Internet Publishing:

The tools of the trade.  What you really need and what you really don't need.

by Rick Carbone

Getting published on the Internet is the easy part.  Securing your published product is another story.  The Internet is a wonder to me.  It's vast and it seems to have an endless supply of exactly everything you want or need.

eBook Security:

If you have been on the Internet for more than five years you know that technology changes at the speed of light and that what you thought was state of the art yesterday is out of date today.  At this rate anything that you buy could potentially be obsolete tomorrow.  Yes and no.  I have written a number of ebooks that I have sold on the Internet and when I first started using Adobe Acrobat to create the .pdf file was the standard.  Unfortunately the bad part of the Internet creeps in.  Hackers and thieves can download your eBook and distribute it before you have had your morning coffee or tea.

It's not a very pleasant time when you check your log files and find that your eBook has been downloaded 200 times overnight but your merchant account balance registers $0.  I've had this sort of thing happen to me and it's frustrating as hell. 

There is a remedy and you can choose how you will address it.  If you are publishing an information product then please pay strict attention to the next few lines as it will enhance your selling experience. 

The simplest way to publish an ebook is to convert your word processing document into a .pdf format.  This is the standard Internet format to share information across all protocols and document types.  In short it is universal and even if you don't have the Adobe Acrobat 7.0 Standard software you can still create pdf format files for free on the Adobe site (Adobe will allow up to five conversions.)

The only issue with this is that even though you can encrypt your eBook and password protect it, it will not work for wider distribution because it is only encrypted with one user name and password.  It wouldn't be very secure if you gave the same user name and password to everyone.  Adobe Acrobat is the industry standard and it pays to understand and know how to use it to your advantage.  One way to understand the total dynamic of Acrobat is to have hands on training.  One of the best sources of training for Adobe products is online at Total Training.  Try it out:  Acrobat 7 Training Online from Total Training.  I use it regularly as a refresher for all of my Adobe products.

Up until most recently the only way you had to protect your publication was to purchase specific ebook software with an .exe extension.  Each eBook is issued a specific password and user name that you supply when someone pays for the ebook. There are several brands that can effect this type of security.  They operate similar to a web site in that they are written in a language similar to html.  

You don't need to know how to program in html to use these products however they are a little bit more complicated to use than writing in a word processor and then converting the doc into a .pdf.  Though they may be a little more complicated than word processing software they make up for in total security management.  They have the ability to issue customer specific id numbers mange the id numbers and if the customer requests a refund you can disable the software when you refund them the money.  This cuts down considerably on any type of fraudulent activity what I would call buyers remorse fraud.

(Buyers Remorse Fraud is when an individual purchases your product knowing that they will download it and use it after they have requested a refund.  Most Online small businesses are forced into offering unconditional refunds on their products to remain competitive.  Unfortunately unless you have a way of disabling your software or eBook you are stuck and hope that most of your customers are honest.)

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