[foosion]

In the context of editing commercial books for personal use, there are some sections in epubs (especially in the front before the actual text) that don't seem very useful and often seem more a legacy of paper books.

Why not just delete (or move to the end), so you can get to the actual book faster? Am I missing something?

Title, half title: These typically duplicate information from the cover, which has title and author. Sometimes they include publisher, but you can find that elsewhere.

Inline TOC: The epub TOC seems more useful.

Index: Often lists print page numbers and suggests using search. In any event, search seems better.

Index of maps, illustrations, etc. Perhaps useful, but search could work. If useful I'd move to the end so you can get to useful text faster,

Copyright page: Important, but fine at the end.

Praise: Why bother - I've already decided to get the book.

Other books by author: Move to end or nuke. Can be out of date and if I want more from the author I can search the web.

Next reads and other publisher ads: Nuke.

Introduction: Often useful in non-fiction. In fiction it's seldom useful and can contain spoilers - moving to the end seems best.

Dedication: Almost always more for the author than for me.