Recent sales of LO user guides

[jeanweber]

Friends of Open Document Inc is the publisher of the printed editions
of our user guides (through Lulu.com) and the custodian of income from
sales of PDFs through the Ubuntu store. I have posted their 6-month
interim accounts (July-Dec 2013) to their website. The page for
LibreOffice Docs is
http://www.friendsofopendocument.com/newsite/?page_id=549

A reminder: the purpose of publishing and selling printed copies is
not to raise money, but to provide a service to people who want them.
The purpose of selling PDFs through Ubuntu is to raise awareness of
our user guides. Some guides are also available through the iBookstore
(via Lulu, which produces them from the files we provide for printed
copies).

I have been looking into getting our user guides sold through Amazon
and other venues. In the past Lulu charged a fee for this, but that
has changed. I hope to be able to get the v4.2 and later books into
those outlets as we produce them.

--Jean

[jeanweber]

I also feel that it's worth using the fund to get into places such as
iBookstore or Amazon or anything like that, even if there is a
reasonable set-up fee or a fee that is a percentage-of-sales. Even if
such places make a loss (as long as that loss is not huge and is well
under over-all profits) at least it gets us out there into markets
that would otherwise be difficult to advertise in. After seeing your
documentation there they might investigate further and then
purchase/acquire the guides from elsewhere.

Money is not an issue about getting into those markets. Someone with
the time to do the work quickly, and some changes to the files (see my
other note on the topic), are the main issues. Also there is a delay
in getting books into those markets (outside our control), and with
our rapid publishing schedule many items have been superceded before
they get there.

Any idea why the German Guides are so low? Is the Lulu Store itself
only in English? Are the guides incomplete (ie only the Base Handbook
available or somethign like that)? Have the German guides only
recently been offered through Lulu?

The only guide currently provided through Friends of OpenDocument on
Lulu is the Base Handbuch, because that is the only one the German
team have asked me to put there.

--Jean

[Tom_Davies]

Hi
Sorry for the extra traffic. I know my emails and ideas have to be
rejected without thinking about them so perhaps i should say the
opposite of what i mean.

Could someone forwards that information to the international
translators team, the L10n one? I feel that if they were able to
raise sundry funds in a similar way then it might make them more
sustainable or more able to reach a wider audience.

I also feel that it's worth using the fund to get into places such as
iBookstore or Amazon or anything like that, even if there is a
reasonable set-up fee or a fee that is a percentage-of-sales. Even if
such places make a loss (as long as that loss is not huge and is well
under over-all profits) at least it gets us out there into markets
that would otherwise be difficult to advertise in. After seeing your
documentation there they might investigate further and then
purchase/acquire the guides from elsewhere.

Any idea why the German Guides are so low? Is the Lulu Store itself
only in English? Are the guides incomplete (ie only the Base Handbook
available or somethign like that)? Have the German guides only
recently been offered through Lulu?

Regards from
Tom

[Tom_Davies]

Hi
if anyone does send the income&expenditure to the translators list it
might be worth pointing out that it's only 1 book and not your
best-seller. The disparity (imo) would raise the question otherwise.

With time being a crucial factor would it matter if they had older
versions? Hopefully it might encourage people to come hunting for the
more recent ones or at least just "raise the profile" of your
excellent guides.

Btw i have bought a couple of the guides and lend them out to
co-workers and it raises their eyebrows when they seee the high
quality. They suddenly realise it really is a professional quality
program.

Regards from
Tom