4 ms·
I have a very negative reaction to sites that require an email to get something of unknown value. Automatic no.
by adamc 4y ago
I have a very negative reaction to sites that require an email to get something of unknown value.
Automatic no.
- qup 4y agoThat's an interesting take, given that the landing page demonstrates its value with some example pages, and the index of topics. I can skim the chapter titles and get a pretty good idea of exactly what value there is. I'm not sure what's holding you up.
- qiller 4y agoWell, for example, intro doesn’t say which SQL flavor the author is targeting. As a MSSQL user I wouldn’t want to share my email in exchange for MySQL tricks
- joe_guy 4y agoWhy not a series of blog posts? To me, the reader, what value does sharing my email or it being in The incredibly less flexible "ebook" format have?
- googlryas 4y agoYou, the reader, don't have a choice between a series of blog posts and an emailed pdf.
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- _lqaf 4y ago> Why not a series of blog posts? It seems pretty self-evident that they wish to exchange something of value for something else of value. This is a pretty common activity among humans. Unfortunately, as we see here, "instead, why don't you do even more work to change it to my specifications and then give it to me for free" is a common counteroffer.
- peruvian 4y agoTake a shot every time a HN pedant types "Why don't you just X".
- tpetry 4y agoI am already writing every tip as a blog post. But those blog posts take a full day to write as they are much more detailled compared to the short summary in the ebook. My time is limited like yours, and the short ebook is the best way to spread the knowledge: You get the information now, and I'll notify you when those full articles are written.
- qup 4y agoHey man, thanks for the book. Don't forget you don't owe these guys what they're asking for. You've done the work to share your knowledge, they can do the work to gather it.
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- 411111111111111 4y agoI think that's true, but I'm also one of the people that's going to bounce from that. While several chapters have mildly interesting titles, what I've come used to from these kinds of offers are mostly just rehashed blog articles from other sources. I remember one extra special case about an Elixir "book" that pretty much just copy-pasted the official getting started guide. Generally speaking, these kind of hurdles don't inspire confidence in the quality of the content.
- qup 4y agoBut you can see the actual content. 6% of the book is on display on the landing page. I think you should just judge the quality of that instead of inventing ways to make assumptions based on other factors.
- uoaei 4y agoYour definition of value differs from that of others'.
- qup 4y agoYeah, of course it does. Fully agree. I don't understand the point you're making. I haven't offered my definition of value. I just said that you can clearly determine the value to yourself by reading the landing page, it has the relevant information required (besides actually reading all the content).
- uoaei 4y agoAnd what of values inherent in privacy concerns? It just seems like you're applying a very narrow view of what can be considered "value" here.
- qup 4y agoThe "privacy violation" is not the value of the book, that's the cost to you. We're not discussing the values inherent in privacy concerns, we're discussing the value of the book, and whether or not you can guess at its value before you give the guy your email. You're talking about something else.
- uoaei 4y agoNo, you're talking about something else. Obviously OOP's concern is about the value of the book vis a vis what is demanded of the recipient in exchange for the book.
- tr33house 4y agocan someone share the pdf here for folks who don't wanna share their email?
- NikolaNovak 4y agoI wouldn't. Author is offering their work at a given price. That price is email. It may be worth it to you or not. Requesting a pirated copy of it without paying the price is not something I encourage,given so many of us here are well to do knowledge workers whose live being depends on people paying for our work. (Not to mention, it's same or less work for you to create a temp email account, vs somebody else doing the work of signing up, sharing their email, and uploading and hosting content for your convenience). Yes yes information wants to be free and all that, but this is just lazy :-D
- tr33house 4y agoagree. Thanks for changing my perspective
- remram 4y agoYou say that, yet every paywalled news article posted on HN quickly gets a web.archive.org or archive.is link as a top comment. What is the fundamental difference with this?
- randStr_ 4y agoI've bounced back from so many walled articles that now I genuinely blame the OP (of that post) for not including a non-walled link. HN should have a tag for walled contents.
- tpetry 4y agoTo be honest. Just subscribe and the next time I wrote a free article and share it with you unsubscribe. I don‘t spam you. Ans I don‘t mind when you only want to grab the ebook.
- 4y ago
- jrvarela56 4y agoI have a negative reaction to sites that require email. In this case, the value was made pretty clear in the homepage. I was happy to only have to exchange my email for what appears to be a very high quality resource - the author is either extremely generous or undervaluing their knowledge!
- quijoteuniv 4y agoWhat about a throaway email?
- icedchai 4y agoThe value is clear if you look at the landing page. There's some interesting techniques in this book, for sure. (I've worked with SQL databases for over 20 years. Several of them I hadn't seen.) Providing an email address seemed like a fair trade.
- layer8 4y agoI'm okay with an email address (can just use a throwaway), but I get annoyed when they want you to fill out name, occupation, etc.
- kwhitefoot 4y agoJust make something up.