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Get my book for free
Yes my book is out today (B&N here) but you don't need to buy it. You can get it here for free.
How?
It is simple. Just write in the comments section some reason why you should get my book for free. I will mail free copies to the first fifteen commenters to meet the following conditions:
1. Your comment must offer a reason why you should get the book for free.
2. You must explain that reason in a moderately-sized paragraph or more. "Just cuz" does not qualify.
3. Your paragraph must address why you should get the book and why you should get it for free.
4. You must believe your reason.
Then email me with your mailing address (to my normal gmu email, and so I know you are you please put your real name on your posted reason as well) and I will send you a copy, through Amazon, at my own expense. You know, at first I thought I would get the publisher to put up copies for this but then I realized no, I ought to be paying for the books myself. I'm not even using an author's discount.
I wish I were a wealthier man, but I am offering only fifteen copies right now. Any future copies will be offered abroad, not in the U.S.
I am very interested in the idea of what it means to have a reason.
Sadly, no matter how good your reason, I cannot send more than one copy to you.
Addendum: This offer is restricted to the United States and Canada. I am worried that the first copies to go out otherwise would end up in the hands of a single Nigerian spammer, plus Amazon does not ship worldwide. Nonetheless I hope to make a similar offer to the broader world in the future, with appropriate safeguards.
Second addendum: The first fifteen slots have now been awarded...
Posted by Tyler Cowen on August 2, 2007 at 09:39 AM in Books | Permalink
Comments
Much like used cars, new books are a gamble. The potential reader has only prior reputation and pre-release hype. Books by scholars may or may not step beyond what is already available in blogs, other books, etc. So I tend towards purchasing paperbacks. However, I am a big talker when it comes to books I love. After reading Fooled by Randomness, I was very happy to tell people about The Black Swan, which I quickly purchased in hardback when it was released. I think a free book would be able to serve both your interests and mine, as I do believe I could generate at least a replacement sale if not additional sales as a result of my word of mouth, and I could read a hardcover at home without waiting to get it from the library. Also, my wife is teaching a class in the fall at a local university, and who knows what some well placed title dropping can bring. More than sales, a whole slew of potential inner economists can be released, all from the shipment of one copy of your book. I know that you as well would be taking a risk in sending a copy to me, but that risk should be spread across the number of other copies that you send out in this offer. Thanks for your consideration!
Posted by: Aaron at Aug 2, 2007 9:49:54 AM
I have already purchased your book. Now, normally that would make me a less than ideal candidate for the free book, but by sending me a free book, you can be assured that you are not displacing a prospective buyer. I will give the book to someone who I can assure you would not have purchased the book, but may, upon reading it be so enamored with the contents that they either:
1. Purchase other books by you
2. Recommend your book to others
Although the expected cost to you from shipping the book to me is still likely negative (I don't think I can get you an additional $17+ from royalties), it is most certainly less negative than others. Thus, the marginal benefit to you of shipping a book to me (in comparison to your other options) is positive.
Posted by: Steven Bass at Aug 2, 2007 9:51:23 AM
Amazon does ship internationally.
I live in Israel.
Posted by: assaf at Aug 2, 2007 9:52:37 AM
Mr. Cowen,
I have been a loyal MR reader for the past year (although admittingly not enough to explore your secret blog). However, I often enjoy reading your take on international news and politics as well as what kind of thoughts/problems have been taking up your time recently. You may remember me from a (currently failed) attempt to have you guest speak at my school some time in the fall. Fianlly, I offer the fact that I am reading your blog at 9:50 AM on a thursday morning whie at work as proff positive to the above.
Posted by: Michael at Aug 2, 2007 9:52:42 AM
If you send me this book, I will be sure to read it and will offer commentary on my moderately well-read blog. I may not agree with everything you write, but can guarantee that a few more people will hear about it than otherwise would have. As for why it should come free, the sad truth is that I have a full stack of reading material at the moment and a list of books in my shopping cart at Amazon; there's a good chance that I'll read this book anyway, but it won't be any time in the next three or four months.
Posted by: Michael Carr at Aug 2, 2007 9:54:04 AM
I can't resist books...about anything. I recently subscribed to Google Reader and started reading your posts through their RSS bundle "Thinkers" and they've been consistently well written and mostly about things I've never thought about. So I'm assuming your book will be the same way. I don't know your history or your slant, so it's a bit of a risk for us both. But if I like it, I'll pass it around. As an aside, I used to blog a bit myself, and I know how hard it is come up with something fresh every day. I respect your ability to keep a blog going and write a book!
Posted by: Lori at Aug 2, 2007 9:54:10 AM
DISCLAIMER: I wrote the above post very fast so I could be one of the first 15... I hope the spelling mistakes don't disqualify me.
Posted by: Michael at Aug 2, 2007 9:54:30 AM
The reason I should get the book is that I am a regular reader of this
blog and comment here quite frequently and that demonstrates I appreciate
the things you write about.
The reason I should get it for free is that I am a poor undergrad student and cannot
afford it, so i'll have to wait for around 6-8 months before my univ library
gets it and only then I will be able to read it. Instead it is much better
for you to get the loyalty of a already dedicated econ reader of your blog!
I think it is clear that I reasonably-believe the above reasons.
~ Jack Sparrow
Posted by: jack sparrow at Aug 2, 2007 9:54:56 AM
In five years, let alone one hundred, you won't care who the books went to. Nor will it make a predictable difference to the readers, since you can't reliably predict who will benefit from reading the book based on a single paragraph, and you don't know what they would have read otherwise or what difference that would have made. What you do know is you can more quickly complete your precommitted giving-away-free-books task by giving them away to early entrants, such as me. Therefore I should get a free copy of your book.
Posted by: Michael at Aug 2, 2007 9:55:07 AM
You should send me a free copy because I'm the marginal consumer. I read Marginal Revolution irregularly. I sometimes read this kind of book (e.g., I've read Landsburg's Armchair Economist, but not Harford's Undercover Economist). I promise to start reading your book and there's a reasonable chance I'll finish it. I might buy the book in paperback, but not in hardcover.
Since the social cost of sending me a copy is very small (just a few bucks to print it and mail it to me) there's a social gain in sending me a copy despite the transfer from Tyler to Amazon and the publisher.
In brief, I'm willing to pay $10 for the book, so send it to me for free!
Posted by: Ragout at Aug 2, 2007 9:55:52 AM
And I live in Canada, so that makes me a perfect candidate for this book.
Posted by: jack sparrow at Aug 2, 2007 9:56:41 AM
I began reading MR a few months ago, and have really enjoyed getting a different perspective on economics and life than what I was getting in my graduate school classes.
The concepts related to economics are typically difficult for me to understand, but I am now in a position to succeed as I begin PhD studies this fall!
I read your blog daily and can't wait to find out new nuggets of information to use to impress my professor, Dr. Stater or my boyfriend, who is a self-professed "econ-geek".
I hope you send me your book, so I can continue to foster a greater comfort level with economics, as it is the core of Public Administration, Policy and Planning in America. :)
Posted by: Ellie at Aug 2, 2007 9:56:44 AM
Dear Tyler,
I believe I should get your book for free because you promised me that the answer to the question I have been searching for (and asked you to answer) could be found in this book. If you don't remember, I asked you to state "Your opinion on how to give to charity." and you stated that "I'll be covering this in my forthcoming book Discover Your Inner Economist: Use Incentives to Fall in Love, Survive Your Next Meeting, and Motivate Your Dentist, due out from Dutton on August 2." See http://www.marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2007/04/hodgepodge_ques.html. So I have been in constant suspense about how I should be giving to charity. Until I get the answer to my question, I fear that lots of poor children will continue to suffer. As for why I should get the book for free; the reason is because by saving money on your books I can give more to the suffering children. So in conclusion, giving the book to me for free saves suffering children. Think of the children Tyler, think of the children.
Will
Posted by: Will Garvin at Aug 2, 2007 9:58:00 AM
I am currently collecting libertarian economics books. Unfortunately, I have none of your books on my shelf yet, since I know that if I were to open myself up to the category of "books by tentatively libertarian professors" I would be forced to buy all of your works. Sending me your book, which to a collector like me is a complemetary good to the rest of your oeuvre, such as In Praise of Commercial Culture and Creative Destruction, would increase the marginal benefits of buying those books, thus leading me to buy them and causing you to get two royalties' worth.
Posted by: Dan at Aug 2, 2007 9:59:33 AM
I should get the book for free, because I am an influencer when it comes to books amongst my co-workers and online friends (some of the books I've gotten people to read are Godel, Escher, Bach, Freakonomics, some physics books, and even Dickens novels). Some people have read books because I have explicitly recommended them to them, some have bought books simply because I've read them and said they were an interesting read.
I don't know what your royalty share is per book, so I don't know if roughly 10 additional sales will offset the cost of one free copy to me.
Posted by: meep at Aug 2, 2007 9:59:37 AM
The book should be free simply because I have a willingness to pay that is roughly equal to the time it's taking me to type this comment (which is far less than the Amazon price). You're employing perfect discriminatory pricing by giving me the book for free (actually, I suppose you'd do a little better if you could capture the $ this post is worth to me, but transaction costs would likely overwhelm that). I want the book because I love the blog and trust that you wouldn't spend the time writing a book that wasn't interesting and entertaining. However, your willingness to do individual podcasts for a whole day does concern me, but on balance, I trust that the book will be interesting to a wide audience.
The only remaining question is whether this is a reason for me or a reason for you. The first commenter is trying to convince you that he will spread the gospel, and I am capable of the same, but I can't do that ex ante, as I don't know how good the book is. Also, since you asked us to truly believe the reason, I feel I should be honest: I am more than capable of affording your book and I visit the library often, so there is a touch of guilt in this post, but I do truly believe that this post is my willingness to pay, so that's a good reason for me to get it for free.
Posted by: D Oppenheim at Aug 2, 2007 9:59:43 AM
I read a lot of blogs including this one obviously, but until this post I didn't even know what your name was and I knew nothing about your book except that you wrote one. I suppose having a copy of the book would be the easiest way to make me more familiar with your ideas and make me more interested in your other work in general.
I have no reason that I should get it for free other than that I probably won't ever buy it.
Despite the ambivalence of my motivations, I can say that if I receive one I will definitely read it and tell others what I think of it.
Posted by: Abraham at Aug 2, 2007 10:01:21 AM
Requirement #4 invalidated all my reasons. I guess I will buy it on-line now.
Posted by: noto at Aug 2, 2007 10:01:39 AM
Also, I will tell my friends how cool the author is. ;) So it's in your own self-interest.
And it's very much in my own self-interest to get a book I want to read for free.
Posted by: meep at Aug 2, 2007 10:02:03 AM
I'm a graduate student in economics, and my funding is the sole source of income for my family (wife and daughter). My wife doesn't believe in the permanent income hypothesis, so I'm liquidity constrained. I'm searching for thesis ideas, and I think your book could be a great source.
Posted by: Chris Wignall at Aug 2, 2007 10:02:50 AM
Sorry, I missed my real name in my posted reason. My name is Angad Sahota
Posted by: jack sparrow at Aug 2, 2007 10:03:09 AM
Receiving the book for free would, assuming that I enjoy the copy I've already pre-ordered, give me a great opportunity to give someone a copy and pique their interest in the practical outworkings of this (for me) new-found field of economics. As a landscape architect, I learned nothing whatsoever about this in college, and assumed that economics and finance were essentially the same thing. Now, as a 29 year old, I've realized why these issues are important on a national policy scale, and I look forward to extending the sphere further into my personal life. In spite of listening to all of Russ Roberts podcasts (some several times), I'm obviously still not adept enough to expand on these issues to friends in a way that gets them as excited about this stuff as I've been.
So, in a sentence, you giving me the book would allow for free evangelism on my part, and personalized giving on yours to someone ‘outside the fold’. You not giving me the book will likely also result in evangelism (because if I enjoy it as much as I assume I will, I’ll buy it to give to people anyway), but being able to give someone a book for free, and tell them that it was a gift to them directly from the author because he wished them to be able to apply economics to their life, would make it more meaningful for the three of us. I've bought one copy of ‘Basic Economics’ for someone, and offered to buy two more people the book, but I (and I assume Thomas Sowell) would have been happier to have given the book as a more ‘personal’ gift.
Posted by: shawn at Aug 2, 2007 10:03:11 AM
Having recently graduated from graduate school, I have a very large amount of debt, so my ability to buy all the books I want to read is limited. Couple that with my burgeoning interest in economics and my recent purchase of A Farewell to Alms to read with the group here, I think that the more I read on the subject, the more interested I will continue to become. I've already learned a lot from reading your blog over the last year or so and look forward to learning more in the coming years.
Posted by: Andrew at Aug 2, 2007 10:03:14 AM
I plan to buy your book, but would of course enjoy getting it for free.
I suspect it will contain at least some stuff that deals with customer/household/firm economics.
I'm curious to see whether you approach those questions from a pure commodity/perfect competition perspective, or whether you've shifted to at least some degree to differentiated products/differential competition perspective.
The two are very different, as Chamberlain and Schumpeter pointed out decades ago. The first assumes that value conversion ( product goodness to worth in exchange) is holistic ( value is value) and positive ( positive goodness produces positive worth). The latter recognizes that in markets for differentiated products, it's bifurcated ( part monopoly conversion, part commodity conversion) and bipolar ( differential contribution can sometimes render positive use value less than worthless .. Schumpeter's creative destruction).
Lots of interesting implications roll out of these differences. I'm curious to see how far you've come in getting your head around this.
Best regards,
Dick Harmer
Boston University
Posted by: Dick Harmer at Aug 2, 2007 10:03:44 AM
Simple, so I can read it as an investment in human capital. This will also me to have higher future earnings. In the future, when I am not so poor , I will buy more of your books, perhaps even purchasing the entire backcatalog over on the right of your blog. I will remain a irrationally loyal reader over the years bringing in increased revenue to you over time than you would lose over not giving me this one book. However, if I don't get the book I might be irrationally disloyal and never buy one of your books out of simple spite, regardless of how much I might benefit. I could go on but I need to post this with a quickness.
Posted by: Mike Russell at Aug 2, 2007 10:04:07 AM
