Quote:
Originally Posted by jerryleejr
Why does everyone expect an industry to develop a business model around what they choose? I think that going in to a purchase like this, one should understand that if they buy a Kindle they wont be reading from the Sony Store and Vice Versa, I dont think one should be angry with the competition. (When you said platform of choice I thought you meant the reader not Computer I now realize you and I are in the same boat so to speak, But I have overcome this small inconvenience with bootcamp and VMware Fusion) Not matter how much I love my Mac I understand that to an extent it is a Windows World.
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Actually, I don't "expect an industry to develop a business model around what (I) choose." Rather, I expect them to be able to understand a few basics:
- It's a "windows world" means: 95% windows if you count total numbers of boxes including cash registers and other embedded devices. 90% windows if you exclude those, but still consider the computers folks have at work. 85% windows if you consider computers people have (access to) at home. This last is arguably the number that actually matters for "who might buy books from the Sony store." (Consider these numbers as ballpark rather than as perfectly researched. But I've been on the inside of decisions like this at a variety of businesses. Believe me, the discussion usually stops at "no one uses Macs" and never even gets to the first actual number.
You'd think no business person ever heard of concepts like market research and due diligence. But I digress.)
- They could easily have built a standards-based web-enabled store that works fine for all comers no matter what platform they use. And thus made their potential market 1.18x larger with no increase in cost, while looking like "good guys" to the folks they currently exclude.
- 1.18x larger market for less than 1.18x increase in costs means higher profits. Business 101.
These concepts appear too complicated for a large fraction of the business community to whom "standard" appears to mean "MS Windows." I can't say for sure about Sony and the Reader, because I wasn't behind the scenes there. But it doesn't pass the sniff test.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jerryleejr
IF you are buying DRM free books you wouldnt be buying from Sony or Kindle stores, Plus those same DRM free books that you are getting probably can be converted to be used with just about any Device you own. There isnt one device to my knowledge that supports all formats, I dont believe that there is one publisher that releases books in all formats, With all devices we must pick and choose. I am not pro one device over another I believe it is up to the individual, As for the prices of books Sony had contacted the publisher a few times for me regarding price differences. Until there is a universal format DRM will be a fact of life. Even if you do have a substanial investment in one format and that company decides to fold, I would bet that you can still read them on your computer or keep the last device you purchased.
JJ
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Not buying from Sony or Kindle due to DRM was kind of the
point of that part of my rant. I buy from Baen and Fictionwise (and a few others)
exactly because of their position on DRM (which would be "it's a pointless waste of time and an insult to our customers
AND it would cost us more money and additional support calls... remind me again why DRM is a good idea?").
As to one publisher and all formats, hmmmm... Baen and Fictionwise come close. No pdf, but it's a lousy choice for readers that vary in size from one model to the next (unless, like feedbooks, you custom produce every pdf file to order). Otherwise, they support palm, mobi, ms-reader, rocket ebook format, sony reader format (and maybe some more that I haven't thought of). I don't think its possible to purchase a current model ebook reader that they don't support (although I admit that I may be wrong about that).
And the pricing issue is mostly the publishers. Fortunately, Baen IS the publisher of the bulk of Webscription's offerings, so they can and have set a reasonable price. And the multi-format offerings at Fictionwise are either older books (thus cheaper) or come from publishers or authors who are enlightened on the pricing front. Other publishers aren't there yet. Of course, other publishers
also aren't seeing sale of bits matching their income from sale of hardcovers either. Makes you go "hmmmmm...."
I guess the overall point of this rant is that the Sony store has made itself a non-player for me (I'm certainly not spending the $100 or so it would take to run Windows on one of my Macs just to shop at the Sony store -- which would be my only use for it). And in the process they've lost the opportunity to compete for my ebook buying $$. By the way, I spend more on ebooks
each year than I spent on buying the 2 PRS500s my family owns (back when they first came out and weren't discounted). Holy leaving money on the table, Batman!
I've heard from some of the Baen authors that they sold some of their shorter fiction to the Sony store with no DRM, and that Sony had no problem with that. Other than having to revise their contracts so that the authors could check the NO-DRM-DAMMIT box. Apparently it had never occurred to them that there might be authors, agents, and publishers who think that DRM is a
BAD idea. Never mind that the two top success stories in fiction ebooks on the net (pre-Kindle, at least) are a publisher who refuses to use DRM and a store that reports that their DRM-free offerings outsell their DRM-crippled offerings more than 5-to-1. But knowing that would have required
actual market research that catches the people who actually spend $$ on ebooks.
(Stepping calmly off the soapbox, hoping no one notices me wiping the foam away from my mouth...)
Xenophon