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Jason Down
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Publishing blog posts as an ebook at Smashwords

Is publishing an ebook through Smashwords allowed if the ebook consists of nothing more than blog posts you've originally written? For example, a collection of "Best of" posts with no extra material.

Reading their Terms of Service, in the Author's Warranties section, some points which collecting and publishing a collection of still up and publicly accessible blog posts may run afoul of:

9b. You further warrant that the Work contains no materials which:

  • [...]
  • contains advertisements for products or services, or is intended to act as an advertising or upselling vehicle for products or services
  • [...]
  • is an incomplete book for the purpose of promoting the purchase of the complete book elsewhere or on Smashwords. Books priced at FREE are held to this same standard.
  • [...]

9c. You further warrant the book meets the following standards for originality:

  • [...]
  • your books do not and will not appear elsewhere on the Internet authored by people other than yourself or by pen names (pseudonyms) different from your pen name at Smashwords;

9d. You further warrant the book represents a complete work:

  • [...]
  • the uploaded file is not a partial sample or sample chapter, or is not a collection of sample chapters, or not simply a catalog advertising other books or products
  • the work is complete and self-contained, and does not try to upsell the user to purchase, or register for, access to information that should have been contained in the book
  • the uploaded book represents a complete story with a beginning, middle and end. Exception: Serials are allowed. Each serial cover image should be different, even if the only difference is a notation on the cover image about the serial's position or episode number in the series. To avoid customer confusion, we recommend it should be clearly identified as a serial in the book description and the serial episodes should be linked together using the Smashwords Series Manager tool.

Given that a collection of blog posts are:

  • only selected articles from a blog, thus incomplete of the total blog archives
  • still available to read as you please
  • in itself is some kind of advertising for the blog
  • non-fiction and has no narrative

would such an ebook be publishable on Smashwords?