Is piracy likely to harm ebook sales?

[delphidb96]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

But publishers aren't in business to make ebooks work. They're in business to make money. Spending lots of money now on temp workers to convert a massive back catalogue is a good route to bankruptcy.

Not that back catalogue isn't important! But I think that they can't afford a crash program.

What? In *THIS* economy?!? Temp workers are cheap, Cheap, CHEAP!!! Hell, just hiring 20 temps and building 20 of those digicam book scanners would be cheap enough to do the job for any major publisher. Or they can just wait it out. In which case, the average reader will become so dissatisfied that you'll see thousands of $100 digicam book scanners being built at home and the used-book stores raided for those OOP titles. (Remember, after the first 4 dozen titles purchased, one can, by trading back in, get another 3 dozen for free.)

But then, I believe I've made it clear that the major publishers are taking a 'Please let me cut my nose off to spite my face' approach to ebooks.

Derek

[CyGuy]

Heck, they could do it even easier than that. They can actually download the "Darknet" version legally (since they own the copyright and likely would not sue themselves). Then just clean them up to the highest quality standards, and sell them. Better than starting from scratch I would think...

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by DawnFalcon

You're drastically over-stating the costs involved. Hiring freelance editors to convert novels is not that expensive, especially when you're doing a few thousand books. It might cost, conceivably, as much as a single marketing campaign for a bestseller, and will have a much greater long-term effect on the bottom line.

You don't need editors. You need proofreaders who can a/b compare the paper copy to the OCRed electronic opy and you may then need one other person to do the conversion to different eBook formats.

[Logseman]

Originally Posted by CyGuy

Heck, they could do it even easier than that. They can actually download the "Darknet" version legally (since they own the copyright and likely would not sue themselves). Then just clean them up to the highest quality standards, and sell them. Better than starting from scratch I would think...

They could be doing it already, but that wouldn't work for translations, in my opinion. Proofreading translations usually equates translating the original text yourself, because you have a different grasp of the original text than the translator had.

[pdurrant]

If I'm wrong and you're all correct, I can't understand why publishers aren't doing it.

A good question to ask the head of a big publisher?

[DawnFalcon]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

If I'm wrong and you're all correct, I can't understand why publishers aren't doing it.

Um, are you serious?

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by DawnFalcon

Um, are you serious?

Yep. You're suggesting that the big publishers could digitise their entire back catalogue (of which they have rights, at least) for a relatively insignificant sum.

I don't believe this to be the case, or they would be doing it, or at least, be planning to do it, very quickly.

As if they could do it, it would be a no-brainer to do it. Since they're not doing it, there must be some reason why they're not doing it. Cost seems most likely, if not in the actual digitisation work (which would need to include proofing), perhaps in the legal aspects of finding out which books they have ebook rights to, and which they don't.

[DawnFalcon]

That assumes they know what they're doing with ebooks.

As the Agency Cartel and the following confusion shows, they don't have a bloody clue.


Do you really think Baen's success is a coincidence? The Baen Free Library is a good part of it, for instance - but try to explain to a big book exec why he should give away some of his company's ebooks for free.

[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

As if they could do it, it would be a no-brainer to do it. Since they're not doing it, there must be some reason why they're not doing it. Cost seems most likely, if not in the actual digitisation work (which would need to include proofing), perhaps in the legal aspects of finding out which books they have ebook rights to, and which they don't.

1) Digital rights--they don't have the right to digitize their entire backlist, even the early books of series. They may have the right to digitize #1 because it's re-released in paperback when #5 comes out in hardcover, but not have access to #'s 2 & 3.

2) They really are, for the most part, oblivious to how the web works away from corporate sponsored websites. They don't know how to find books on the torrents, and their IT departments have filled their heads with visions of viruses and trojans that will destroy their entire network in seconds if they download anything from an unapproved site. (The IT dept's have done this mainly to keep them from downloading malware from doom while trying to get a free copy of SuperBlasterMegaKill II, or whatever the video game of the week is. And somewhat to keep them from accidentally uploading the company's entire email archives to some torrent somewhere.)

3) The labor that's freely available on fansites, including Gutenberg, is not freely available for HarperCollins or Macmillan--and they don't even know how to shop for the people who do the kind of work they'd need for ebook conversions. If they figure it out, they don't know how to justify the expense; they can't measure the market for products that have never existed.

4) They don't know that there's enough interest to justify it. There might not be--I won't be buying any $9 DRM'd backlist titles, when I could get a used paperback for $2 and scan it myself. (Most people won't go that route--but still won't buy the backlist title instead of a new one.)

I think a lot of people here are underestimating the expense and difficulty involved for a publisher to convert a book that they do not already have an accurate digital copy for into an e-book. Right now I am finishing up converting a used paperback book into an epub file for my personal use and I can tell you the process will ultimately have involved about 40 – 60 hours of work. That is to get a work that matches the original text and is in a nice format for my reader. I should mention that this is a book of about 200 pages; a cost per page model is appropriate here. Sure the publishers could not pay for all that effort for proofing the OCR output from scan and be able to sell it for a relatively cheap price, but that's all it would be worth. And this assumes that the publisher already has rights to publish as an e-book without having to go back and negotiate for these rights with the author or copyright holder.

[random50]

hamlet53, I would much, much, much rather have a poorly OCRed digital version of a book that has blatantly not passed through the eyeballs of even a single proofreader than no digital version at all. Hell, that's mostly what I already have! Many of them weren't that cheap, either. They were more expensive than a used copy and similar to a new copy, for the most part.

This doesn't have to be either/or. Sales of the poorly OCRed version could be used both to determine whether a cleaner version is worth funding, and also to fund that cleaner version.

[Worldwalker]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

As if they could do it, it would be a no-brainer to do it.

No-brainer? Remember, this is the publishing industry we're talking about.

By the way, I'm 3 stories into Kai Lung Raises His Voice and loving it.

P.S. Hamlet, if it costs the publisher $10 an hour to hire some college students for that 40-60 hours, that's $400-$600 to convert the book. In publishing terms, that's too small even to be pocket change. Even when you account for royalties, etc., if they're selling the book directly, they'll be turning a profit after the first couple dozen copies.

They're afraid to cut into the sales of their hardcovers. But here's something to think about:

What if movie studios had refused to release movies on DVD for fear of cutting into their LaserDisc sales? (remember LaserDisc? pretend for the sake of the example that it lasted longer than it did) How much money did they ever make off of LaserDicsc? Not a whole lot, because only a handful of aficionados could afford the $100+ discs and the insanely expensive player. How much do they make off of DVDs? Enough so that DVD profits can surpass theatrical profits, and enough so that they can do straight-to-DVD movies (generally awful ones, but still) and make a profit off those, too. It was getting the price of the movies down to something within the impulse purchase range that made all the difference. Cheaper movies drove sales of DVD players, which expanded the market for movies, allowing economies of scale (and even some competition) to operate and produce still-cheaper movies, etc. Ebooks are still in the LaserDisc stage. Unfortunately, publishers seem to be very slow on the uptake.

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by Worldwalker

No-brainer? Remember, this is the publishing industry we're talking about.

Originally Posted by Worldwalker

By the way, I'm 3 stories into Kai Lung Raises His Voice and loving it.

I'm very pleased to hear it. When you've finished it, a review at Amzon would be much appreciated.

[Greg Anos]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

Yep. You're suggesting that the big publishers could digitise their entire back catalogue (of which they have rights, at least) for a relatively insignificant sum.

I don't believe this to be the case, or they would be doing it, or at least, be planning to do it, very quickly.

As if they could do it, it would be a no-brainer to do it. Since they're not doing it, there must be some reason why they're not doing it. Cost seems most likely, if not in the actual digitisation work (which would need to include proofing), perhaps in the legal aspects of finding out which books they have ebook rights to, and which they don't.

It's all about control. The publishing culture has many, many, years of control of content. (and I include many authors in the culture as well).

I keep thinking of Don Rickles in Kelly's Heroes.
Telly Savalas: "Nobody's moving that Tiger."
Don Rickles: "Then make a deal."
Telly Savalas: "What kind of Deal?"
Don Rickles: "A Deal deal! Maybe the guy's a Republican..."

The publishing industry refuses to make a Deal deal. Here's sample deal.

Publisher X has print right to author Y's back list, or most of it. No e-books have been released. Publisher X offer the following deal...

A 50/50 split of revenue. The publisher has a new imprint - call it Backlist Books. Price $5 per book, no DRM. The publisher does nothing to provide the text, that's the author's job. The publisher point out that the author can scan his own, or see what's available on the "darknet" to steal back and use them if they wish. The publisher doesn't care. If the OCR proofing is bad, readers can complain to the authors.

The revenue is small ($2.50) an e-book, but the costs are even lower. From the publisher's viewpoint, just web hosting costs. From the author (or heirs and assigns) either scanning costs, or downloading effort. And of the authors were really smart, they'd put a placeholder for their books not yet offered, begging for a fan to do a nice job scanning for the author. Offload to cost to the customer.

$2.50 a copy gross may not seem like much, but you're making $0 as is now. Piracy? Is it not better to get some revenue and some piracy than no revenue and some piracy? That's been Baen's bottom line for years. They, and their authors, don't seem to be at bankruptcy's door because of it.

But you give up control....

[djgreedo]

Originally Posted by Worldwalker

P.S. Hamlet, if it costs the publisher $10 an hour to hire some college students for that 40-60 hours, that's $400-$600 to convert the book. In publishing terms, that's too small even to be pocket change. Even when you account for royalties, etc., if they're selling the book directly, they'll be turning a profit after the first couple dozen copies.

I think you're dramatically underestimating the costs to the publisher and probably overestimating how much return they are likely to get from the ebook version (in the short term, which is all the shareholders care about).

Firstly, a publisher isn't going to hire a bored college student to do this work. Believe it or not they would hire professionals who would be getting paid a lot more than $10 per hour. On top of that hourly rate there are taxes, etc. You cost your employer a lot more than whatever your hourly rate is. And there will probably be at least 2 rounds of proofreading on the manuscript. And someone will need to format the ebook to the desired format(s) - again professionally.

I think several thousand dollars is a conservative estimate for getting a book into ebook format if the book wasn't already in electronic format.

When the publisher sells that ebook, some of the 'cover price' is going towards overheads, royalties, the retailer, etc. To recover the costs of creating an ebook they may have to sell hundreds or even thousands of copies. And ebook sales are still a tiny fraction of the book market.