The First 30 Days of ProWebType

My book, Professional Web Typography, released to the world 30 days ago. It has been an intriguing experience to see the reaction from the web community, especially on Twitter, and to learn about the pay-what-you-want model. Although the book was never intended to be free, I even put a prominent buy button next to the read button, I noticed a handful of tweets refer to it as a free ebook.

To give you some perspective on the economics of the book in its 30 days, I have gathered some information from Google Analytics and PayPal. According to Analytics, there were 18,075 sessions, 11,578 users, and 50,399 pageviews. According to PayPal, out of 76 readers have supported the book, one paid $25, four paid $0.01, and everyone else paid in between.

As promised to keep the book up-to-date, I added two new chapters: “Using SVG as Type” and “Animating Type.” My goal is still to keep the book as succinct as possible.

One of the most requested additions to the online book is a PDF version. In fact a handful of supporters expected to get a download link after they made the payment. Although I initially had no plan to release any other format other than the web, I had made a PDF version for anyone who supports $7 or more for the book. Since I have been writing a personal email to thank anyone who had supported the book, it would not be too much work to attach a PDF copy.

Once again, thanks for all your support.