MobileRead Forums - View Single Post - Poll Says a Low-Priced Tablet Will Turn the Masses on to E-Reading

Worldwalker · 05-17-2010, 02:59 PM

I don't think that publishers are more likely to publish ebooks if, as has been suggested, they're turned into multimedia software packages that require elaborate hardware, such as tablet computers, than they are when all they need to do is turn some text into an epub file and buyers can read it on all sorts of devices. If they're not doing it now when the effort required is so low -- something the office summer intern could do -- why would they want to spend the hundreds of thousands of dollars required to create something like that DK program?

Also, given that there are hundreds of millions of computers that could run the software in my example, yet relatively few copies were actually sold (I believe DK dropped the whole line due to low sales/profits), it seems improbable that something of the kind would be profitable on the iPad. A few might sell for gimmick value, but when you think of the development costs, and Apple's significant cut of the sale price, the price would have to be higher and the market larger than they were for the PC version for the publisher to make a profit.

I really think, as I said, the focus needs to be on creating a better ebook -- decent typography, for example, would be a good start. Hell, not having it riddled with OCR errors would be a good start. Trying to turn books into websites doesn't make them into good books; it makes them into poor websites. Which, as you've probably noticed, we already have plenty of.

05-17-2010, 02:59 PM	#18
Worldwalker Curmudgeon Posts: 3,085 Karma: 722357 Join Date: Feb 2010 Device: PRS-505	I don't think that publishers are more likely to publish ebooks if, as has been suggested, they're turned into multimedia software packages that require elaborate hardware, such as tablet computers, than they are when all they need to do is turn some text into an epub file and buyers can read it on all sorts of devices. If they're not doing it now when the effort required is so low -- something the office summer intern could do -- why would they want to spend the hundreds of thousands of dollars required to create something like that DK program? Also, given that there are hundreds of millions of computers that could run the software in my example, yet relatively few copies were actually sold (I believe DK dropped the whole line due to low sales/profits), it seems improbable that something of the kind would be profitable on the iPad. A few might sell for gimmick value, but when you think of the development costs, and Apple's significant cut of the sale price, the price would have to be higher and the market larger than they were for the PC version for the publisher to make a profit. I really think, as I said, the focus needs to be on creating a better ebook -- decent typography, for example, would be a good start. Hell, not having it riddled with OCR errors would be a good start. Trying to turn books into websites doesn't make them into good books; it makes them into poor websites. Which, as you've probably noticed, we already have plenty of.