@Schneems Just curious, you licensed your book "How to Open Source" as CC BY-NC-SA 4.0. Doesn't that effectively eliminate copy protections (assuming attribution and free digital copies)? Have you found it to be a problem? As the author, have you seen improvements from the community? Have folks re-mixed your work and published it?
@haruska Also my subject matter is deeply entwined with open licenses and copyright. I knew from the beginning I wanted to do something there.
That's one reason I self published instead of going through a publisher which would require assigning (at least partial) copyright.
@haruska
I know other books that give away as much or more. Rails Tutorial by Hartl for example. I think it can possibly help your marketing strategy, but can't be the ONLY marketing strategy.
Regarding contributions. I've not open sourced the raw text.
I've gotten lots of (positive) feedback and got a few minor corrections which I updated on Gumroad.
@haruska Bigger than CC BY-NC has been running a slack group for early purchasers and actively engaging with them. Otherwise it's hard getting feedback from people.
@Schneems Interesting. Yeah, I'm trying to understand an instance where the "Share Alike" part of the license has come in to play. Curious if something like the Rust Book publishing model is a better way to have a primary author but still allow for public contributions. Curious how many copies they sell at No Starch Press. I own a hard copy but probably not the norm.
@haruska I want to produce a hard copy one day. I actually exclusively buy hardcopies of tech books. Or else I print them out and put them in a binder.
I need to read them with a highlighter or nothing sticks.
I could still publish via no starch The key is that I made all the content without their help. Or I can do my own thing via KDP (print on demand).
For me share alike just means if someone else makes it way better on their own, then i'm at least entitled to see the improvements.
@haruska I've seen no downside.
In general I ask people to not just post a copy to every comment field in existence on the internet, but if your friend can't afford a copy it shouldn't be illegal for you to give them one.
I wanted to license it like that so educators who might want to give it to students could make access easier. etc.
It's hard to encode those wishes in a legal binding way so CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 is second best :)