Wednesday, April 7, 2010

Long Tail

This isn't about the usual "long tail" you hear about, but about something similar that for some reason I find amusing - having just received a check for $39.78.

Back in 1998-99 I wrote a book on a VPN networking protocol called L2TP (Layer-2 Tunneling Protocol). I had written (in C/C++) our L2TP (as well as PPTP and L2F) implementations at my first startup, New Oak Communications, and then had gotten involved in the IETF process around the standardization of L2TP.

I wasn't looking to write a book, but based on some I-D's I had written on extensions to the base L2TP at the time, I was contacted by an editor in an email and asked if I'd think about writing a book. I had no delusions this would be a best seller, and said yes expecting (correctly) that it wouldn't really pay back in money for the time I spent on it, and that it would be a useful experience.

This makes me think of the long tail in two ways. First, this is obviously a niche subject. I wrote it for the audience of software developers who would be implementing the L2TP protocol, and secondarily for those that might be involved in the network planning around deploying its use. Yeah, there's gonna be a lot of those.

Honestly, I completely forget I even wrote a book unless one of two things happen. First, someone says (for some random reason) something about "your book" to me. It usually takes me a good 5 seconds to know what they're even talking about. Second, twice a year when I get the royalty statement. I say "statement" because it only becomes a royalty "check" when it accrues > $25 due to me.

So that's the second, and most significant, way it seems like a "long tail" to me. Because a full 11 years later the royalty stuff still dribbles in on this seriously niche-subject book. I wonder how much longer the poor publisher will need to keep sending me these statements.

It's most interesting to me just to see that 11 copies sold the second half of 2009. It must've been the holiday season. I'm really surprised it is more than zero at this point.

It's sold 4046 copies over these 11 years (technically only 10.5 so far), which is pretty cool. All in all it was worth the experience. The most surreal thing was one day years ago coming home to a small package that came in the mail from the publisher that contained a few copies of the Japanese translation. That was worth it just for the joke from my mother that she understood about as much of it as the original in English.

The thing I'm happiest about is the positive reviews on Amazon that it got. That's what I was most worried about back then, having direct access, and for all to see, to someone's potential negative take on something that I put some real effort into. That was a new thing back then, and it was scary.

Anyway, whenever this statement comes it just makes me chuckle. I was pretty sure I wouldn't break the $25 threshold again and get a check. I've got to imagine though that this one really will be the last one.

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