Quote:
Originally Posted by JSWolf
Given the time it takes to get a Mobi file to look good would be better spent working on the ePub version instead. Overall, ePub converts to Mobi pretty well. Sure you may have to tweak a few things here and there, but it can be done. So once you've put the effort into the ePub, you just convert to Mobipocket and done. Both versions are ready to go. The other way, you have to work on the Mobi and then work on the ePub. Sometimes converting from Mobi to ePub is not all that easy to do because the underlying code can be a real mess so then you have to work on cleaning it up and that ends up being a lot more work then just working on the ePub and converting down to Mobi.
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We're dealing with three different formats here, there's no converting. Granted, the ebooks I've seen prove that there's a lot of converting going on that shouldn't be, but I would never (in this hypothetical scenario or in reality) convert mobi to ePub if I was planning to sell it. But it also doesn't make sense (to me, at least) to do the reverse if one wants to make the most of each format. Anything in the ePub not supported by Mobi would have to be fixed to display properly anyway, so it seems to me that starting from the text and building each format makes the most sense.
The third format, of course, is the Smashwords Word doc. That's its own monster to deal with. (If I ever do get around to writing that book, I really hope they have a better system in place at some point.)
So to me, the option would seem to wait until all formats are completed, or putting the first format up for sale while working on the others.
Quote:
Originally Posted by JSWolf
The other issue is that the author has gone exclusive with Amazon and that then causes the author to lose credibility as far as sticking it out with the ePub versions. How do we know the author won't pull the ePub and go back to Amazon? We (the readers) lose trust in the authors who go exclusive with Amazon. Once they go with Amazon, they may as well stay there since they've lost our trust.
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You say "we" but I wonder how many people actually feel this way, or even think about it at all. (I'm serious, I do wonder about this, but there's no way to get any accurate data on that.) Yes, in the case where books have been pulled, I can see why some would be upset. And disappearing series would definitely cause consternation. But preemptive judgment based on a debut or new release seems odd if there's no precedent of yanking books back to KDPS later.
It also kind of comes across as a convenient self-fulfilling psuedo-prophecy.