MobileRead Forums - View Single Post - Save lots of money *and* make Kindle better

ATDrake · 03-02-2011, 08:28 PM

I think I notice typos more in print books now that I've gotten used to paying attention to them in Kindle versions.

But generally print book typos tend to be fairly mild: dropped punctuation, misspelling, a single dropped or added letter once in a while. While e-book typos can get very, very bad, simply due to poor OCR proofreading and careless use of auto-correct.

Most hilarious example I remember was from a library e-book on the history of US-style car racing (which was riddled with them), quoting from some guy named "R-emphasis Petty"*. I still wonder exactly what combination of scanning/software/conversion house mishaps could cause that.

Anyway, if the typos aren't bad enough to render the book unreadable (or very annoyingly readable), I'm more likely to fix them myself if the price was low.

Though I would request a return if they were seriously distracting to the point where I should just save my money and check out the library copy instead because the e-book version was clearly not providing value for money spent.

* Turned out to be this guy, who did a voice on Pixar's Cars.

03-02-2011, 08:28 PM	#12
ATDrake Wizzard Posts: 11,517 Karma: 33048258 Join Date: Mar 2010 Location: Roundworld Device: Kindle 2 International, Sony PRS-T1, BlackBerry PlayBook, Acer Iconia	I think I notice typos more in print books now that I've gotten used to paying attention to them in Kindle versions. But generally print book typos tend to be fairly mild: dropped punctuation, misspelling, a single dropped or added letter once in a while. While e-book typos can get very, very bad, simply due to poor OCR proofreading and careless use of auto-correct. Most hilarious example I remember was from a library e-book on the history of US-style car racing (which was riddled with them), quoting from some guy named "R-emphasis Petty". I still wonder exactly what combination of scanning/software/conversion house mishaps could cause that. Anyway, if the typos aren't bad enough to render the book unreadable (or very annoyingly readable), I'm more likely to fix them myself if the price was low. Though I would request a return if they were seriously distracting to the point where I should just save my money and check out the library copy instead because the e-book version was clearly not providing value for money spent. Turned out to be this guy, who did a voice on Pixar's Cars.