11 ms·
I am inclined to disbelieve you. I could agree that tech writing in general doesn't pay well, but this is an author who has sold over 150,000 physical copies,
by ipsin 11y ago
I am inclined to disbelieve you.
I could agree that tech writing in general doesn't pay well, but this is an author who has sold over 150,000 physical copies, in addition to whatever virtual sales (like mine) he's had. Even if his take is 10% for a $30 book, that's still respectable income.
- InclinedPlane 11y agoI had no idea where you came up with the "150,000 copies" figure but then I ended up seeing the same thing listed on a page about "More Effective C++", which has been in print for 2 decades. Even if he received $3-4 per copy sold for all those books, that's over a 20 year timespan, that only works out to $20k or so a year, although he does have other books. It's possible that Scott Meyers might be a sufficiently popular author to be able to support himself just on book income at a level comparable to having a decent day job, but at best it's a very close thing and even so he would be one of the extremely rare few who could do so.