Would you pay extra for a an error-free ebook?

[GeoffR]

Almost all of the ebooks I buy from the big publishers have far more errors than the paper versions, including many spelling errors that would have been caught by even the most basic of spell checkers.

I wonder how much money those publishers are losing because of this? Would you pay extra, and if so how much, for an ebook that had some form of error-free guarantee?

The guarantee might not be absolute, perhaps just that there is no more than one error per 10,000 words. I would gladly pay an extra 20% for a book that came with such a guarantee.

[speakingtohe]

Nah. I make so many typos myself I have grown accustomed to them

Helen

[Terisa de morgan]

So, would I have to pay more money for them to make well their job? I don't think so.

[susan_cassidy]

I expect the book to be error-free, so no, I would not pay extra for an error-free version. If they had an error-free version, wouldn't they have put that one out?

[GeoffR]

Originally Posted by susan_cassidy

I expect the book to be error-free, so no, I would not pay extra for an error-free version. If they had an error-free version, wouldn't they have put that one out?

Think of it another way. Say you had the choice of buying a book from one of the big publishers, or the same book from another publisher that provided an error-free guarantee. Would you still buy the one without the guarantee just because it was one cent cheaper?

[susan_cassidy]

If there was only one cent difference, of course, I'd buy it error-free.

[DiapDealer]

I swear I must read the wrong (or the right) books. Or I'm just ridiculously lucky. People keep talking about all these errors in ebooks from big publishing houses and I just don't see them. No more so than I always would have in the physical book, anyway.

If they're there and I'm just not noticing ... well there's your answer as to whether or not I would pay more for an error-free version.

I wonder how much money those publishers are losing because of this?

I'd say they're losing right around $0. Otherwise, you wouldn't be seeing the errors.

[JSWolf]

I won't pay extra for a BPH to do their job or stop hiring out to the lowest bidder in India to botch (er make) their eBooks.

[alanHd]

Why should I pay extra for something that should be correct, or do there terms and conditions state, that since they cant be bothered they can push anything on you.

I think it should be the other way around, should we expect partial refunds for errors.

[mr_nihilism]

Originally Posted by GeoffR

Think of it another way. Say you had the choice of buying a book from one of the big publishers, or the same book from another publisher that provided an error-free guarantee. Would you still buy the one without the guarantee just because it was one cent cheaper?

If it were to come down to that, I would of course pay the extra for an error free book. Of course, that decision would be based on the difference in cost being rather small.

Seriously though, it's not too much to expect a certain quality control being put forth into a product that costs money.

Oh, and I`d just like to point out that White Lung by Grant Buday is the most error-prone book in the history of ebooks. Or at least the product Kobo is selling anyways.

[Catlady]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

I swear I must read the wrong (or the right) books. Or I'm just ridiculously lucky. People keep talking about all these errors in ebooks from big publishing houses and I just don't see them. No more so than I always would have in the physical book, anyway.

Ditto. I simply haven't seen a lot of errors in e-books from the major houses, and those are pretty much the only e-books I read.

[JSWolf]

OCR errors can be quite a mess in backlist eBooks.

[JSWolf]

the other question is... Why can't eBooks be well formatted? Most are not something I would want my name on either as author, publisher, or creator of the eBook.

[GeoffR]

Originally Posted by alanHd

I think it should be the other way around, should we expect partial refunds for errors.

I think getting a refund for errors amounts to the same thing as paying extra for no errors. So how much of a refund would you expect to get for a book that had many errors?

If you were offered say a 20% refund if a book you buy contains errors, but you find that the book in fact has no errors, then you have in effect paid 25% extra for an error-free book.

[mr_nihilism]

This is why I don`t feel so bad stripping the DRM from a lousy product that I`ve paid for in order to make the necessary changes to have a readable book.

And a question: would book x be identical (in terms of correct grammar, punctuation etc.) between Kobo & Amazon? Just curious.