anyway, maybe someone will reproduce it online soon, and then you can read it! i just dont like computers too much to sit there and type it out or scan it or whatever. there are lots of pdf lovers out there who are probably already started on uploading it. crimethinc just doesnt want to, i guess they are busy or their eyes hurt when looking at computers too, or maybe they’re like “damn its done i dont wanna touch it anymore”

maybe you can get one into your local library and then upload it for other pdf lovers!! good luck on however it gets done! my eyes hurt just from this long comment haha!

Personally, I feel a type of comfort and “magic” at the feel of the computer’s keys beneath my fingers, the glow of the monitor in the night, the ability to read information about almost anything for free [unless that material is published by Crimethinc =( ].

p.s. libraries are definately the best, and crimethinc into libraries is even better.

that arguement is contained here:

“….one can buy copies of Days of War, Recipes for Disaster, and the new book for less than $30 including shipping. That is 4 hours of work at a minimum wage job, 10% of a work week and 2.5% of a full-time month in exchange for over 1,400 pages of printed material. (That package also includes 4 posters, 2 guides, fighting for our lives, and 10 stickers). ….
clip
…a couple hours of spanging can achieve the same results, or perhaps most simply, going to all the libraries in your are and properly filling out book request forms, and getting friends to do the same, will, with a 100% certainty, result in getting one’s hands on the books.”

you may well be right to point out that those exact words were not used but i think one can admit that is the essence of the point.

clicking on a link is indeed a real experience. just not much of one.
but what if on the other end of that link is something which makes you look at the world at a 180 degree perspective from where you were before?
those books may well have that effect.
putting it online only increases the chance that someone will be led to have that real experience with the book as well.

and personally, i think that clicking on a link is not a real experience, whereas opening a book is. so thanks crimethinc, for making books.

Furthermore, how people read the book is not your decision. No one can argue that you have put a ton of work into this project and deserve a ton of credit. This, though, does not allow one to decide how another consumes it. Once the book is out in the open, it is not yours anymore. It is the reader’s book. They can choose how they read, interact and (hopefully) disseminate it.

It is a little to sad to see you falling back on the argument that anyone can afford your book. With that rationale anyone can afford about anything. Is dumpster diving is a waste of time since a bag of chips is affordable by anyone? Clearly you are not a chip manufacturer and this comparison is limited but if one of the arguments for dumpster diving is that food should be available to everyone, shouldn’t this apply to books about anarchism to an even greater degree? Shouldn’t information concerning the end of property be the easiest information to get?

As rechelon suggested, putting your book online will not result in less sales. Ask cory docotorow and lawernce lessig http://www.free-culture.cc/freecontent/ (a book i suggest you read considering your responses. don’t worry you can check out the pdf before you buy it) if posting their books has lessened sales. The reason they do it is because they actually want people to read their books. By not doing this you are almost requiring people to buy it or dependent on someone who has. The large percentage of people who are going to buy the book are part of the choir you have been preaching to for years. There is a huge audience for your books that might not want to take the plunge without knowing what they are getting. A simple pdf can alleviate this issue for at least a few.

If the end you are after is revolution and your book is one of the many means to it, start treating it like one. The book is not an end in itself. It is not a money generator. It is merely information that should be able to be read by anyone who wishes to and hopefully put to use.

In the end, making pdfs will not do any of the things you claim. It will not lower you sales. It will not keep people in front of a computer that they wouldn’t already be in front of. Clicking a link may very well start a revolution if the right person clicks the right one. One of the reasons it may have yet to is everyone is keeping there damn property so close to themselves. Do not be a part of that problem. It is a simple one to solve.

I hope you do not take this as an attack on ct as a whole, just this particular issue.

we’d never suggest that sometime obtain employment just to get our books! we listed many ways to obtain our books, one of which is with cash obtained by employment. while not employed personally, nearly everyone i know is, and for those people using cash from that labor is probably the easiest way to get the books.

http://www.crimethinc.com/books/intolibraries.html
http://www.crimethinc.com/texts/atoz/practical.php

I’m not central to the group that maintains this website, but I think there are plans to hammer out some kind of guidelines for blog commenting, to keep all the material on this website streamlined and useful to the general public (which blogs often are not, in my opinion). Just as the last few convergences have been sober spaces, I think it could make sense to request that people refrain from insulting language and off-topic rambling here.

1. Things are better in print format, fuck the internet. The internet already has such a mass of worthless information that some good information added to the pile really doesn’t do much for the medium, and also, the internet lends itself more to skipping over shit and not seriously reading anything. Things in print are more likely to be read in full by the people that have access to them that things on the internet are.

2. I’m surprised little attention has been given to the argument that these books cost money for a reason. It’d be nice if money or resources were all obtained for free which resulted in the ability to distribute this kind of literature freely (Which certainly happens from time to time), however books are things that take a considerable amount of resources and money to produce, and you, the passive consumer who seeks to skip over most of it while reading it online, don’t have to pay those expenses, the people producing the books do. It’s absurd to say that all the books should just be free. I’m sure the crimethinc publishing collective probably has enough resources to perhaps produce this book for free as a “gift to the masses” if they wanted to, however I’m sure that would also consume all money saved entirely and would result in the seizure of any future crimethinc publications from lack of funds. Books cost money because they cost money to produce. This is obvious to most, but not to you Dizzie.

3. Some facts for readers of these comments about Dizzie. I have seen Dizzie’s comments elsewhere on the internet, particularly heavy on forums like totse.com and the worthless shit that gets spewed there. Dizzie spends most of his time compiling scams everyone already knows into rediculously lengthy online documents that a few people read and probably skip over most of given that they’re all just excerpts from a bunch of things people have already read. He also criticizes crimethinc on numerous other websites on the internet, calling the publishing collective “greedy” for charging the small fees needed to make the publications available. If you search for some of his posts online, they show his intelligence and ethics, both of which are very low. He consistently writes about methods of ripping PEOPLE off (not corporations) through pickpocketing, robbing people’s personal belongings, and generally fucking people over for personal benefit in the types of ways that people talk about on the mostly horrificly oppressive message boards of totse and other sites. In other words, Dizzie has the ethics of the stereotypical “scum punk” that steals from their friends for drug money and other assorted nonsense that goes along with it. While having the ethics of a scum punk, he clearly has the access to computer tools of a more privileged character and judging from the amount and frequency of content he posts online I judge that he also spends a considerable amount of time online, enough to suggest that he’s probably a middle to upper class suburbinite fascinated with the “forbidden” parts of the internet like 12 year olds who fetishize the jolly roger “anarchist” cookbook.