In all fairness, he has said it is targeted to absolute begginers who probably wouldn't be as good at finding the information as the webmasters here are. If he was selling it as a get rich book, I would have had a different reaction but everyone has to start somewhere and it seems to be credible for learning the basics in one place
I think you can say that about most non-fiction books these days, it's certainly not limited to AdSense and realted topics. You'd be surprised at how many people find it difficult to find credible information on the web without having to wade through screenful after screenful of spammy results. Some people just don't have the time to go looking, they want it all together in one convenient place. Some people just want a physical book they can read. Some people want well-edited content. Etc. etc. I don't see books dying out, even with all the free information available on the Web. Some publishers even put the entire content of a book up on the Web and still manage to sell printed versions of it! This whole area is evolving a lot. Back to my book, I don't claim to have any "secrets", and I state it quite clearly in the introduction: Please understand that there are no secrets in this book: Like many things, everything discussed here is already described somewhere on the Web -- you just have to find it and understand it. Not only do I save you the hassle of finding the material, I also make sure you understand it. That's the primary value of this book. I've gotten some really nice letters from readers who found the book really valuable, so I know I'm not off the mark with this...
Yeah one wonders how much easier it would be for novices to find information if it was not hidden behind all the people trying to sell them access to that same free information. Seems like a self-fullfilling prophecy. kind of like driving around your neighborhood and disconnecting everyone's water main and then bringing a water truck through town an hour later.
Except for authors like Eric don't drive around your hood and disconnect your water (hide the info already publicly available but dispersed around the Net). Don't see anything wrong with someone making a buck based on summarizing their knowledge into one place such as an ebook and charging $$ for the work they've done.
No, a better analogy would be having dozens of trucks circling the neighborhood, some with water, some empty, some with other liquids But that's really a different debate... all I'll say is that finding information is only truly free if you place no value on your time.
Ok , if you are targetting new users, or people without alot if time (don(t know why they bother making websites then..) , one could buy the book
Sure if you want to read sift through all the crap posts. Then you have to figure out what is BS and what works. This book is for the people who are just starting out. I bought this book (Amazon) for my parents to read and within a month my Mom had her first website..... with adsense on it. My mother is not tech savy at all and the book taught her most everything she needed to know. I remember her only asking a few questions which is why I bought the book in the first place. For the $20 I spent on the book.... Eric saved me a lot of explaining. Well worth it.
I think a lot of older people find the Internet an intimidating place. They use it, but they don't necessarily understand how it works. For them, these kind of books are truly valuable. If you go to the bookstore these days, you'll even see that there are computer books specifically geared at senior citizens. It's great to hear stories like that about the book. Please tell your mother I'm happy she found the book helpful. Sometimes I'm even surprised with what people do -- I gave a copy to one of my friends for him to read, but his 13-year old daughter grabbed it off his hands and read it instead, because she wanted to know how to setup a website. I don't think the AdSense-specific parts of the book interested her that much!
Now, that's a review! I might even buy it myself. There's no doubt about it that there are lots of spammy sites out there promising the earth and selling promises, however, I'm already convinced this isn't the case with this book. Finding decent, accurate information on the internet can use up a lot of time and energy and can also be very discouraging with all the blind alleys a person has to deal with. Kudos, Eric, for putting the book together and for taking the time to answer questions here. I wish you well, and hope you continue posting. <edited to add>ISBN: 0321321146 in case anyone's looking for it
When you look at these Adsense books targeting newbies, they make a lot more sense. Maybe I'll write one.
Haven't read any of the others, so I can't comment on whether or not they target newbies. I've already had readers request a more advanced book, but I haven't quite recovered from writing the first one! (Book writing is not easy, trust me...) Mostly I tell them to read my blog, I put a lot of good content up there.
Now why didn't I think of that, it would have made writing the book much easier Someone I know just finished building a site with that system, though, so I'll have to ask them how it worked for them. Me, I just tell people about Nvu (open source, see http://www.nvu.com), I'm not promoting a system or anything.
Never used NVU personally. From my 20 second glance at the url you posted, I guess it's an HTML editor?
Heh, to go back to one of your earlier analogies, Site Build It would be one of those trucks with some liquid other than water.
Yes, although they call it a "web authoring environment". Basically it's a nice HTML editor that supports cascading style sheets (CSS), which is a big big plus for me. Makes it pretty easy for novices to build web pages and to publish them up to their site via the built-in FTP support. For someone who's just experimenting, a free tool with those features is a great way to get started.
There's most definitely a market for beginner web books...many people don't even know how to really search for free information online, let alone start their own website. I hope Eric will visit the DP boards more often and share some of his experiences. It's always good to have new posters chiming in.
Yes, people may be surprised, but how else do you explain books devoted solely to using Google, let alone making money with Google. Like I always say, one person's paté is another person's Spam. (Sorry, Hormel!) I'm happy to be here. The problem is keeping track of all these different forums! I do mention the Digital Point AdSense sandbox tool in the book, BTW.