Poll on obstacles to ebook buying

[dragonbone]

Originally Posted by Pardoz

They have indeed, and for all of those decades nothing has prevented individuals from buying books from stores located in other countries, as up until the past year nothing prevented individuals from buying e-books from stores located in other countries - the point of sale was defined by the location of the seller, not the format of the book. Trying to hand-wave that away is disingenuous at best.

Slightly off topic.... I have been a member at Audible.com for about 6 or 7 years. In the last year or so, I have noticed a rapidly increasing amount of books 'not available to my geographical location'. Recently 1 in every 3 books I'm interested in, is no longer available to me - sometimes mid series! Then I heard that Amazon.com bought Audible.com.... well...! Things started making much more sense!

[Pardoz]

Originally Posted by alvico

I don't think that's what Pardoz meant. Anyone anywhere in the world can buy any published paper book (irrespective of rights) from Amazon in the US. The point is sale is deemed to be in the US. So why is an ebook different?

You've grasped my point exactly. An e-book is different for one reason and one reason only: because its publisher has decided it is and cooked up some excuses in an effort to justify doing so.

I can understand the reason for it easily enough - shipping paper around the world is sufficiently expensive and awkward that the numbers who will do so are limited: publishers don't have to worry about loss of control or risk competition. Shifting electrons, on the other hand, makes buying from a retailer on the other side of the world no different, for the consumer, than buying from one down the street.

[alvico]

Originally Posted by lene1949

Long ago I actually sent them an email about these 10%, telling them they had it backwards... It's roughly 10% which are non restricted.

You too?

[orwell2k]

As has been mentioned numerous times, my main gripes are not mentioned in the poll:

(1) Geographic restrictions - like other attempts at artificially fencing off the markets (e.g. DVD region codes) it lacks any real justification and probably drives more people to obtaining books from "other" sources when they are not allowed to spend their money willingly to buy the legal copy. This was understandably not included as to those living in the centre of the universe (i.e. the US) it simply would not occur to them that there is an issue.

(2) Books Unavailable - This is also annoying, when books are simply not published in e-formats. I am sure this will reduce over time, but I frankly expected more progress - but it is still an emerging market, so I'll give it another year or so to allow some catching up on past titles.

Some others:

(3) Price I guess is always an issue, but in all honesty I can usually shop around and find discount or offer on books I want. Geo restrictions are becoming tighter (e.g. I can no longer fool Fictionwise into believing I am in the US) so that is limiting the options, hence price is now more of an issue. BTW, Fictionwise has lost my business permanently due to their drachonian regional restriction increases.

(4) DRM is an unfortunate fact of life, and at the moment any system can be "liberated" so I don't care that much. But for people who can barely find the computer keyboard and simply want to buy a book and read (a not unreasonable request) this is a major issue and the sooner DRM dies the death ot deserves the better off we will all be (authors, publishers and readers alike).

Anyway, good poll overall and some interesting issues for publishers and authors to ponder...

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by Pardoz

They have indeed, and for all of those decades nothing has prevented individuals from buying books from stores located in other countries, as up until the past year nothing prevented individuals from buying e-books from stores located in other countries - the point of sale was defined by the location of the seller, not the format of the book. Trying to hand-wave that away is disingenuous at best.

Exactly.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by dragonbone

Slightly off topic.... I have been a member at Audible.com for about 6 or 7 years. In the last year or so, I have noticed a rapidly increasing amount of books 'not available to my geographical location'. Recently 1 in every 3 books I'm interested in, is no longer available to me - sometimes mid series! Then I heard that Amazon.com bought Audible.com.... well...! Things started making much more sense!

What reason do you have to suppose that Amazon have anything to do with it? Do you really believe that Amazon don't want you to buy stuff? It's the publisher you need to blame, not Amazon.

[tompe]

I felt I could not answer the poll since my biggest reason not to buy an ebook is if there is DRM that restricts my uses of the book (for example hinder search of the file). DRM like Watermark does not restrict my uses so this is OK but no alternative fits this.

There was also no distinction bewteen portability now and portability in the future.

[dragonbone]

Originally Posted by HarryT

What reason do you have to suppose that Amazon have anything to do with it? Do you really believe that Amazon don't want you to buy stuff? It's the publisher you need to blame, not Amazon.

This happened immediately after Amazon bought Audible.
Just saying...

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by dickon25

Alvico
And yet they claim something like only 10% of books are affected! Thanks for this. ....

Really?? I haven't seen that claim before - can you recall where you saw it?

It's in one of the FAQ's on the FW site; I've seen it, too.

I would guess that the 10% figure comes about by including all the "multiformat" books, none of which are geo-restricted.

[Jellby]

Originally Posted by HarryT

It's the publisher you need to blame, not Amazon.

More specifically, it's the other publishers. The situation is something like:

Publisher A has the rights to sell in the US, they do sell paper books and ebooks.
Publisher B has the rights to sell in Europe, they sell only paper books, as they are afraid of ebooks.

Now, publisher A would like to sell ebooks in Europe, of course, and people in Europe are willing to buy ebooks from publisher A, but publisher B will complain, fight and prevent this to happen, as only they have the rights to sell in Europe. So, if you can't buy ebooks from publisher A, publisher B is to blame

[Ben Thornton]

I'm not sure whether the VAT situation that someone has mentioned is not more important than the publishers respecting geographical boundaries.

Is it a criminal offence to "import" an ebook without paying VAT by fraudulently registering as a resident in the country of purchase?

I'm wondering if, in the eyes of the law, it's a worse crime to buy a book without paying VAT than to copy it off the darknets without paying anything.

[RedHeadPeter]

It isn't a price of $9.99 or $4.99 or whatever. It's being asked to pay more than the physical book would cost. Why would you expect to get an e-book for less than $9.99 if the physical book costs $100?
And geographical restrictions.

[RedHeadPeter]

Originally Posted by Ben Thornton

I'm not sure whether the VAT situation that someone has mentioned is not more important than the publishers respecting geographical boundaries.

Is it a criminal offence to "import" an ebook without paying VAT by fraudulently registering as a resident in the country of purchase?

I'm wondering if, in the eyes of the law, it's a worse crime to buy a book without paying VAT than to copy it off the darknets without paying anything.

And of course paperbooks have no VAT.......go figure

[Ben Thornton]

Originally Posted by RedHeadPeter

It isn't a price of $9.99 or $4.99 or whatever. It's being asked to pay more than the physical book would cost. Why would you expect to get an e-book for less than $9.99 if the physical book costs $100?
And geographical restrictions.

Quite so. A lot of people seem to talk about the absolute price ("I won't pay more than $15") when for me, as you say, the important thing is to pay no more than for paper - and ideally a little less. There aren't many e-books that I'd pay £100 for, but there are some (well, one).

[tompe]

Originally Posted by Ben Thornton

Quite so. A lot of people seem to talk about the absolute price ("I won't pay more than $15") when for me, as you say, the important thing is to pay no more than for paper - and ideally a little less.

If the ebook is more useful by being searchable or having a vary good index or having hyperlinks than I do not see any reason why not pay more than for a paper book. Now an ebook is nearly always less useful than a paperbook but that can change.