[The Practical Nomad Newsletter] "The Amazing Race", NPR inteview, and more

[Edward Hasbrouck]

"The Amazing Race 15" starts Sunday, 27 September 2009.
I'll have weekly commentary as usual (and CBS now has full-episode video 
online, for those who live in places where the show isn't broadcast).

Details (and an aside on netbooks):
http://hasbrouck.org/blog/archives/001722.html

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I was interviewed on NPR's "All Things Considered" last week. Not, as I 
would have preferred, about travel or about my books and other writing, 
but about the threat to writers' rights posed by the proposed "settlement" 
of copyright infringement lawsuits against Google for its unauthorized 
scanning and for-profit electronic republication of millions of books -- 
including "The Practical Nomad: How to Travel Around the World".

One English novelist even posted in his blog about how "there are 
thousands of really good books which are not getting written" because 
every author in the world had to spend last week deciding what to do about 
the proposed Google Books settlement.  By default, writers who did nothing 
would lose some of the rights to their books, but get no money.  So each 
of us had to decide whether to "opt out", object, and/or make a claim:

If you'd like to learn more, see the links and the white paper I prepared 
to help other writers understand the issue, or listen to an hour-long 
discussion I'll be part of on KQED's "Forum" on Tuesday morning, 8 
September 2009 (9-10 a.m. in San Francisco, noon-1 Eastern Time). KQED 
streams live on their Web site, and will post an mp3 after the broadcast:

Details of the KQED "Forum" program:
http://hasbrouck.org/blog/archives/001721.html

My interview on "All Things Considered":
http://hasbrouck.org/blog/archives/001715.html

Background:
http://hasbrouck.org/blog/archives/001703.html

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Turning to my books (what I'd really rather talk about, as I said), an e-
book of "The Practical Nomad: How to Travel Around the World" will be on 
sale later this month through Amazon.com for the Kindle e-book reader.

This is a bit of an experiment. Please let me know: If you pay to read 
"The Practical Nomad" on your Kindle or iPhone, how do you like it and 
what do you think is an appropriate price? Would you prefer to buy a PDF e-
book you could read on any device of your choice, and how much would you 
pay for that? Or would you prefer to read it "for free" on a Web site with 
advertising (bearing in mind that it would have to have lots of ads, 
conspicuous enough to get your attention, to generate as much revenue from 
each reader as the price of a license to an ad-free e-book)?

Details:
http://hasbrouck.org/blog/archives/001718.html

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In a previous newsletter, I wrote about the continuing saga of the attempt 
to get compensation from banks and credit card companies for the hidden 
fees they've charging for years on foreign currency transactions.  (Lately 
the fess have gotten higher and more widespread -- affecting transactions 
with "foreign" merchants, including foreign airlines airlines flying from 
the USA to other countries, even when the charges are in US dollars! -- 
but have become slightly better disclosed.  Unfair but no longer illegal.)

My arguments were given surprisingly serious consideration at the court 
hearing last month, despite the fact that I'm not a lawyer and  was going 
up against lawyers for Visa, Mastercard, etc.  who have hundreds of 
millions of dollars at stake (the lawyers who bought the suit are asking 
for $75 million for themselves).  The judge asked me for more evidence 
about whether the "typical" American abroad was a short-term visitor, a 
long-term traveller, or an expatriate, which I've provided in a follow-up 
letter.  It turns out that private, civilian U.S. citizens living abroad 
outnumber short-term U.S.travellers abroad by at least 4 to 1.

Details:
http://hasbrouck.org/blog/archives/001714.html

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As usual, there's more in my blog. Hope you've had a good summer (or 
winter Down Under), and haven't stopped travelling now, when airfares and 
hotel prices are falling with the end of high season in most of the world.

Bon voyage!

Edward Hasbrouck


----------------
Edward Hasbrouck
<edward at hasbrouck.org>
<http://hasbrouck.org>
+1-415-824-0214

"The Practical Nomad: How to Travel Around the World"
(4th edition 2007)
"The Practical Nomad Guide to the Online Travel Marketplace"
<http://www.practicalnomad.com>

Around-the-World and multi-stop international air tickets:
<http://hasbrouck.org/tickets/>