Advertisements in Ebooks-Good Idea?

[xg4bx]

Many publishing companies are toying with the idea of building advertisements contained within books. The idea is that books can be sold at tremendously reduced costs or given away for free with the intention of making long term gains with making money on ad-clicks or people purchasing products. Would customers accept this?

The big advantage with advertisements being displayed within ebooks is the cost to the end user. It would encourage people to pirate less because they could get the official version for free and give the companies important data on downloads and customer demographics. Most users want to do the right thing and get the book via legitimate channels. A fair chunk of users would continue to purchase the ad-free books but the option to give it away with the ads embedded in the book might be a solid option.

.http://readerupdates.com/uncategoriz...t-a-good-idea/

pirate less? HA!!! i'd trip over myself running to pirate sites to get ad-free versions.

[pdurrant]

I can't see adverts in ebooks ever taking off. I don't think the economics are right (the cost per advert would need to be too high to be able to make a significant difference to the ebook price).


I think Amazon has found the only way to make money from adverts and ebooks — adverts on the ebook reader.

[HomeInMyShoes]

I like focusing on what I'm doing. Get the adds out of my reading. There's way too much push in our society right now anyway.

I can already see the first blinking text ad on the Kindle. Users wondering why battery life has gone from weeks to a couple of days.

[SmokeAndMirrors]

Absolutely not. Are they kidding? I don't have to listen to an ad half-way through every song I buy. Why should I have to stare at an ad in the middle of the book I'm reading?

This won't do anything to discourage piracy. All it will do is create a new piracy market for ad-stripped ebooks.

The reason people pirate is because they charge insane prices and impose DRM that make books almost unusable in a variety of ways. And all they'll be doing by putting friggin' ads in books is making it worse, and forcing more people into the piracy game.

Charge and license reasonably. Then people will be more inclined to buy stuff. Holy crap, why don't these people get it?

Nor will I ever buy an ereading device that forces ads. Again, that's like having ads pop up on my personal computer while I'm offline and trying to write a document. It's insane and invasive.

Leave me alone! I am sick of companies thinking that they have the right to shove ads in my face absolutely everywhere I go, with everything I do.

[JD Gumby]

Horrible idea. Other than the standard list of books at the beginning from that author that that publisher also puts out, and maybe an order form (pbook)/store link(s) (ebook) at the end for more books from that author & publisher, ads have no place.

[GeoffC]

No ...

[emellaich]

... But use Google's secret for advertising; show relevant ads and enhance the experience.

Advertise later books in the series and similar books. I can also see very useful similar product ads. For example, with a book set in some locale carry an ad for trips to that locale. It would really be interesting to see how to actually go to the places named in the book. Or advertise the products used.

Of course, the problem will be when tailor-made adverbooks are written. Books just to promote a place or product. I can remember the low quality of some kids books that were solely created to push a brand.

To me this is the relationship between real web sites in google results and content farms that have a veneer of content,nbut no real substance. Genuine books with genuine tie-ins would be interesting. Artificial ad-vehicles not so much.

[rogue_librarian]

Let's not forget this is digital files we are talking about. So, after obtaining such a copy by whatever means required I'd just open this up in Sigil and remove the offending pages. After having removed the DRM layer, as the case may be, which would really only serve the purpose of letting the user not modify the file.

[carld]

Adverts inside ebooks would probably be the one thing that would turn me into a total ebook pirate. It's a horrible idea.

[stonetools]

This was discussed a couple of times earlier. But then, so was DRM and ebook prices.

Ads have been in books in the past , contrary to myth. If ads can be done in a tasteful, non-intrusive fashion, and if the economics justify it, they will be in ebooks

[kjk]

I used to love the end ads about other books available from the publisher at the end of the old DAW science fiction novels-back in the old days it was one of the few places you could read blurbs about other related books.

[RainingLemur]

No. Not only no, but heck no.

[HomeInMyShoes]

Originally Posted by stonetools

This was discussed a couple of times earlier. But then, so was DRM and ebook prices.

Ads have been in books in the past , contrary to myth. If ads can be done in a tasteful, non-intrusive fashion, and if the economics justify it, they will be in ebooks

Did you just use the word tasteful with respect to advertising? It will be tasteful until the cognitive behaviorists in the marketing departments start using all their tricks to divert reader's attention away from reading. I can't wait for my first flashing text hot singles advertisement on my Kindle. Great.

[ekster]

I could live with it if they did ads comicbook style. Throw in a random page of adds every now and then. But I'd expect the price to be significantly lower and have a non-ads ebook available for realistic prices.

But if this happens, I'd hate to see them implement this, say an ebook with ads costs $4.99-9.99, and then justify that an ebook with no ads costs $9.99-19.99 all of a sudden. Unfortunately, companies love this tactic. :/

[Belfaborac]

Worst idea ever. I'd never for a moment consider buying a book containing advertising and if it ever becomes prevalent, I'm straight off to the dark side.