Unexpected Success

March 27, 2003

Glenn Fleishman is a guy with a lot of regrets, or at least one BIG regret that he’s not going to forget anytime soon. Fleishman, looking for a way to boost sales of his book, decided he would make it available to the public as a free download - you know, to get people interested. Well, it seems to have worked. In the first 36 hours, the book was downloaded a whopping 10 000 times. Wait, it gets worse - because he’s charged incrementally for bandwidth, he could face a tab of $15 000 or more.

“It’s a financial catastrophe,” said Fleishman. “I’m a working stiff with a mortgage … I never suspected the penalty would be so high for giving something away…. It’s like living in Singapore and getting 15 years in jail for chewing gum.”

Read When a Free Download Isn’t Free from Wired.

Posted in Books