Free online promotes demand for print

Lawrence Lessig has a nice link to the story of the Human Sciences Research Council in South Africa which used to publish high quality research in print. They’ve changed their strategy. Now they’re giving away the research online, and then offering a high quality print-on-demand service. The result? A 300% increase in sales. Recently the Lexington Seminar did something similar, they placed a great new book’s chapters (Practical Wisdom) online in ‘pdf’ format for free. I hope that people will read a chapter or two, and come away convinced to invest in the whole print version of the book.