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Sean's Picks of the Week (1113-1117) - Get Your GURPS Week!
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<blockquote data-quote="prosfilaes" data-source="post: 7729570" data-attributes="member: 40166"><p>The Wayback machine says the e23 website first appeared in August 2003*, which said they were working on it, and finally came to life in March 2005**. RPGNow started in 2001 and and DriveThruRPG in 2004. Compared to other major print publishers, the first White Wolf books were out on DriveThruRPG in April of 2004, Palladium started releasing PDFs in 2013, and I can't find the entire history of WotC PDFs, but IIRC, they started in 2006-2007, they stopped in 2009 and started again in 2013. So, no, I don't think they were late-adopters. </p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>When DriveThruRPG first became a thing, they already had plans for a website for RPG PDFs. </p><p></p><p> </p><p></p><p>Within a few days of opening E23, they had 50 GURPS books available through it. By 2007, they had 120 GURPS books and 40 Car Wars books. That seems like a reasonable rate of PDF release. They've pretty much posted their backlog without licensing complications (and some with); if they haven't been posting more PDF books for 4th Edition, it's because 4th Edition GURPS isn't selling well enough to pay people to write for it.</p><p></p><p>"Lower prices" is not a form of promotion. Sales are, but that requires other forms of promotion. And optimal pricing is hard; selling 1 copy at $8 is more profitable than 3 copies at $2, and GURPS may not get the spontaneous sells at a low price that the Pathfinder name can get.</p><p></p><p>Paizo doesn't produce PDF-only works, besides Society adventures. Steve Jackson Games produces most of its RPG releases (plus its magazine Pyramid) as PDF-only releases. I'd say they see PDF as the primary format for GURPS.</p><p></p><p>* <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20030814005617/http://e23.sjgames.com:80/" target="_blank">http://web.archive.org/web/20030814005617/http://e23.sjgames.com:80/</a> </p><p>** <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20050303173024/http://e23.sjgames.com:80/" target="_blank">http://web.archive.org/web/20050303173024/http://e23.sjgames.com:80/</a></p><p>*** <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20070425184716/http://e23.sjgames.com:80/browse.html" target="_blank">http://web.archive.org/web/20070425184716/http://e23.sjgames.com:80/browse.html</a></p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="prosfilaes, post: 7729570, member: 40166"] The Wayback machine says the e23 website first appeared in August 2003*, which said they were working on it, and finally came to life in March 2005**. RPGNow started in 2001 and and DriveThruRPG in 2004. Compared to other major print publishers, the first White Wolf books were out on DriveThruRPG in April of 2004, Palladium started releasing PDFs in 2013, and I can't find the entire history of WotC PDFs, but IIRC, they started in 2006-2007, they stopped in 2009 and started again in 2013. So, no, I don't think they were late-adopters. When DriveThruRPG first became a thing, they already had plans for a website for RPG PDFs. Within a few days of opening E23, they had 50 GURPS books available through it. By 2007, they had 120 GURPS books and 40 Car Wars books. That seems like a reasonable rate of PDF release. They've pretty much posted their backlog without licensing complications (and some with); if they haven't been posting more PDF books for 4th Edition, it's because 4th Edition GURPS isn't selling well enough to pay people to write for it. "Lower prices" is not a form of promotion. Sales are, but that requires other forms of promotion. And optimal pricing is hard; selling 1 copy at $8 is more profitable than 3 copies at $2, and GURPS may not get the spontaneous sells at a low price that the Pathfinder name can get. Paizo doesn't produce PDF-only works, besides Society adventures. Steve Jackson Games produces most of its RPG releases (plus its magazine Pyramid) as PDF-only releases. I'd say they see PDF as the primary format for GURPS. * [URL]http://web.archive.org/web/20030814005617/http://e23.sjgames.com:80/[/URL] ** [URL]http://web.archive.org/web/20050303173024/http://e23.sjgames.com:80/[/URL] *** [URL]http://web.archive.org/web/20070425184716/http://e23.sjgames.com:80/browse.html[/URL] [/QUOTE]
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