Ebook or Pbook?

[Justin Nemo]

Originally Posted by crich70

We've been there before. One king of France was considered wealthy because he had a large library ( some 24 Volumes) and in more recent past centuries (even with pbooks becoming cheaper due to Gutenberg's work on the printing press) a book collection was a status symbol. Just having a bookcase or five with books on it was just as impressive as having an automobile was. Never mind that often said collection wasn't read. I remember in fact hearing of someone buying a collection of books some 1 or 2 centuries old at an estate sale and finding that many of them had pages that were still uncut (they'd never been read).

Never mind about not read, what about not books?

I could name a couple of stately homes in England where most of the library is just book spines stuck together. Previous incumbents had sold of the books to pay debts. Just think how much physical space an ebook library would take up.

[Moksha]

Originally Posted by QuantumIguana

I don't think that CD and Vinyl make a great analogy from e-books vs. paper books. Both CD and vinyl offer pretty much the same experience, the listener might not even know whether they are listening to a CD or a vinyl record. The reader does know if they are reading an e-book or a paper book. The difference is much more tangible than it is with CD and Vinyl. CD and MP3 might be a better analogy. You can download MP3s, but CDs stick around because it is a convenient backup. I like being able to rip the songs and put the CD on the shelf as a backup.

I think I raised the analogy of CD vs Vinyl and e-books vs Paper books.
It seems to have opened up a whole other can of worms: so appologies for that.

I don't agree that e-book vs a paper book offers any more different an experience than Cd compared to vinyl.
If anything the opposite. The media in which music is presented can affect the sound which directly affects the experience.

With reading I think it comes down to the readers direct interaction with the word. Book vs ebook is just the mechanics of how the words are delivered.
Whether you turn a page or touch a screen, once you're immersed in the story the medium vanishes.
I think the difference is more in the realm of non-fiction like text books or technical manuals where the media might be limited in its ability to display diagrams and charts etc.

The real difference comes down to perception.
If there are fewer hurdles to getting an ebook out there is it really as good as one that has suffered the slings and arrows of an old fashioned publishing house.?

[Penforhire]

Muckraker, when I say "media" I mean the storage hardware. Format refers to the software encoding and file format.

If you mean you've never had a hard drive crash, CD fail to read, or USB flash drive fail then consider yourself lucky. I and others have experienced all three. Old files also have a way of not getting copied onto newer media. If you are disciplined that way then I commend you. The world at large has ALREADY failed at that.

File formats have converters but they are not always up to the task. If you mean you'll write your own conversion routines in the far future then perhaps you'll make yourself a niche in the market. Because we ALREADY see failure to convert formats perfectly.

[Justin Nemo]

Originally Posted by Penforhire

Muckraker, when I say "media" I mean the storage hardware. Format refers to the software encoding and file format.

If you mean you've never had a hard drive crash, CD fail to read, or USB flash drive fail then consider yourself lucky. I and others have experienced all three. Old files also have a way of not getting copied onto newer media. If you are disciplined that way then I commend you. The world at large has ALREADY failed at that.

File formats have converters but they are not always up to the task. If you mean you'll write your own conversion routines in the far future then perhaps you'll make yourself a niche in the market. Because we ALREADY see failure to convert formats perfectly.

Any fool who has been through the amount of hard disc crashes that I have, will know to store their data on more than one external hard drive. As we speak this very post is being stored on four separate external hard drives and on a secure online server.

[anamardoll]

I'm using CreateSpace to create a POD version of my book. I'd planned to do so anyway, just to have a copy, but one of my readers has indicated she'd like to buy, so...

I do concur that print is still the dominant format, BUT I think what a lot of people forget is how transient that print is. Even if I were picked up by Random House (which I don't want to be, but hypothetically) and printed out and slapped onto the shelves at B&N, those copies would stay up for... how long? A few weeks? A month, maybe? But then MY books would be down and room would be made for the newest latest thing. If I was really lucky, the mega-stores would keep one or two copies on the back shelves.

So while, sure, it would be pretty to walk into B&N and see a display of my book, it's just not a reliable business plan for me. Although I'm sure it would work well for less "niche" literature.

[Muckraker]

Originally Posted by Penforhire

If you mean you've never had a hard drive crash, CD fail to read, or USB flash drive fail then consider yourself lucky.

I've had many hard drive failures but I have yet to lose writing due to one. I have no faith in hardware because I used to work in the computer industry. Unfortunately, it often takes a catastrophic failure to remind the average user of the importance of backups. I was lucky in that I had to help dozens of people recover their lives. I was able to learn my lesson vicariously.

File formats have converters but they are not always up to the task. If you mean you'll write your own conversion routines in the far future then perhaps you'll make yourself a niche in the market. Because we ALREADY see failure to convert formats perfectly.

I think the days of incompatibility are long gone. Old DOS text files are just as readable today as they were 80's. A perfect conversion is nice but it's not required as long as all of the original content is intact. Most reprints and translations of paper material are not perfect either.

There will continue to be issues with cross-compatibility between the proprietary "working" files of an application, such as .indd and .psd, but the exports and the final product are compatible.

Paper books may be time-tested but keep in mind that the only paper books you see today are the ones that actually survived. All sorts of paper material throughout history has been lost forever.

We also have to acknowledge that paper books are not, and were never, representative of even a sliver of what humans have actually written. They represent what was published. Pretty much every digital word written today is preserved and can be made accessible to all people. A low print-run book from sixty years ago could very well disappear. And if copies are extremely rare the book is inaccessible to all but the owners.

[Justin Nemo]

Originally Posted by anamardoll

I do concur that print is still the dominant format, BUT I think what a lot of people forget is how transient that print is. Even if I were picked up by Random House (which I don't want to be, but hypothetically) and printed out and slapped onto the shelves at B&N, those copies would stay up for... how long? A few weeks? A month, maybe? But then MY books would be down and room would be made for the newest latest thing. If I was really lucky, the mega-stores would keep one or two copies on the back shelves.

So while, sure, it would be pretty to walk into B&N and see a display of my book, it's just not a reliable business plan for me. Although I'm sure it would work well for less "niche" literature.

That's a really valid point Ana and one not many people here have taken into consideration. Thanks for making it.

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by Muckraker

Paper books may be time-tested but keep in mind that the only paper books you see today are the ones that actually survived. All sorts of paper material throughout history has been lost forever.

And not just books: I'd written three times as many short stories of The Onuissance Cells than made it to ebook. Why? Because I'd lost the original longhand papers. The stories that made it into the book survived because I had transcribed them to my PC.

Originally Posted by anamardoll

I do concur that print is still the dominant format, BUT I think what a lot of people forget is how transient that print is. Even if I were picked up by Random House (which I don't want to be, but hypothetically) and printed out and slapped onto the shelves at B&N, those copies would stay up for... how long? A few weeks? A month, maybe? But then MY books would be down and room would be made for the newest latest thing. If I was really lucky, the mega-stores would keep one or two copies on the back shelves.

So while, sure, it would be pretty to walk into B&N and see a display of my book, it's just not a reliable business plan for me. Although I'm sure it would work well for less "niche" literature.

This is the essence of the latest discussions regarding the old "scarcity" model of selling and the new "abundance" model that some say is replacing the old. Print is the model (even the icon) of scarcity, while ebooks are the model of abundance.

[Justin Nemo]

Originally Posted by Steven Lyle Jordan

This is the essence of the latest discussions regarding the old "scarcity" model of selling and the new "abundance" model that some say is replacing the old. Print is the model (even the icon) of scarcity, while ebooks are the model of abundance.

............. and the future.

[Justin Nemo]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

I can see ebooks being 50% of the market* within ten years, and 80% of the market within twenty years.

*UK market.

This post in the general forum seems to disagree with that:

https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...07#post2017707

[VydorScope]

Originally Posted by Justin Nemo

This post in the general forum seems to disagree with that:

https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...07#post2017707

Well bookmark this thread and come back in 10 years to see who is correct.

[Justin Nemo]

OK Deal

Hang about, that's a bit of a put down to genuine readers isn't it?

[VydorScope]

Originally Posted by Justin Nemo

Hang about, that's a bit of a put down to genuine readers isn't it?

How so?

[Justin Nemo]

Originally Posted by VydorScope

How so?

OK let's clear this up. Are you saying, like pddurrant, that pbooks won't overtake ebooks for maybe another 20 years, or are you saying the opposite?

[VydorScope]

Originally Posted by Justin Nemo

OK let's clear this up. Are you saying, like pddurrant, that pbooks won't overtake ebooks for maybe another 20 years, or are you saying the opposite?

I believe I said...

Originally Posted by VydorScope

8 Track died, VHS Died, Laser Disk Died, Papyrus Died, and so on... mediums of recording information come and go with time. To think paper books will be around always is likely a mistake. Around in 20 years? I think so. Around in 100? Well I'll be dead and gone and wont care... but probably not any more then 8 tracks are today.

But I could be remembering wrong