[kwjones]

Before I purchased an ebook reader, my reading experience was something like this:

The newest hardcover was just released by one of my favorite authors. At this point I have a few options.

Option 1: I can go to a national bookstore chain and immediately purchase the hardcover. Sometimes the store offers the book for 20% off and if I have a membership card, I get another 10% off. I go home and enjoy the book. If I found a chapter was missing, or something happened in the printing process and a page was completely not readable, I can take the book back to the store for an exchange or refund.

Option 2: I can get my name put on the waiting list at my local library. I pick up the book from the library, then go home and enjoy the book. If I found a chapter was missing, or something happened in the printing process and a page was completely not readable, I can take the book back to the library and let them know. Once I read the book, I can decide if it's something that I might read again. If it is, I can purchase the hardcover, or wait until the paperback comes out.

Option 3: I really like the author, but I'll just wait for the paperback. A few months later, I go back the the national bookstore chain and buy the paperback, go home and enjoy the book. If I found a chapter was missing, or something happened in the printing process and a page was completely not readable, I can take the book back to the store for an exchange or refund.

All in all, not a bad system. I can lend the books out if I really wanted to, but since I don't even trust my wife not to dog ear a page or crease the spine, I just don't lend out my books. If the bookstore didn't have the book I wanted to purchase, they could order it for me and let me know when it was in.

So last year I bought an ebook reader. I was really hoping that ebooks would mirror my past experiences with paper books, but they don't. The industry seems to be rife with double standards.

Here's what I want in an ebook, and this is where you failed: price, back catalogs and formating. If you failed at any level on one of these issues, you've failed on all of them because they are all linked together.

I would pay $15 for an ebook released the same day as a hardcover as long as I could be guaranteed that the content was the same. I've downloaded several free copies of books and the spelling and formating errors are terrible. If I had bought a hardcover or paperback with these errors, it would be going back to the store for an exchange or refund.

I would pay $5 to $8 for the ebook equivalent of a paperback, but there is no way I am going to pay for an ebook that costs more than the paperback already sitting on my shelf. I know I'm paying for convenience, but seriously, this is just stupid.

Back catalogs are a problem for me. Some books I want to replace just aren't available in ebook format. I want to purchase them...really, I do. I even have a budget just for personal entertainment. The only place I've seen some of the books I want are only available through "illegal" file sharing sites. Someone has taken the time to scan one of your books and transform it into an ebook. Some even take extra time to proof read everything and correct all of the mistakes from the scanning process. Why did they bother to take the time to scan your book? Maybe because you don't make it available for purchase. How is it that a single person can put out a better quality product than you can most of the time? Maybe you could hire one of these criminals to scan your back catalogs and make sure there aren't any formating issues. Or you could just download them yourself and repackage them so you can sell them.

I'm not going to discuss DRM, because frankly, there are so many ways to get around it, it's not even an issue anymore for most people. You might consider saving me a few minutes of my time by not forcing it on me. You might even find that if you save enough people the time and effort of circumventing your DRM schemes, you might sell more books.

So purchasing ebooks has been a source of frustration for me. Thankfully, sites like mobileread.com have a wide selection of free public domain books. The formating is great, and if I notice any major mistakes, I can let the person who created the ebook know, and they will fix it. I've also purchased a few ebooks directly from the author. They seem to appreciate it a lot more than you do.

Sincerely,

Consumer of books