Jeff Wright:
...Not sure how charging a fair publishing price equates to 'not freely given?'
Most of "books" by Thai, Burmese, etc. teachers (e.g. Thanissaro Bhikkhu, Mahasi, Pandita, Silananda, PaAuk Sayadaw, etc.) and the classic texts (e.g. Visudhimagge) offered at no charge, most now available as PDF downloads.
Is there an expectation for them to ship it for free? :-)
Probably not, though I never gotten one via shipping. Printed books by Than-Geof are wherever someone who gets them from him offers them (e.g. he leaves them at IMC, Redwood City, as also Gil Fronsdal's 1st book was 'freely offered'); students of PaAuk get copies to distribute (I got some from Shaila Catherine), maybe paying the shipping themselves. Silananda's and some Mahasi & Pandita books are at the TMC monastery in San Jose, CA where he was abbot.
I'd imagine it's good, maybe required, to pay shipping for books themselves "freely offered".
And then again, these books are mostly small printings paid for by donations -- no administrative, no marketting overhead, etc. E.g TMC books and Taiwanese reprints of the Visudhimagga list a couple of pages of the donors -- almost all ca. $5-$100 small folks. It takes just a couple $k to print a couple thousand copies in places other than the rich countries.
