Charlie Stross: Publishers "Cutting their own throats"

[kennyc]

Matthew Ingram response:

.....Publishers — and some authors, especially those who control the Authors Guild, which has fought every attempt by Google and others to open up the book market — have been so obsessed with piracy and locking down their products that they have allowed Amazon to take control of their fate (if that reminds you of Apple and the music industry, that’s probably not a coincidence). Instead of making it easy for readers to download their authors’ work on different platforms and share and copy it, they have only made it easier for Amazon to control them and dominate the industry.

As some authors have pointed out, even if you take advantage of Amazon’s self-publishing options to avoid having to get a traditional publishing deal, you’ve really just exchanged one corporate overlord for another. For most writers, the ideal would be an industry with multiple players — but unfortunately, their own publishers have helped make that even less of a possibility. And Amazon is the major beneficiary.

http://gigaom.com/2011/12/02/how-pub...eat-them-with/

[carld]

Originally Posted by kennyc

Matthew Ingram response:


http://gigaom.com/2011/12/02/how-pub...eat-them-with/

I really don't think Ingram gets it right here.

>attempt by Google and others to open up the book market

Google wasn't attempting to "open up the book market" they were trying to do an end run around copyright law by scanning other people's work and selling it. This wasn't an altruistic move on Google's part, they were motivated by potential profit just like any other corporation.

>Instead of making it easy for readers to download their authors’ work on different platforms and share and copy it

You can still do that if you want too. You can publish on Amazon without DRM, you can release your book on your own website, Smashwords or others that don't use DRM.

>As some authors have pointed out, even if you take advantage of Amazon’s self-publishing options to avoid having to get a traditional publishing deal, you’ve really just exchanged one corporate overlord for another.

Unlike the big publishers who tightly control what's done with your book, while retaining the rights for years, Amazon doesn't restrict what you do with your book outside of Amazon (other than price matching). If you want to release your book into the public domain, publish it at Apple, Smashwords, B&N, Overdrive, wherever, you're completely free to do so.

>For most writers, the ideal would be an industry with multiple players

It's still an industry of multiple players. Amazon may be the largest for now, but they are far and away from being the only major player in the game.

[Andrew H.]

Originally Posted by carld

I really don't think Ingram gets it right here.

Me neither. He points out some (maybe) inconveniences in the e-book market, but doesn't show how removing them would weaken Amazon.

>Instead of making it easy for readers to download their authors’ work on different platforms and share and copy it

It is already easy for readers to download their authors' work on different platforms; I'm not sure what they would do to make it easier. And consumers, by and large, would prefer to just go to *one* platform because it's more convenient. There has to be a compelling reason to go to multiple platforms, and I don't see one here. (In fact, agency pricing has probably done the most to make competing platforms viable since Amazon can no longer compete on price).

As for sharing and copying (by which I assume he means removing DRM) - I don't think that would harm Amazon. Amazon isn't a proponent of DRM; it comes from publishers and I'm sure they'd be happy if it were gone since it would probably encourage people to buy more. Removing DRM didn't hurt the iTunes store, and I can't see how it would harm Amazon. If anything, it would help Amazon by making it easier for non-Kindle owners to shop there.

>As some authors have pointed out, even if you take advantage of Amazon’s self-publishing options to avoid having to get a traditional publishing deal, you’ve really just exchanged one corporate overlord for another.

Yeah, Amazon does give authors a lot of freedom. And of course authors can self-publish as far as that goes. But, at some level, if you want all of the benefits that a large corporation can provide you, you'll end up owing something to that corporation.

>For most writers, the ideal would be an industry with multiple players

It's still an industry of multiple players. Amazon may be the largest for now, but they are far and away from being the only major player in the game.

This, basically. Amazon is where they are because they are very good at what they do, not because of any mistake made by the publishers that gave them some sort of advantage. The only thing the publishers can really do is give other providers the opportunity to do what Amazon does, and hope that they are able to execute well.

And the publishers's most effective tool has been agency pricing, which guarantees retailers a certain profit that they might not get if they were competing with Amazon. I don't really like it, as it basically supports retailers at the expense of the consumer. But I think it is working.

[Ken Maltby]

Its hard to view the authors as just misguided victims in this whole process. Take the
example of Lawrence Watt-Evans and his "Obsidian Chronicles" series; He is a very
savvy internet user with ebooks released through many outlets, and yet for this series
you can only find the first book in the series available as an ebook. The rest of the trilogy
is only available in paperback or hardback.

Much of what I've seen at Baen Books follows a similar pattern, with only some parts
of series available for purchase as an ebook.

As a reader and ebook purchaser I find this a deliberate slap in the face by the author,
and a very odd and cynical move on their part.

Luck;
Ken

[ATDrake]

Originally Posted by Ken Maltby

Take the example of Lawrence Watt-Evans and his "Obsidian Chronicles" series; He is a very savvy internet user with ebooks released through many outlets, and yet for this series you can only find the first book in the series available as an ebook. The rest of the trilogy is only available in paperback or hardback.

Much of what I've seen at Baen Books follows a similar pattern, with only some parts of series available for purchase as an ebook.

As a reader and ebook purchaser I find this a deliberate slap in the face by the author, and a very odd and cynical move on their part.

Lawrence Watt-Evans doesn't have the rights or control to release certain of his books in e-editions, and then it becomes up to the publisher to do so, which they often don't.

He's previously blogged in the past about how he wished the two "missing" Ethshar books right in the middle of the series (which also happen to be out of print) were available because he's well aware that they kind of screw the reading order for his fans (especially since one of them is an important linking volume that's part of a major story arc involving the warlocks).

But unlike the early rights-reverted ones he took to Wildside (who did e-editions), and the latest ones he writes via a subscription model on his website (which then get picked up and paper/e-printed by Wildside as well), he can't release them himself because Tor or whoever it was who bought the series after he moved over from Del Rey/Ballantine either has no plans to release e-versions/isn't returning the rights.

In Baen's case, the guy who managed most of their Webscription activity died last year and it turned out he was doing a lot of the associated work on a basically volunteer basis, so they'd been scrambling to replace him, and it costs to bring books older than Webscriptions (which dates back to 1999, IIRC) back into e-print simply due to different file formats and such which have to be converted over.

They are slowly filling in the gaps for some of the series by the really popular authors with moderately high demand (some of those Mercedes Lackey books, and some Anne McCaffrey stuff, for example). And Baen has had to remove books from their old Webscription bundles because the authors have withdrawn distribution rights, planning their own releases now that the market is growing (Doranna Durgin, Holly Lisle, and probably some others I haven't noticed).

[Fbone]

Originally Posted by carld

Unlike the big publishers who tightly control what's done with your book, while retaining the rights for years, Amazon doesn't restrict what you do with your book outside of Amazon (other than price matching). If you want to release your book into the public domain, publish it at Apple, Smashwords, B&N, Overdrive, wherever, you're completely free to do so.

If you use Amazon's publishing imprint, they require exclusivity. Same if you wish to add your titles to Prime Lending.

[Ken Maltby]

Originally Posted by ATDrake

Lawrence Watt-Evans doesn't have the rights or control to release certain of his books in e-editions, and then it becomes up to the publisher to do so, which they often don't.

He's previously blogged in the past about how he wished the two "missing" Ethshar books right in the middle of the series (which also happen to be out of print) were available because he's well aware that they kind of screw the reading order for his fans (especially since one of them is an important linking volume that's part of a major story arc involving the warlocks).

But unlike the early rights-reverted ones he took to Wildside (who did e-editions), and the latest ones he writes via a subscription model on his website (which then get picked up and paper/e-printed by Wildside as well), he can't release them himself because Tor or whoever it was who bought the series after he moved over from Del Rey/Ballantine either has no plans to release e-versions/isn't returning the rights.

In Baen's case, the guy who managed most of their Webscription activity died last year and it turned out he was doing a lot of the associated work on a basically volunteer basis, so they'd been scrambling to replace him, and it costs to bring books older than Webscriptions (which dates back to 1999, IIRC) back into e-print simply due to different file formats and such which have to be converted over.

They are slowly filling in the gaps for some of the series by the really popular authors with moderately high demand (some of those Mercedes Lackey books, and some Anne McCaffrey stuff, for example). And Baen has had to remove books from their old Webscription bundles because the authors have withdrawn distribution rights, planning their own releases now that the market is growing (Doranna Durgin, Holly Lisle, and probably some others I haven't noticed).

That is all good news, but if even the most informed and appreciative of the
value of ebook sales authors are making deals that result in no ebook sales,
we have a long way to go.

I understand that paper book sales still dominate the marketplace, by a large
margin, and that most successful books will have the paper book release as a
priority over the ebook. Its natural that authors would have that in mind
when negotiating their book deals, but ebooks have certainly grown beyond
a minor afterthought that they may once have been. The trend may even
end with the pbook as a special "Collectors Edition", to a limited number of
fans who are willing to pay a higher price, and the real money maker being
the larger sales of the less expensive ebook.

Luck;
Ken

[teh603]

Originally Posted by ATDrake

Lawrence Watt-Evans doesn't have the rights or control to release certain of his books in e-editions, and then it becomes up to the publisher to do so, which they often don't.

He's previously blogged in the past about how he wished the two "missing" Ethshar books right in the middle of the series (which also happen to be out of print) were available because he's well aware that they kind of screw the reading order for his fans (especially since one of them is an important linking volume that's part of a major story arc involving the warlocks).

But unlike the early rights-reverted ones he took to Wildside (who did e-editions), and the latest ones he writes via a subscription model on his website (which then get picked up and paper/e-printed by Wildside as well), he can't release them himself because Tor or whoever it was who bought the series after he moved over from Del Rey/Ballantine either has no plans to release e-versions/isn't returning the rights.

See, this is why I don't classify sales in used bookstores as stolen sales the way the big publishers do. Most of the time, the books in the used bookstores are already out of print and aren't available anywhere else.

Unfortunately, the publishers have already circled the wagons and are doing everything they can to prevent any secondary distribution of books, even print ones. Never mind that they've already taken the print books I want out of print so I have no choice but to get it in the secondary market or download a bootleg.

Case in point, the Knights of the Old Republic sourcebook for Star Wars Saga Edition. The print run was so pathetically short and the book so insanely popular that six months later it was gone from the shelves and selling for about $500 on Amazon. Its unavailable as of this writing, don't bother looking. The only way you can get it now is to download a bootleg copy, and I knew a lot of people who would've bought it if WotC had made it available.

Then again, WotC is slowly digging its own grave by inches. Their only really popular product line left is Magic since they started the D&D edition war.

In Baen's case, the guy who managed most of their Webscription activity died last year and it turned out he was doing a lot of the associated work on a basically volunteer basis, so they'd been scrambling to replace him, and it costs to bring books older than Webscriptions (which dates back to 1999, IIRC) back into e-print simply due to different file formats and such which have to be converted over.

Nuclear reformatting can't be that hard. Open the document in a word processor, copy into notepad, paste, save as .txt. Done in less than five minutes. Hopefully they didn't use a bizarre word processor like Appleworks 16 (as in Apple IIgs era), Symentec GreatWorks, or Nissus Writer.

They are slowly filling in the gaps for some of the series by the really popular authors with moderately high demand (some of those Mercedes Lackey books, and some Anne McCaffrey stuff, for example). And Baen has had to remove books from their old Webscription bundles because the authors have withdrawn distribution rights, planning their own releases now that the market is growing (Doranna Durgin, Holly Lisle, and probably some others I haven't noticed).

The only surprise here is that the authors didn't try doing this earlier. It doesn't take much to generate a PDF; the classic Macs had an rdev called Print2PDF as early as the late '90s that could generate a PDF of any word processing document.

[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by teh603

Nuclear reformatting can't be that hard. Open the document in a word processor, copy into notepad, paste, save as .txt. Done in less than five minutes. Hopefully they didn't use a bizarre word processor like Appleworks 16 (as in Apple IIgs era), Symentec GreatWorks, or Nissus Writer.

Quark Xpress was common for print formatting. So was Pagemaker. These are both convertible today, but the actual formatting would need to be redone from scratch. Some of the other formats are now entirely inaccessible; the easiest way to convert is chop-and-scan a physical copy, OCR and proofread, and again, reformat entirely.

Getting a TXT file is relatively easy; resetting chapter headings, scene breaks inside a chapter, indented quotes, and so on is several hours per book. Not awful for any company that's budgeted for the time, but if there's only a limited labor pool, it's going to be focused on new works, not converting old ones, except when there's particular demand.

The only surprise here is that the authors didn't try doing this earlier. It doesn't take much to generate a PDF; the classic Macs had an rdev called Print2PDF as early as the late '90s that could generate a PDF of any word processing document.

"Late 90's" was not long ago in the print industry. And although many books were converted & printed from PDFs, they weren't retained after the print run was finished. File storage was a lot more expensive (not that any one book cost too much to retain but saving them *all* would require both drive space and some kind of archiving system, both of which were resources publishers didn't want to bother with). And besides, once the decision was made to stop printing entirely, why retain a copy? It'd have to be reformatted if the print run were redone anyway, potentially with a new introduction and such, maybe new fonts, possibly errata changes. The print-ready PDF wasn't the file they'd be most likely to save.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by Ken Maltby

That is all good news, but if even the most informed and appreciative of the
value of ebook sales authors are making deals that result in no ebook sales,
we have a long way to go.

Yes, we have a loooonnnggg way to go.
But it isn't necessarily so that authors are *now* making deals that result in no ebook sales (though quite a few are doing exactly that) just that many/most are bound by their *past* deals with publishers who neither exercise the ebook rights they control nor give them up.

I'm thinking that if the author's guild would take a few seconds to worry about something other than piracy and Amazon, they might discover a worthier cause to lobby for: a use-it-or-lose-it campaign, even if (as it most likely) all they can do is browbeat the publishers.
At least, for a change, they would be browbeating a worthy target for a worthy issue.

[carld]

Originally Posted by JoeD

Agency pricing may have been put in place to stop amazon getting a monopoly

It was really set up to raise the price of ebooks in order to protect the big six publisher's hardback profits.

[cfrizz]

So did they assume that if one is a HC buyer, they would never convert to ebooks and if they saw the more expensive price of ebooks would simply buy the hc?

Or have a good many HC buyers switched over to ebooks & seeing the high price possibly stopped or greatly cutback on their purchases.

Originally Posted by carld

It was really set up to raise the price of ebooks in order to protect the big six publisher's hardback profits.

[carld]

Not being privy to their meetings I can't say what their rational was for certain, but from what I read it was hoped that higher ebook prices would cause HC buyers to stay HC buyers. I don't have any idea if it worked or not.

[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by carld

Not being privy to their meetings I can't say what their rational was for certain, but from what I read it was hoped that higher ebook prices would cause HC buyers to stay HC buyers. I don't have any idea if it worked or not.

It hasn't.
Between Sept 2010 and Sept 2011, hardcover sales dropped by 18%, and ebook sales doubled. MMPB sales dropped by over 50%.

[stonetools]

Mike shatzkin analyzes why the publishers instituited agency pricing HERE.

Money quote:

well, agency seems to have accomplished its purpose of preventing Amazon from maintaining a stranglehold Kindle share through their deep-pocketed ability to forgo margin for a pricing advantage. The other retailers in the ebook market have their margin protected

Agency pricing was an attempt to prevent Amazon from monopolizing the ebook market by pricing ebooks below cost. That is fundamentally what it was about.
Publishers actually had to reduce their margins to implement agency pricing .