[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by Donnageddon

I am stubborn in that I am still an SF Book Club member, even though I (for various reasons) do not want dead tree hardback, or paperback books.

I still buy dead tree editions. For me, ebooks are an additional format for books, not a replacement for paper.

I have some in one format, some in the other, and some in both.

I haven't been an SFBC member for years, but I like SFBC editions, and often buy them at conventions. For me, the best part of the SFBC was the practice of creating hardcover anthology editions of things that had been a series in paperback I happily acquired them to replace the PBs and free shelf space. I also have a few SFBC editions where the SFBC version was the only hardcover edition of a title.

I still enjoy the monthly mails that let me know what is new, and the reviews and commentary.

I have said this before, but I wish SFBC would find a way to adopt an ebook alternative. They have a captive audience to hopefully sway publishers for a "bulk" sale.

I hope they (and other book clubs) will use this formula to get into the ebook world. It might help getting older neglected works into the mix.

addendum: I have many anthologies and classic SF hardbacks from SFBC that I would love to have transformed into ebooks. And SFBC would be just the outlet for that opportunity.

It's a lovely idea, but implementation will be a bear. The book clubs aren't the original publisher. They license the rights to produce a book club edition. (Some years back, the late Judy Lynn Del Rey had a problem: she was editor at Ballantine/DelRey. The Book of the Month Club was interested in producing an edition of a Ballantine title as an alternate selection for a month. But BotMC required a hardcover edition to reproduce, and Ballantime was a PB house. Judy Lynn's boss said "Poof! You're a hardcover publisher!" )

For the SFBC to make ebook editions available, they would have to go back and negotiate rights to do it for all the titles they wanted to issue.

And the status of the SFBC and associated clubs is in question. Bertelsmann, AG, acquired Doubleday and the book club operations to add to their portfolio of publishing assets, since they were already big in that area in Europe and wanted to expand to the US. But the book clubs are under the same sort of pressure as the rest of publishing. Back in May 07 they laid off long time editor Ellen Asher and her assistant, Andrew Wheeler, and replaced them with a chap named Rome Quezada. (Ellen took an early retirement buyout and is fine. Not sure of Andrew's status.) More recently, thre have been rumors they were looking to unload the book clubs, though it isn't clear who would buy them.

I do not like having them kept in storage.

I have a fair number of books in storage, too, Which is where is a matter of "How likely am I to want to grab and re-read this?"
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Dennis