Please Proceed, Governor

[chris_gerrib]

Some people feel compelled to slow down and gawk at car accidents on the highway. I feel compelled to point out stupidity on the Internet.

We are told that the Sad Puppy-related boycott of Tor Books has had a "six figure impact" on Tor sales. Tor is a unit of Macmillan, which is owned by Holtzbrinck, a German conglomerate. Per the later's web page, Macmillan's revenue last year was 721 million Euros. As of this writing, that's 793 million dollars.

Six figures is a rounding error to Macmillan. Somehow I doubt the good folks at Macmillan are spending a lot of time on this.

(Feel free to confirm all of the above via your favorite search engine. I've got bigger fish to fry.)

ETA 7/11/15: from Jason Sanford absolutely no detectable effect on Tor sales.

Comments

[baron-waste.livejournal.com]

I've got bigger fish to fry

That sounds like, “I can't be bothered to see if it's really true” - which is Bad Science.  I doubt that Tor Books will go the way of, say, Air America, but the same mechanism is at work:  We don't want what you're selling.

If any sort of sales slump occurs, six figure or no, it ought to attract their attention - and their response will be significant, may indeed be the entire point of the exercise.  Who run Bartertown?

[chris-gerrib.livejournal.com]

No, it's a statement that if you type Holtzbrinck into your web page the following link comes up: http://www.holtzbrinck.com/

And if you scroll down a bit on that you get all the Macmillan information you need. Regarding the financial impact of the boycott, File770 has been all over it like white on rice.

In short, I think you're indulging in a bit of sealioning (http://wondermark.com/1k62/).

[baron-waste.livejournal.com]

No, I wasn't, but that's seriously funny - thank you.

Amazing how often that guy manages to put his finger right on it.

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

Furthermore, if that "six figure impact" figure comes from Puppies, I wouldn't take it too seriously. Puppies tend to be ...optimistic... about their importance to the rest of the world.