What's the deal with generic covers in ebooks?

[Katsunami]

I think it's just lame laziness or unwillingness of the publisher/author to pay/authorize the cover. Ever bought a paper book without a front cover? Don't think so.

If I get such an e-book, I use Calibre's editor (previously, Sigil) to replace the generic file. This only works if the book is de-DRM-ed or has no DRM to begin with, though.

Although I don't use covers on my reader (for now), all my books have covers in Calibre.

[GeoffR]

For almost all of the books I have bought with a generic cover, I have been able to go to the publisher's website and download the proper high resolution cover image for free. So I don't think it can be an issue of the publisher not having rights to the image.

Edit: Unless it is a way to avoid paying the cover artist. Perhaps if they include the cover with the ebook they would have to pay the artist a percentage of the book's price, but if they give away the cover separately for free the royalty would be a percentage of zero?

[Alfy]

Originally Posted by GeoffR

For almost all of the books I have bought with a generic cover, I have been able to go to the publisher's website and download the proper high resolution cover image for free. So I don't think it can be an issue of the publisher not having rights to the image.

Edit: Unless it is a way to avoid paying the cover artist. Perhaps if they include the cover with the ebook they would have to pay the artist a percentage of the book's price, but if they give away the cover separately for free the royalty would be a percentage of zero?

Well, the publisher might have paid for the right to use the image for promotional purposes, in which case, yes, they will use it on their website.

[Katsunami]

Originally Posted by GeoffR

For almost all of the books I have bought with a generic cover, I have been able to go to the publisher's website and download the proper high resolution cover image for free. So I don't think it can be an issue of the publisher not having rights to the image.

Edit: Unless it is a way to avoid paying the cover artist. Perhaps if they include the cover with the ebook they would have to pay the artist a percentage of the book's price, but if they give away the cover separately for free the royalty would be a percentage of zero?

No use. In a DRM-ed book, you can't replace the cover. You would only be able to replace it in Calibre itself, but the actual book wouldn't be changed.

[Barty]

I hacked my kindle to show book cover when in stand by, using the entire 6" screen, so I don't like seeing the generic cover. I can and do fix it with calibre, but it's a bit annoying. Esp when I'm not sure I even like the book yet.

[Namekuseijin]

whenever I find them, I cover covers

[rkomar]

We've had cover discussions here at MR before, and I vaguely recall that one of the reasons that fancy covers aren't always used is that the vendors charge the publishers an increasing amount based on ebook byte size. A nice picture cover can easily take up more bytes than all of the text in the ebook. A generic text-only image that uses two or three colours can be quite small, though, cutting down the size of the book significantly.

[GeoffR]

Originally Posted by Katsunami

No use. In a DRM-ed book, you can't replace the cover. You would only be able to replace it in Calibre itself, but the actual book wouldn't be changed.

Not true for Kobo devices. You can use Calibre's KoboUtilities plugin to replace covers for any book on the device, even those that have DRM.

[tidegirl]

I have replaced all of my generic covers in Calibre, but they did not all transfer to my new PW2 in AZW3. I guess I am going to have to reconvert all o them to mobi and reload them.

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by tidegirl

I have replaced all of my generic covers in Calibre, but they did not all transfer to my new PW2 in AZW3. I guess I am going to have to reconvert all o them to mobi and reload them.

Is it still showing the old cover? or none?

If there is no cover, it may be a cache issue.

[tidegirl]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Is it still showing the old cover? or none?

If there is no cover, it may be a cache issue.

It shows the auto generated generic cover in the library, no cover in the book when opened. They all had downloaded covers in the metadata when I sideloaded them.

I take that back. The new book I just opened to start does have the cover as the first page, but the auto gen cover in the library.

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by tidegirl

It shows the auto generated generic cover in the library, no cover in the book when opened. They all had downloaded covers in the metadata when I sideloaded them.

I take that back. The new book I just opened to start does have the cover as the first page, but the auto gen cover in the library.

When you say auto gen cover, you mean the blank background with title and author that the Kindle generates? That is the blank cover I mean; try resending it, as I believe the cover just didn't take. Always disconnect your Kindle via the calibre Eject device option, and this shouldn't happen.

And delete the book via the Kindle GUI before resending, to prevent cache issues from also doing this.

[magicmonster]

I have been known to replace a new style cover with a better or first remembered one. For example new novels of Mirror of Her Dreams had a Michael Whelen cover and newest e-book has a crappy cover. So in goes Whelen...