Some others have mentioned a similar philosophy: the notice on the bottom of
the file is like a No Trespassing sign; it won't stop a determined thief, but
will keep honest people reasonably honest. It also causes an extra step if you
intend to pirate them, which may be enough.
50% lower seems about right for an original composition, roughly equal to the
retail markup charged by a store. My reduction is 25% off if I don't have to
print/bind/mail it, but I deal with different kinds of music. I charge for
printing to orchestra paper and taping/binding, and true enough, some ensembles
have a healthy budget and would rather not have the bother of having to print
out themselves. I'll give them the option. Of course, I am not dealing with
anything approaching even a small volume; most of my sales are one-off.
Christopher
On Wed Mar 28, at WednesdayMar 28 2:38 PM, Paul Hayden wrote:
> Wow -- great replies! Your comments bring up a couple of other issues:
>
> 1. I assume that PDFs should be priced lower than paper copies. If they're
> not, I would think there would be a greater incentive to pirate the PDF
> rather than just buy your own copy. Does 50% lower sound right?
>
> 2. Adam Engst (TidBITS founder) was kind enough to offer some advice: don't
> bother password protecting your PDFs -- they're easily removed. Even so, he
> said that it's probably a good idea to stamp (in Acrobat) the PDF with the
> price and buyer's name. This is similar to what Christopher Smith wrote
> ("This score and set of parts is for the exclusive use of [the buyer]").
>
> Paul Hayden
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