July AUTHOR EARNINGS report brings focus on DRM

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Your friend could solve his problem by just throwing books away when he is done with them. It would come to the same thing, and be cheaper by the cost of an ereader.

Of course, there is still:

Throw away (almost) new books?
Rather wasteful...

He used to buy, read, donate.
Stockpiling was not his thing.
Donating meant the library would either put them into circulation or sell them, but either way they'd get reread.

Both my (non-price sensitive) friend and my (price sensitive) cousin were getting their books back into circulation for others to read. I find no fault with either. Neither finds the cost of a reader an issue (and they come from very different worlds--my cousin, a suburban housewife with two kids and the friend, a single, mover-shaker who routinely dines with congressmen and governors in multiple states--yet both are very into SF&F.

As I said, it takes all kinds...
...yet all kinds find value in the same things, though not for the same reasons.

To a lot of prople a book is just a (hopefully) good read, not an object of veneration or special snowflake and neither labels nor provenance worry them overmuch.

[BearMountainBooks]

Originally Posted by Josieb1

I have a kindle, and Kobo and a Nook. I buy my books from small independent publishers. I am lucky that as I read genre fiction I have loads of direct publishers to buy from, at my last count it was about 16. By choice I will not buy DRM books, only Amazon, Kobo and Nook use DRM in my world. I need every book I buy to be available on ePub and mobi. Most publishers give me both versions, for those that don't I use calibre to convert the version I buy (usually mobi) to the other version.

If I couldn't do that I wouldn't have multiple ereaders and I would buy a fraction of my books. I hate DRM with a passion, it's never good for the reader.

So, in that case, if you wanted to buy from an indie, would you buy direct from her website? Or even look there if you were concerned about DRM being on the other versions?

[Josieb1]

Originally Posted by BearMountainBooks

So, in that case, if you wanted to buy from an indie, would you buy direct from her website? Or even look there if you were concerned about DRM being on the other versions?

Most of the books I buy come from individual publishers, such as Samhain, Loose ID, Dreamspinner Press, or from the genres version of Amazon, AllRomance. Any books self published tend to end up on AllRomance as well as Amazon, Smashwords etc so I don't buy direct from the authors web sites as that's not usually an option.

I avoid Amazon if the book is available anywhere else.

[BearMountainBooks]

Originally Posted by Josieb1

Most of the books I buy come from individual publishers, such as Samhain, Loose ID, Dreamspinner Press, or from the genres version of Amazon, AllRomance. Any books self published tend to end up on AllRomance as well as Amazon, Smashwords etc so I don't buy direct from the authors web sites as that's not usually an option.

I avoid Amazon if the book is available anywhere else.

Rats. I've been thinking of pulling my books from AllRomance as they don't do particularly well there (mine are all one flames and that could be it. They do a good job offering advertising in a range of prices though.)

There's another venue I wanted to try, but being on both would be a bit more difficult to manage.

Thanks for the input. Appreciate it.

[Josieb1]

Originally Posted by BearMountainBooks

Rats. I've been thinking of pulling my books from AllRomance as they don't do particularly well there (mine are all one flames and that could be it. They do a good job offering advertising in a range of prices though.)

There's another venue I wanted to try, but being on both would be a bit more difficult to manage.

Thanks for the input. Appreciate it.

I'm friends with quite a few authors and even though I avoid Amazon it's still their most important seller, and vital for self publishing. They get more money from direct publisher sales (I.e Dreamspinner, Samhain etc) per book but they shift more books via Amazon compared to any other seller.

[BearMountainBooks]

Originally Posted by Josieb1

I'm friends with quite a few authors and even though I avoid Amazon it's still their most important seller, and vital for self publishing. They get more money from direct publisher sales (I.e Dreamspinner, Samhain etc) per book but they shift more books via Amazon compared to any other seller.

This is generally true for me as well, although some months I sell almost as many copies total over at Kobo (different mix of what sells, but on a per copy count). Kobo has even beaten out Amazon at least one month. But I don't think going without Amazon is a viable plan.

I don't sell a lot on AllRomance so I'd been thinking of trying another channel. I like their CS and they run deals that my books qualify for and so on. But not all my books are romance and generally speaking romance is a subplot for my books so I thought they might do better on a different platform. Right now I use AllRomance to push the titles to Apple and that hasn't worked well for me, but it's all or nothing--I either push all of them via AllRomance or none and it's not easy to switch on and off...bother.

Well, it's interesting input and by that I mean your personal experiences as well as the topic of someone buying based on DRM. Thanks.

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

Throw away (almost) new books?
Rather wasteful...

He used to buy, read, donate.
Stockpiling was not his thing.
Donating meant the library would either put them into circulation or sell them, but either way they'd get reread.

Both my (non-price sensitive) friend and my (price sensitive) cousin were getting their books back into circulation for others to read. I find no fault with either. Neither finds the cost of a reader an issue (and they come from very different worlds--my cousin, a suburban housewife with two kids and the friend, a single, mover-shaker who routinely dines with congressmen and governors in multiple states--yet both are very into SF&F.

As I said, it takes all kinds...
...yet all kinds find value in the same things, though not for the same reasons.

To a lot of prople a book is just a (hopefully) good read, not an object of veneration or special snowflake and neither labels nor provenance worry them overmuch.

I agree it is quite wasteful. Which is why I was surprised to hear a "solution" that involved buying the digital version, which is just as wastefully "thrown away" in the sense that only the original purchaser can read it, and that person has the intent never to read it again.

If I didn't reread books, I would make sure to use a format that allowed me to pass them on.

[crossi]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

I agree it is quite wasteful. Which is why I was surprised to hear a "solution" that involved buying the digital version, which is just as wastefully "thrown away" in the sense that only the original purchaser can read it, and that person has the intent never to read it again.

If I didn't reread books, I would make sure to use a format that allowed me to pass them on.

Sounds like kleezex. Use once then toss.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

I agree it is quite wasteful. Which is why I was surprised to hear a "solution" that involved buying the digital version, which is just as wastefully "thrown away" in the sense that only the original purchaser can read it, and that person has the intent never to read it again.

If I didn't reread books, I would make sure to use a format that allowed me to pass them on.

Meh.
All he ever wanted was to read them once, not accumulate clutter.
The ebooks are cheaper, clutter-free, and no trees had to die.
And he gets them anywhere.

As I said, to each their own.

[speakingtohe]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Your friend could solve his problem by just throwing books away when he is done with them. It would come to the same thing, and be cheaper by the cost of an ereader.

Of course, there is still:

Many people feel guilty throwing away a book. I know I have never been able to do it. There is nothing wrong with it, any more than throwing away any other item that is still useful to someone, but I think it is slightly harder for me with a book. Luckily there are thrift stores close by.

Helen

[speakingtohe]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

I agree it is quite wasteful. Which is why I was surprised to hear a "solution" that involved buying the digital version, which is just as wastefully "thrown away" in the sense that only the original purchaser can read it, and that person has the intent never to read it again.

If I didn't reread books, I would make sure to use a format that allowed me to pass them on.

Does not compute for me. What exactly are you wasting that is not wasted on any single use purchase? Food, Kleenex, utilities etc., you only get to use once, you can't even re-eat. And of the things that can be passed on, with or without reusing, how many are? Not talking about you here, but a lot of people wear an item of clothing once and it sits in the closet, till the closet bulges and into the trash.

I buy a book because I want to read it. No other reason. Lending it, donating it or other ways passing it on only became a factor when it was taking up space I needed. I never went into a store, looked at a book, and said to myself, bet I could lend, sell, trade that book pretty easily.

I do lend my reader(s) to people very occasionally so they can legally read the book, but this is because I am enthusiastic about ebooks and am lending it to them for the experience, not for getting added value from the book. My added value is the convenience of ebooks over paper.

Helen

[eschwartz]

Ummm, because I don't particularly like the idea of wasting anything that is still perfectly usable, but the topic here just so happened to be books?

[speakingtohe]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Ummm, because I don't particularly like the idea of wasting anything that is still perfectly usable, but the topic here just so happened to be books?

Yes. I just can't see what you are wasting I guess. The content is the value for me, whether I reread it or not. I understand that you can't pass it on, but that does not equal waste to me. Perhaps in the event that I thought a book a must read for someone to the point that I would buy them another copy whether they wanted to read it or not, I might have that view. Not likely to happen though. If they wanted the book as a gift though, I wouldn't mind spending the money, because in reality I have done the same with paper, bought a new copy as a gift rather than just giving my used copy. Lending there is always the library.

Helen