Canon Fodder

Last week, online used book retailer Alibris announced a new program called Alibris Basic targeting "small and moderate booksellers," i.e. non-professionals. The program appears to differ from Alibris' main offering in terms of pricing:You can list up to 1,000 items for sale, and you only pay $1 plus a small commission for each one that you sell. If you don't sell anything, you don't pay anything except the annual subscription charge of $19.99.This compares to the flat monthly fee (plus commissions) that larger scale booksellers are required to pay. For folks who have a lot of collectible books, the Alibris program is probably worth checking out, as the site specializes in this sort of inventory. As much as Alibris would like people to list all of their books for sale, however, there are better options for readers who are looking to unload their old non-collectible books.Amazon lets you very easily list your books for sale in just a couple of steps through their "Sell Your Stuff" page. Amazon charges 99 cents plus a 15% commission on the books you sell. The main upside of going with Amazon, as I see it, is that it probably has the widest reach of all the bookselling programs out there.Still, creating and managing listings for dozens of different books can be time consuming, and one must also deal with shipping off books that get sold to various individual buyers. If this sounds like a pain, then Barnes & Noble's book buying program might be a better bet. You need only enter the book's ISBN to get started. B&N will tell you if it's buying that title and how much it'll pay. After you've entered your books into the system, you print out an invoice and shipping label that allows you to send the books off to B&N for free. A few weeks later you get a check in the mail. I've tried B&N's program, and I found it remarkably simple. You may not be getting the best price for your books, but it's a lot easier than the other options. The main drawback I found is that B&N is somewhat limited in the books it is willing to buy. Textbooks are the best bet, and it's a good way to try to unload any older ones you might have lying around.Beyond the above programs, there's always eBay, which in the realm of non-collectible books is more trouble than it's worth (though I have had luck putting up a few dozen books at once, charging $1 a piece to start, and cross-promoting across all my other listings as a "$1 book sale.") And then there's the local used book shop. Buying policies at these stores vary greatly, but some pay well - and often much better if you're willing to get paid in store credit. Of course, these "trade in" policies are how many of us ended up with such big collections of books in the first place.Feel free to share any basement bookselling tips in the comments.

A nice rememberance of Hunter S. Thompson by his friend Paul Theroux in The Guardian.William T. Vollmann's substantial look at Pol Pot: Anatomy of a Nightmare by Phillip Short in the NY Times.Deborah Solomon sits down for a long chat with Jonathan Safran Foer which reveals this: "he received a $500,000 advance for his first novel and a $1 million advance for his second, meaning that he is probably the highest-earning literary novelist under 30."

At the Freakonomics Blog, Steven Levitt explains how the publishing industry is putting out more bullshit than ever these days.

In the world of Google, we are all aware of our doppelgangers. These people share our names, but we never meet them except to rub elbows in search engine results. In pre-Internet days, however, fewer of us felt the odd sensation of sharing your identity with another person. In order for this to happen, you either needed serendipity or a very common name, or you needed to share a name with someone notable.My parents aren't big football fans so when they named me, they had no way of knowing that the name they gave me was effectively identical to the man who scored the first touchdown in the first Super Bowl.Max McGee was a tight end for the Green Bay Packers, and it didn't seem to matter to football fans that our names are off by a letter (like me, he also went by his middle name). My whole life, people, upon hearing my name have asked me if I knew about him. It wasn't long before I knew by heart the story of that first Super Bowl. I'll let Wikipedia recount it:In his final two seasons, injuries and age had considerably reduced his production and playing time. Ironically, these two seasons would be the ones for which his career is best remembered. In the 1966 season, McGee caught only four passes for 91 yards and a touchdown as the Packers recorded a 12-2 record and advanced to Super Bowl I against the Kansas City Chiefs. Because McGee didn't expect to play in the game, he violated his team's curfew policy and spent the night before the Super Bowl out on the town. The next morning, he told starting receiver Boyd Dowler, "I hope you don't get hurt. I'm not in very good shape."However, Dowler went down with a separated shoulder on the Packers' second drive of the game, and McGee, who had to borrow a teammate's helmet because he had not even brought his own out of the locker room, found himself thrust into the lineup. A few plays later, McGee made a one-handed reception of a pass from Bart Starr, took off past Chiefs defender Fred Williamson and ran 37 yards to score the first touchdown in Super Bowl history. By the end of the game, McGee had recorded seven receptions for 138 yards and two touchdowns, assisting Green Bay to a 35-10 victory.I bring this up because I've just heard the news that McGee died at the age of 75. Tragically, it happened following a fall from his roof, where he'd been clearing leaves. Since I've talked about McGee with people regularly for my whole life, it seemed strange not to mention his passing. I suspect people will still note the name we (almost) share, but probably less and less as his gridiron feats recede into history.