Quote:
Originally Posted by JaneFancher
How about sending the author that picture along with 50% of what you paid for it? Remember, they made far less than the used book store owner on the initial sale, and nothing on the purchase you just made.
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Seriously? Wow, that is some seriously delusional thinking. It amazes me how many authors I have spoken to on boards like this who believe that it is the customer's responsibility to actually campaign for the right to spend more money. Look, if you don't want people buying second-hand paperbacks, then you need to make sure there is a first-run format that they'll want to buy instead. For example, many video games have started putting bonus content on-line that is only available to the first person to register the game. If you buy it second-hand, you don't get the content, so that is an incentive to buy the game new. Similarly, I prefer to buy my books in ebook form because I don't have the storage space for 900 print books. If you offer me an ebook version of the content I want, and you price it at a fair price---I am not saying free or $1, but I am also not saying 'same as the hardback' and certainly not 'same as a hardback when a $6 paperback has been on sale at the bricks and mortar store for the last decade'---then I will prefer to buy the ebook. If you don't offer the ebook, well, your loss.
The problem is not that customers are not voluntarily emailing two dollars to the author every time they buy a used paper book in the absence of a suitable e-alternative. The problem is that authors have not yet banded together under some sort of union or author group or something and pressured the agents to start negotiating better deals. This is not the reader's fault. I am not saying it is necessarily the author's fault---entirely---either. But it is absurd to me that you expect people who would but it new if only you would let them that it is their responsibility to voluntarily send you money to cover the loss you incurred as a result of this missed sale.