Quote:
Originally Posted by Kali Yuga
Well, there's only so much they can do.
• Publishers do not have unlimited budgets or staff, and it takes time and money to release back catalog ebooks.
• The authors/estates may well want to use a different publisher for ebooks as for paper.
• Authors / estates may hold out for better royalty rates.
• Authors / estates may just hate the idea of digital books (I can't imagine JD Salinger, for example, ever authorizing an ebook of Catcher in the Rye).
• Paper sales may be so low as to not justify priority for an ebook release.
• The works in question may be orphans -- e.g the original publisher holder may be out of business; author or estate may be unlocatable; rights may be in dispute...
In other words, it's not like Penguin can snap its fingers and release its entire back catalog in digital form overnight. A process like this takes time and money.
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Thus my concern about the publishers' lack of ability.
In regard to copyright, I am in favor of "use it or lose it". I object to a publisher having the legal right to keep a book off the market because it does not think the book will sell.