Quote:
Originally Posted by LDBoblo
Just a bit of a thinking exercise.
Ebooks are currently at a state where they are quite primitive and significantly inferior quality-wise to their paper counterparts. The degree of work that is normally involved in finishing a book seems to largely be omitted in ebooks.
Of course, the ebook market itself is also quite underdeveloped, and will probably mature a little bit.
As the market matures and a digital model is developed, will the product quality rise to that of physical books, or will quality remain where it is, with previously important jobs and associated costs getting cut as a means of bringing price down (or profit up)?
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At the beginning of "personal" (mainstream) computers you had companies like Apple, concentrating on quality, and IBM that thought that there was no demand for a "PC" (they produced an underpowered computer with a "chiclet" keyboard.
Now you have companies like
Baen Books producing high quality books (some free) and others that seem to get their $14.99 books off a pirate website, scanned in at 200dpi.
Some publishers resent the very notion of ebooks and want them to go away. Others see the future.
Things in general will get better.
"There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home." Ken Olson, president/founder of Digital Equipment Corporation, 1977.