3 ms·

The exclusivity clause is being misinterpreted. They aren't demanding exclusivity for the content of the book, only for the Author-provided layout. With my rea

The exclusivity clause is being misinterpreted. They aren't demanding exclusivity for the content of the book, only for the Author-provided layout. With my reading of this, you are free to sell your book in as many places as you like, as long as you don't use Author to publish for those other platforms. Since Author is being distributed for the express purpose of publishing to iBooks, I can't see why this would be a problem.

viscanti 15y ago
I agree. The demos all show text being imported from some other text file (likely whatever the writer has already written to distribute elsewhere). Then Author is just used to add an additional level of interactivity for iBook distribution. A writer could write their whole book in Author, but that's misusing the tool. Author is a great tool for adding additional interactive content to an already written book. It's a lousy tool for writing content you want to also put elsewhere. It seems like most complaints come from the assumption that the writer will be using Author as their primary writing tool. That's not how to get the most out of Author.
- mikeash 15y ago
  People who misuse Author still deserve fair treatment.
  - batista 15y ago
    Yeah, and they still can get their text out of the program, and format it again in some other program. Nobody demands or will demand the literary rights of the content of people writing primarily in iBooks Author. Just that they don't use the output file of that program for selling it elsewhere.
    - mikeash 15y ago
      The license terms are not clear as to whether they lay claim to the output or to anything you create with the app, which would include the content if you use it as your word processor. Certainly a lot of people are giving them a charitable interpretation of it, but if that was their intent, I don't see why they didn't state it explicitly.

viscanti 15y ago

I agree. The demos all show text being imported from some other text file (likely whatever the writer has already written to distribute elsewhere). Then Author is just used to add an additional level of interactivity for iBook distribution. A writer could write their whole book in Author, but that's misusing the tool. Author is a great tool for adding additional interactive content to an already written book. It's a lousy tool for writing content you want to also put elsewhere. It seems like most complaints come from the assumption that the writer will be using Author as their primary writing tool. That's not how to get the most out of Author.

mikeash 15y ago
People who misuse Author still deserve fair treatment.
- batista 15y ago
  Yeah, and they still can get their text out of the program, and format it again in some other program. Nobody demands or will demand the literary rights of the content of people writing primarily in iBooks Author. Just that they don't use the output file of that program for selling it elsewhere.
  - mikeash 15y ago
    The license terms are not clear as to whether they lay claim to the output or to anything you create with the app, which would include the content if you use it as your word processor. Certainly a lot of people are giving them a charitable interpretation of it, but if that was their intent, I don't see why they didn't state it explicitly.