Has anyone tried selling RPGs as shareware?

[Paul Czege]

How the heck do I sell an .html file download by Paypal? Right now, I'm having people email me (no emails yet.) I'd like to be able to sell downloads directly like RPGnow, but I can't find any advice how to do it on the Paypal site.

Some webhosts (like Dreamhost) allow you to create password-protected folders. You could put your game in such a folder, and when you receive an order then provide the customer with a unique login/password allowing them to view/download the game.

Paul

[Palaskar]

Thanks Paul, but that doesn't strike me as any easier than just sending my RPG by email, as I'd have to change the password every time someone pays me.

[Ron Edwards]

Hello,

I'm a little puzzled. The Forge Bookshelf method seems perfectly capable of handling downloads of any file type, HTML in this case.

Palaskar, do you know how that service works? If not, I suggest contacting Clinton and learning more about it.

Best,
Ron

[Palaskar]

Thanks Ron. No, I don't know how the Forge Bookshelf works. Yes, I'll contact Clinton.

[Clay]

Palaskar,

While I highly recommend checking with Clinton, don't be fooled into thinking that a folder on a web site must be limited to a single password.  Every web server that I'm aware of allows multiple user names to access the same folder.  They get stored in a file with their associated password.  So instead of changing the password on the folder, whenever somebody buys a product you would create a user id for them and give that id a unique password.  Everybody else keeps their old password.

You can even keep multiple works in the same folder and allow access to individual works to only those people who have paid for that articular work.  That way somebody purchasing multiple works from you would receive a single password, and just be added to the groups for the works that they purchased.

Drop me a private line if you need tools that can do this for you.  It's quite simple really.