It may seem Psychedelic, but it’s the Honour System, Folks
From time to time we get a friendly do-good note that goes something like this: “I don’t know if you realize this, but when I go to buy something in the ‘Money & Meaning’ Online Store, nothing is stopping me from getting the discounted price for members or book-buyers even though I’m not a member…you might want to do something about that.”
It’s never a hot email or anything like that, but the ‘creased forehead, waggy finger’ tone definitely comes through.
So here’s the ‘official’ explanation for the record…yes, it’s true. We are not policing who uses the discounted button versus the regular price button. For the most part (99% of the time) people use the appropriate button and only avail themselves of the savings for members or book-readers if they are those things. It’s the honour system.
Rationale? For the amount of abuse it gets, it isn’t worth it to me to police it. I have lots I want to do, to read, to write, to think, and feel and see and be and do…policing isn’t included anywhere in those things. So we don’t. Every once in a while a crackerjack team member may catch an occurrence, and if so, a polite email goes out (once) to give folks a chance to sort it.
But sometimes things can be just that simple. We just don’t worry about it. (This is similar to the conundrum of ‘how to make sure a PDF file of an ebook doesn’t get shared’ etc. )
Anyway, for the $30 or $50 or $100 savings the abusers enjoy in the short term, I figure their karma will run over their own dogma in the long, and that will be the that.
End of official story.
