Quote:
Originally Posted by kjk
To play devil's advocate for a second 
With eBooks, I can take all my books with me wherever I go. I can read the same book on an iPad at home, my iPhone on the train, and my computer at work, and it remembers where I left off reading last. I can adjust the typefaces depending on my mood and eye strain, can read in the dark without a nightlight. Plus, my wife, my son, and I can all read the same new book at the same time
All of these features make an eBook more valuable to me than a used paperback. |
I agree with added value for remembering where I left off - for all the books and magazines on my Kindle. There is also some added value to the delivery being now and where ever I am.
I like my Kindle and I prefer eBooks. I just think the industry is structured wrong and priced wrong. With DRM, and I do not see the current crop of Executives at the Big 6 dropping DRM, RENTAL makes more sense for fiction than purchase.
If however, they come up with a scheme to lend, sell-back, reformat for any new different eReader I buy - then the value of an eBook gets closer to a NEW paperback to me.
15 years from now, there is significant risk that DRM'd eBooks I buy today will be orphaned. My Kindle will be obsolete --- if it works at all.
I have no problem with DRM or the licensing restrictions like at SmashWords. (I like SmashWords a lot) I think it lowers the value of the Publisher's product to below a used paperback. With SmashWords - many of the prices are there already. If a Publisher insists on pricing like a new paperback (or worse) they just don't get my money unless I REALLY, *really* want the book.
The publishers, retailers, and authors would get MORE of my money with a rental model for eBooks. Failing that, they would also get more of my money with a reasonable sell-back feature. Or thirdly, they would get more of my money in total if they simply priced eBooks like used paperbacks.