Download Makers For Free

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There’s a dangerous group of anti-copyright activists out there who pose a clear and present danger to the future of authors and publishing. They have no respect for property or laws. What’s more, they’re powerful and organized, and have the ears of lawmakers and the press.

I’m speaking, of course, of the legal departments at ebook publishers.

These people don’t believe in copyright law. Copyright law says that when you buy a book, you own it. You can give it away, you can lend it, you can pass it on to your descendants or donate it to the local homeless shelter. Owning books has been around for longer than publishing books has. Copyright law has always recognized your right to own your books. When copyright laws are made — by elected officials, acting for the public good — they always safeguard this right.

But ebook publishers don’t respect copyright law, and they don’t believe in your right to own property. Instead, they say that when you “buy” an ebook, you’re really only licensing that book, and that copyright law is superseded by the thousands of farcical, abusive words in the license agreement you click through on the way to sealing the deal. (Of course, the button on their website says, “Buy this book” and they talk about “Ebook sales” at conferences — no one says, “License this book for your Kindle” or “Total licenses of ebooks are up from 0.00001% of all publishing to 0.0001% of all publishing, a 100-fold increase!”)

I say to hell with them. You bought it, you own it. I believe in copyright law’s guarantee of ownership in your books.

So you own this ebook. The license agreement (see below), is from Creative Commons and it gives you even more rights than you get to a regular book. Every word of it is a gift, not a confiscation. Enjoy.

What do I want from you in return? Read the book. Tell your friends. Review it on Amazon or at your local bookseller. Bring it to your bookclub. Assign it to your students (older students, please — that sex scene is a scorcher) (now I’ve got your attention, don’t I?). As Woody Guthrie wrote:

“This song is Copyrighted in U.S., under Seal of Copyright #154085, for a period of 28 years, and anybody caught singin’ it without our permission, will be mighty good friends of ourn, cause we don’t give a dern. Publish it. Write it. Sing it. Swing to it. Yodel it. We wrote it, that’s all we wanted to do.”

Oh yeah. Also: if you like it, buy it or donate a copy to a worthy, cash-strapped institution.

Why am I doing this? Because my problem isn’t piracy, it’s obscurity (thanks, @timoreilly for this awesome aphorism). Because free ebooks sell print books. Because I copied my ass off when I was 17 and grew up to spend practically every discretionary cent I have on books when I became an adult. Because I can’t stop you from sharing it (zeroes and ones aren’t ever going to get harder to copy); and because readers have shared the books they loved forever; so I might as well enlist you to the cause.

I have always dreamt of writing sf novels, since I was six years old. Now I do it. It is a goddamned dream come true, like growing up to be a cowboy or an astronaut, except that you don’t get oppressed by ranchers or stuck on the launchpad in an adult diaper for 28 hours at a stretch. The idea that I’d get dyspeptic over people — readers — celebrating what I write is goddamned bizarre

So, download this book.

Some rules of the road:

It’s kind of a tradition around here that my readers convert my ebooks to their favorite formats and send them to me here, and it’s one that I love! If you’ve converted these files to another format, send them to me and I’ll host them, but before you do, make sure you read the following:

  • Only one conversion per format, first come, first serve. That means that if someone’s already converted the file to a Femellhebber 3000 document, that’s the one you’re going to find here. I just don’t know enough about esoteric readers to adjudicate disputes about what the ideal format is for your favorite device.
  • Make sure include a link to the reader as well. When you send me an ebook file, make sure that you include a link to the website for the reader technology as well so that I can include it below.
  • No cover art. The text of this book is freely copyable, the cover, not so much. The rights to it are controlled by my publisher, so don’t include it with your file.
  • No DRM. The Creative Commons license prohibits sharing the file with “DRM” (sometimes called “copy-protection”) on it, and that’s fine by me. Don’t send me the book with DRM on it. If you’re converting to a format that has a DRM option, make sure it’s switched off.

Fan conversions:

83 Responses to “Download Makers For Free”

  1. Anthony

    Would you welcome fan created cover art, also released under the same CC licence?

    Perhaps a flickr photo pool or some such could be arranged? Flickr seems to do a good job of getting CC licensed stuff onto the CC search radar, plus it would keep any art related drama (think dA here…) from derailing the whole thing

  3. Whatever

    I had read two other of your books and was going to buy this one too….

    Then I found that Amazon (US) doesn’t sell Kindle version to Europe…
    And isn’t avaible in Europe/UK region at all (not even listed).

    Thankfully is avaible for free download…. :)
    If there’s a way I can pay for my copy with a donation…

  4. Whatever

    I’m kinda stupid..
    I’m starting reading ebook downloaded and found a good start on how to donate.

    Still valid my opinion about region locks and stupid fancy DRM made by majors and big publishers

  5. free ebook

    I found that Amazon (US) doesn’t sell Kindle version to Europe…
    And isn’t avaible in Europe/UK region at all (not even listed).

    Thankfully is avaible for free download…. :)

  6. Lawlz Deep

    “Total licenses of ebooks are up from 0.00001% of all publishing to 0.0001% of all publishing, a 100-fold increase!”

    Wouldn’t that be a 10-fold increase?

  7. John Lewis

    I will never buy a kindle or any other e-reader that requires drm encumbered books.

    My sovos reader isn’t perfect by any means but it cost less than £90 (90 UK Pounds) when I got it last year. I download to my PC and copy files to the reader via usb cable.

  8. Bill Seitz

    Have you thought about making a version that can be recommended to high-school kids without freaking out their parents? At the very least, cutting the graphics bits of the Hilda chapter would make this a lot easier…

  9. Onkar

    Why don’t you can sell the ebook without DRM? And if the popular ebook stores don’t allow that then you can always use sites like lulu.com

  10. Daniel Mckendrick @ Rustic Owl Cafe

    I snatched this book off chapter’s shelf one day after reading only a paragraph. It was the first time I’ve ever bought a book on an impulse – I read it twice.
    Then I read ‘For The Win’, and hope to eventually cover all of your titles.
    Thank you Cory, you’re a great writer with fantastic ideas, each one worthy of it’s own cult following.

  11. Cory Doctorow

    Thank you, Daniel. That is very high praise, and I’m honored and best pleased!

  13. Mack

    Epub files are actually zipped html files, so they would almost always be smaller than a plain text file.

  14. claudia

    hei,does exist an italian version of this book?

    thankssss

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