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06-11-2009, 11:22 AM | #16 |
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Err ... because they're dedicated professionals with decades of experience under their belt and a record for finding all those knockout books you like to read and helping their authors develop from ingenue to sophisticated story teller?
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06-11-2009, 11:29 AM | #17 | |
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There really is a significant difference in quality between an unedited manuscript and a finalized one. There are always exceptions to the rule, but I prefer the quality of a polished manuscript. Not that it doesn't sometimes backfire - I can think of a lot of big name authors where their work actually seems to decrease in quality, because they have enough clout and influence to reject editorial suggestions. |
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06-11-2009, 12:17 PM | #18 |
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I find myself agreeing with the article's authors on ebook pricing, much to my surprise. Certainly if the publishers fulfill their responsibilities, both to authors and to customers, there is justification for them getting their share of the profit.
However, it is amusing to note that one of the authors was from Random House Publishing Group. Random House recently floated their free ebook site http://www.suvudu.com/freelibrary/ and one of their first offerings was His Majesty's Dragon by Naomi Novik. I got a copy of the ebook and compared it to the paperback I already owned. I was more than surprised to discover that the quality of the editing/proofreading of the ebook was far below the print version with quite a few simple errors in the ebook that were not in the print copy. It is also interesting to look at the prices of another book in the series. The Throne of Jade, the second book in the series, is advertised at $7.99 on the Random House site for both paperback and ebook. The book is also available from Random House as an abridged audio download for $14.98 and unabridged audio download for $25.00. (Is it any surprise that Random House was one of the first publishers to disable TTS in their ebooks?) I paid $7.50 for the paperback at a bookstore, the paperback version is no longer available at Amazon except used but the ebook version sells for $6.39 and the hardbound version is $78.75 (The newest book in the series hardcover price is $16.50). Following the pricing guidelines proposed in the article the ebook version should be around $3.00-4.00 which seems more reasonable than the current ebook price if the editing/proofreading is up to snuff. It is worth mentioning that Random House Publishing Group is a firm supporter of DRM and has been diddling with author's royalties with respect to ebooks of late. I don't buy ebooks from them but I'll take free ones. Last edited by NormHart; 06-11-2009 at 12:29 PM. |
06-11-2009, 12:54 PM | #19 |
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I don't like DRM, but I'm learning to live with it. I'm more concerned with pricing, and while I'd love to see $2-3 as a regular price I'm perfectly willing to pay $5-8 for a novel. I think ebooks of books currently available in paperback should cost about the same (ideally a little less - but never more) as the mass market edition.
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06-11-2009, 12:59 PM | #20 | |
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So the profit of (author + publisher) is what, 5x higher? Maybe more? it has to be, we're comparing selling a digital good in a world where bandwidth is (almost) free and carriyng things all over the country in a truck. So like I’m cheap (and I still have good eyes) I usually buy soft backs (10E average), if I download an eBook for 2E on your publisher website, then you and your publisher are earning the same, maybe more, no ? Plus the "Google" point of view of that transaction: you just sold a book to me. No middleman, I just came to you. You can contact me (no spam please), you can infer my taste from anything else I did from you or you publisher or platform. That could have a value. Then, forgetting about all the things that went wrong in everything I stated above, (but I would really love to be corrected, because I tend to think that the dead tree related costs makes for 80% of the cost of an newspaper/book/magazine) if buying a ebook for 2E is a acceptable deal, then it looks your book is way cheaper than a pack of cigarettes, but hopefully everyone (author and publisher) get more. |
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06-11-2009, 01:08 PM | #21 | |
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When Baen promotes a new author, I pay attention. I don't love everything Baen publishes, but I know it'll be in a quality range I can enjoy, even if the book itself isn't to my taste. I don't want to scour a hundred potential author websites looking for new sci-fi talent. I read some romances... and again, I certainly don't want to search for those on my own. Harlequin rarely publishes anything I consider great, or even memorable--but almost all of their works fit in my "light entertainment for an afternoon" zone. Knowing they consistently provide content in that niche, saves me a lot of hunting time. I read Pagan religious books. I dislike much of what Llewellyn publishes; I don't touch their books unless a friend I trust recommends one in particular. OTOH, a lot of people do like their books. And I am willing to try Weiser or New Falcon from an interesting title--I know that their choices fit what I like to read. The problem's going to be the non-niche publishers, who'll need to figure out how to cater to *all* their types of readers. Right now, they're working more as distributors. While they do spend time (and money) finding new authors and guiding them through the process, the public doesn't see it, doesn't know how their selection process works... doesn't know how to recognize books by publisher, rather than by genre or keyword. A person might know she likes "murder mysteries in rural settings," but not realize that one publisher has an entire line of those. |
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06-11-2009, 01:25 PM | #22 | |
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Oh. I'd love to live in a world where the writer can just write and that would be the end of it. Cloistered away from the reading public with several layers of agents, publicists and marketing droids between me and the reader -- but that's just not how it is any longer (if it ever was). |
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06-11-2009, 01:42 PM | #23 | |
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In short, book-writing is a worse-than-ever means to a livelihood, and mass-market renown is disappearing as a concept, fractioning into a million niches. Ultimately the only good reason to write books remains what it probably always was: The compulsion to try to entertain, persuade or make meaning is irresistible, and the process absorbs you like nothing else. If it doesn't, there's no reason to bother. |
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06-11-2009, 03:37 PM | #24 | |
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In the ebook world, they compete with the illegal download. This is available quickly and conveniently from the time of release or shortly thereafter if the book has any popularity. This makes price much more important because convenience is no longer in the mix. Sure, some of us won't download illegal copies because it's against our ethics. I don't think that's a majority of people. They will need to offer a fair price and hopefully some other compelling benefits to keep people buying. Last edited by Alisa; 06-11-2009 at 03:56 PM. |
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06-11-2009, 03:39 PM | #25 |
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I'm all for lower priced ebooks but to tell the truth the publishing industry just isn't built for it yet and they will need to do some slimming down if its ever going to happen.
eBooks sales are growing at a crazy rate (170% or something like that) compared to the decline in book sales but the problem is that their is a much smaller base that eBooks are growing from compared to paperbacks. Paperbacks are still the lifeblood of a publishers income. The only reason why unknown authors can get published is because there are James Pattersons that are selling like crazy for prices not far above what a new author would sell for. Every book sale has to account for the risk not only of the book that you are buying but the book that you're not buying because the costs are mixed. It would make sense from a business standpoint to charge $50 for a James Patterson book because you know people want it and $0.50 for a new author because its not known how many people will want it or better yet why even print it at all. I think publishers are afraid to move ebook prices substantially lower than hardback and paperback books because it may dramatically shift consumer attitudes toward ebooks and people will buy them up in droves. How many people that never bought a book in their life are going to because an eBook is $5? Not many because they could probably get the same book used on amazon for $2 if they wanted to. The issue with the publishing market share between Hardcover, paperback and ebooks is that it is mainly based on cannibalization. The market for books is pretty much defined, there are people that read and people that don't. If you make ebooks much cheaper than paperback and hardcover books, there will not be a flood of new readers; old readers will shift from hardcovers to ebooks (more likely paperback to ebooks as people that buy hardcovers usually are more wedded to the format). That is a drastic drop in the profitability of the books being produced for a publisher. Therefore what a publisher would need to do is stop taking risks with new authors and stick with the homerun hits (established authors) but then that depletes your future revenue projections if an old author retires or moves to a different publisher. Publishers are going to have to really sit back and find a new way to rationalize their business model. They are still needed for promoting (most new authors are not going to have a couple ten or hundred thousand dollars to go on a promotion tour for their book, unless they plan on murdering someone on youtube it might be difficult for them to get mass appeal). How will the publisher be compensated for its risk on these authors if they aren't getting the same upside? The answer is they need to cut their bloated costs which will take time. It will be interesting to see how the whole thing develops and I foresee a lot of news on major publishers revamping their business structure as eBooks become more prominent (a few of them may end up going under if piracy can not be stymied as new readers and ways to read ebooks are debuted) but ultimately they will have to give consumers what they want at a reasonable price or similar to music and mp3s, people will find it elsewhere |
06-11-2009, 04:01 PM | #26 | |
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06-11-2009, 05:02 PM | #27 | |
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http://blogs.adobe.com/digitaleditio...sign-epub.html |
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06-11-2009, 05:41 PM | #28 | |
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Publishers still have a use and an important one because they have connections to get the word out to a mass audience which is still difficult. You can't google a new author if you've never heard of them and don't know that they are writing a book. The established players will be able to go independent more easily but in reality they probably wont want to deal with all of the hassle that's involved (opportunity cost of the amount of extra effort they need to put in vs what they will get from nixing the publishers probably isn't worth it, they could spend that time writing another book) |
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06-11-2009, 05:45 PM | #29 | |
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From my point of view a ebook with DRM is significantly less useful than a paper book so I am not willing to pay much for such a book. And I will not remove DRM since I am then showing that I support books with DRM by buying them. |
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06-11-2009, 05:49 PM | #30 | |
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