For Tunglið, how you publish is as important as what you publish. Named after the Icelandic word for the moon, the tiny publisher prints its books in batches of 69 on the night of a full moon. So far, so weird. But keen readers must also buy their books that same night, as the publisher burns all unsold copies. Weirder still.
Why? While most books can survive centuries or even millennia, Tunglið – as its two employees tell me – “uses all the energy of publishing to fully charge a few hours instead of spreading it out over centuries … For one glorious evening, the book and its author are fully alive. And then, the morning after, everyone can get on with their lives.”
Here is the full story, and here is background information on durable good monopoly and the returns to rendering output less durable, as a means of precommitting to not lowering the price in later periods. Avoid remainders, in other words, so customers will buy it now. Guess who first came up with those insights?
Adam Smith wrote it in Das Kapital, his 500 page proposal to implement a global tax on success.
” For one glorious evening, the book and its author are fully alive. And then, the morning after, everyone can get on with their lives.”
It’s television in printed form.
Or radio.
Television has good movie shows but the mooing in films is where the fun lays flat. Television is strong work if you have the stomach for it but the teleplay is usally why they edit so much. Movie films are okay if you watch them over and over again but the short story is key to the victory parade.
Where did the founding fathers get the idea to write it down?
It is Stuff White People Like turned all the way up to eleven. On steroids. On the steroids steroids would take if they wanted to be buff.
If someone wants to make publishing performance art, by all means, they should do so. But it is absurd to think that buying a book by the full moon makes you more alive than reading it peacefully in your own chair in front of a warm fire just after DHL delivered it from Amazon. It is book buying for rich upper middle class virtue signallers who don’t read books.
‘It is book buying for rich upper middle class virtue signallers who don’t read books.’
You really cannot wrap your mind around the idea that the rest of the world is not like the U.S., can you?
Wrap your mind around the fact that you’re a cuck. Although do is SMFS.
Italo Cavino says “hi pie”
I give up: who first came up with them there insights?
Or radio well never get old.
The most likely reference is probably to Adam Smith discussing how candlemakers would, if they could, regulate the Sun, to decrease the quantity of daytime and increase the special nature of candlemakers. Second most likely : I am not certain, but I would guess maybe Keynes and a comment about (I have changed the comment) digging up gold, exhibiting it for a day, trading it for another day, and then reburying it in an unknown place, as a way to make the island economy larger. Economics history is, in its way, fascinating, but if you only dip into it every few decades or so you notice that credit for being the first to say something is always bouncing around.
Can you provide a reference to that gold digging story? I’m interested.
“General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money” Chapter 10, Keynes. Fourth paragraph from the end.
HOratio will never get even.
Shakespear iteratation theory. That that that.
The better marketing strategy to prevent a secondary market of used books, would have been for the publisher to print “e-books” which are not transferable to other devices other than the first user, eliminating the risks of resale and the development of a secondary market, unless you sell your tablet. This does not prevent future price reductions, but the price in a later period may reflect its value as an old and less relevant book in a later period. This kind of segmentation and price discrimination maximizes total revenue and profit.
Even better marketing strategy is to not give the buyer the product at all but only rent access to it under tightly controlled conditions. The user can never stop paying for the product or he loses access to it. For examples of this, see Netflix, Spotify, etc.
Perhaps Thorstein Veblen? Idk
And how is this Coasean? Because the firm is only two men strong, and is hence only limited to production once a month?
Tyler – as you can see in the above comments, we’re pretty confused about your mention of Coase and your last question about who came up with this idea. Please help us mortals and clarify.