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Issue 49 |
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Printing Your Own II (By Nick May) OK - we've done the education bit - now lets think of it in terms of printing your own money.. Let's say you have "written" a book, one entirely and completely without educational merit (makes it more fun, what! And anyway, your sudents won't know the difference..) The problem in Japan is always distribution, so it would pay to have as many "teachers" involved in your little publishing con as possible - they are your distribution network. Say 5 teachers, all teaching at universities and all dibbing in some materal. Say they swore in rancid natto to use the book in all their uni. classes plus those hard-to-teach 3 to 5 kiddy-groups.. (and what do YOU do with them..?) Maybe 300 students in all and assume your tome has a life of five years. That's 5 teachers, times 5 years, times 300 books = 7500 books.. Say you have them printed for 250yen a copy - 1million 875 thousand yen.. Now say you sell them to your students at 1800yen, (mustn't be greedy!) but the bookshop (most universities order through bookshops chiz chiz) take 300yen so you only receive 1500yen.. That's 1500yen times 7500books = 11million 250 thousand yen.. Or a "profit" of 9, 375,000yen over 5 years, between 5 of you. That's 375,000yen per person per year.. Fewer "authors" means fewer "distributors" and less profit. Now of course there are other costs besides printing - the use of computer equipment for one, and storage. But there are other means of increasing your income as well - like paying your friends to use your book - (yes yes - I KNOW about the ethics, but feel the profit..) Every book you sell, even through a bookshop, generates a cool 1250yen after costs. You could afford to give teachers who use your book a hefty.. er.. "commission"! Flog a few more off through the local bookfair and bobs yer uncle guv.. Of course, you'd need a name.. Something international sounding but that reflects the nature of your little enterprise. So "Inter"? - "Inter", "Inter" something - but what? - wait a minute, "Inter.."- where's my thesaurus - ah yes - SCAM! INTERSCAM! Issue 49 |
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