering it would be nice to avoid all the pitfalls by consulting someone with experience who has been through it themselves.
I highly doubt you would sell it. They’re very long books. Some are very complex, others are just not that marketable. If you can, then good job, you’re an amazing marketing genius.
