Quote:
Originally Posted by SensualPoet
Another piece of the cost puzzle that is not factored in -- and which benefits ebooks -- is that an ebook is never out of stock or out of print or in transit to the bookstore and not available for sale. It means that every impulse sale of an ebook can be completed provided the consumer has cash/credit in hand.
Bookstores have to have physical stock on hand, on the shelf ... or it's no sale. Ebooks are always available which means more sales, higher profits, and more royalties.
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Yes, but it creates another issue.
In the days when books were all paper, the paper edition would go out of print. When it did, the author (or author's agent) could formally request that the rights revert, and attempt to resell the property elsewhere. Most books went out of print fairly quickly. They would be distributed to retailers. If the book flew off the shelves, the retailer would reorder, and the publisher would do another print run. Most books never reached that status. The average bookstore had limited shelf space, and had to clear older books to make room for new releases, so stuff that didn't move quickly got remaindered. On things like airport newsstands, the average shelf like for a mass market PB was
two weeks.
What does "out of print" mean when you have ebooks and print on demand editions? The last thing an author wants is the rights tied up in the hands of a publisher who has lost interest in the book. Current contracts cover electronic publication and POD as well as standard paper editions, and tend to use a formula factoring in sales in various formats to determine when a book should be considered out of print, with rights returning to the author.
The fact that an ebook edition is
available doesn't mean the publisher is making any effort to
sell it.
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Dennis