The eventual impact of ebooks on the used book market

[speakingtohe]

Originally Posted by harriska2

I'm also on the swap website and at first got rid of tons of books as I switched to ebook. It has *really* slowed down in the last year or so - I have lots of books on my swap site still available. I realize ebooks may lead to a diminished used book future - but I wonder if the cost of books will go down because people tend to buy "new" ebooks that that have money going to the pocket of the author (especially with self publishing) rather than used books which give nothing to the author. I buy a lot of used old books - especially elementary school science books - because the new ones are really crap.

I doubt prices will go down because of money going to the author. But they do seem to go down in time. And there are the giveaways and the coupons and the library for those of us lucky to have a good one.

A year ago I was thinking to buy a book that was 17.99 for the ebook and paperback and the hardback was 32.99. Today the ebook is 12.34, the paperback 11.99 and the hardcover 32.49. But my library has the book available

I acan't see the market changing much for used elementary science books, but I know absolutely nothing about it.

Helen

[Tarana]

Honestly, I don't think the supply of used books is primarily due to ebook reading. I think it is the economy - both for people parting with books and those buying books.
Back in the 80s and 90s, when people moved they threw out their books that they didn't want or donated them to charity (most of which were destroyed). Today, they instead sell them at a garage sale, sell at Amazon, swap or trade them online somewhere. Also, how much of the used book market is the result of aging baby boomers clearing out because of death, inability to read, or downsizing living quarters? They are a substantial population still. Many of those folks now have restricted incomes and are more likely to buy used rather than new, if they can.

I do not deny that ereaders will have some impact on the market. For instance, I'm divesting the last of my novels, collections of Stasheff and McCaffrey on ebay. My brother is selling his entire hardcover sci fi collection. My sisters, on the other hand, while not buying new books, don't get rid of any of their older ones.

[calvin-c]

Originally Posted by Tarana

Honestly, I don't think the supply of used books is primarily due to ebook reading. I think it is the economy - both for people parting with books and those buying books.
Back in the 80s and 90s, when people moved they threw out their books that they didn't want or donated them to charity (most of which were destroyed). Today, they instead sell them at a garage sale, sell at Amazon, swap or trade them online somewhere. Also, how much of the used book market is the result of aging baby boomers clearing out because of death, inability to read, or downsizing living quarters? They are a substantial population still. Many of those folks now have restricted incomes and are more likely to buy used rather than new, if they can.

I do not deny that ereaders will have some impact on the market. For instance, I'm divesting the last of my novels, collections of Stasheff and McCaffrey on ebay. My brother is selling his entire hardcover sci fi collection. My sisters, on the other hand, while not buying new books, don't get rid of any of their older ones.

Honestly I think you're extrapolating from a narrow view to the wider world. I've lived for a long time now & in a lot of places-and I don't remember people ever throwing out significant quantities of books when they moved. Donating to charity, yes-and I agree that a lot of those books ended up being destroyed.

Out of all the thousands of people I've known though I've only known a couple-certainly fewer than a dozen-that sold anything online. They buy plenty of stuff but again, it's just too much trouble for somebody who doesn't know what they're doing and only has a few hundred books to get rid of. By the time they figure things out they've sold everything. Besides, most people pack up & move in days or weeks, not months or years. I'm sure many would sell their books in bulk if they knew of anybody buying-but they don't. So they still donate them to charity.

Or they try selling them at garage/yard sales. Sometimes they're successful, sometimes it's like selling VHS tapes. I go to yard sales almost every weekend and I've been seeing fewer & fewer books over the last few years. That might be where I live now-but I started noticing it where I lived before so it might be wider spread too. It's hard to tell with a 'sample' of only two areas. When/if I move again (getting too old for moving every few years, I think) I'll get a better idea. For now I think it's because fewer people read any more. Judging by the paperwork I process a truer statement might be that fewer people are actually able to read any more. I've noticed that more & more news is video now. Online, of course-TV news has always been video with no need for the audience to read at all. Print news seems to be dying unfortunately. Probably because reading is.

[Lemurion]

Originally Posted by calvin-c

Very logical but, as somebody said, if the world were a logical place men would ride sidesaddle. I've certainly seen no diminishment in the supply of used pbooks so, if they're going to disappear then I think it'll take a long, long time.

I think it really depends where in the market you're looking as to what's happening with the numbers. There are more than enough used books in the system to keep it going for a very long time. Where we're likely to see the drop first is in mass-market paperback bestsellers.

With mass-market paperback sales dropping as ebooks rise, there are fewer copies of the new titles going into the system, and as this continues they'll get harder and harder to find. It may take a while, and the possible shift from used pbooks to ebooks may mask it as the demand goes down along with the supply, but used pbook stores are going to see the hit more and more.

[ApK]

Of course, I'd hope that by the time ebooks become a significant factor in killing the used pbook market, we'll have seen the light and created a thriving used ebook market.

[Katsunami]

Originally Posted by speakingtohe

I have yet to spot a book in the recycling bin in my building.

While cleaning up, I did put a huge amount of computer books from the 80's and 90's into the old paper bin, along with newspapers and advertisments... Nobody nowadays would read old books on long-gone computer stuff anymore. Asking someone to read that would be like like asking a doctor to study a book dated 1825.

I do intend to give away all paper novels, after I replaced them with ebooks. All but some very old Dutch ones can be replaced now.

[copyrite]

I am slowly replacing well loved paperbacks with ebooks. The books then go to Goodwill because there is no way I could ever throw out a book. Someone else has to do that!

[leebase]

Only the reduced buying of NEW paper books affects the supply of Used paper books. I imagine that is already happening and will only accelerate.

However, along with the decline in the source of used paper books will be a decline in the DEMAND for used paper books. There is a huge catalog of free out of copyright books, and new books being offered by non-established authors that are free or very low cost. And there is piracy. I imagine these forces will more than compensate for the decline in the creation of used paper books.

[leebase]

Originally Posted by rkomar

Used book shops used to be plentiful around my neighbourhood, but recently they've been dying like flies. As there are fewer places to take used books, more and more people will just toss them into the recycling bin rather than put them back into circulation. The change seems to be happening more quickly than I would have hoped for.

Right. That's the result of the decline of used book DEMAND, not availability. Fewer people are reading paper books period.

I imagine the online used book sites also affect used book stores just like they did for the likes of Borders books

[Waylander]

I don't think the disappearance of paper books is a good thing. The simple fact is they last a lot longer than ereaders.

[shalym]

Originally Posted by Waylander

I don't think the disappearance of paper books is a good thing. The simple fact is they last a lot longer than ereaders.

They may last longer than your average ereader, but do they last longer than your average ebook? I know that I have files on my computer that were originally created 20 years ago, and they're still usable--I also have paperbacks that I bought 10 years ago that are falling apart.

Shari

[DuskyRose]

Originally Posted by shalym

They may last longer than your average ereader, but do they last longer than your average ebook? I know that I have files on my computer that were originally created 20 years ago, and they're still usable--I also have paperbacks that I bought 10 years ago that are falling apart.

Shari

I know that Library books are said to have about 30-35 loans in them before they start to fall apart. And there have been complaints on the trade sites that books are falling apart faster. Which could be to cheaper paper, glue, and the stress of being handled and mailing. I have several trade-size that fell apart during the first reading. Bad glue.

And people lose whole pbook libraries all the time, due to water/liquid/smoke/fire damage. When I moved overseas I had to get rid of most of my MMPB books, and only had a box of "keepers". When I finally got them, guess which -one- box in the whole shipment had gotten wet? I lost the rest to mold.

At least with the ebooks I can save copies at home and off-site. When I had a safety deposit box I'd burn a DVD of all our pictures and books on a DVD and put a copy in there. Now we have a media safe and Carbonite.

With ebooks, the machines are just the 'cover'. Ruin a cover, and if you've been backup stuff up, the 'contents' are fine. I have more faith I can recover those than the pbooks I still have all over the place.

[covingtoncat73]

Originally Posted by shalym

They may last longer than your average ereader, but do they last longer than your average ebook? I know that I have files on my computer that were originally created 20 years ago, and they're still usable--I also have paperbacks that I bought 10 years ago that are falling apart.

Shari

Originally Posted by DuskyRose

I know that Library books are said to have about 30-35 loans in them before they start to fall apart. And there have been complaints on the trade sites that books are falling apart faster. Which could be to cheaper paper, glue, and the stress of being handled and mailing. I have several trade-size that fell apart during the first reading. Bad glue.

And people lose whole pbook libraries all the time, due to water/liquid/smoke/fire damage. When I moved overseas I had to get rid of most of my MMPB books, and only had a box of "keepers". When I finally got them, guess which -one- box in the whole shipment had gotten wet? I lost the rest to mold.

At least with the ebooks I can save copies at home and off-site. When I had a safety deposit box I'd burn a DVD of all our pictures and books on a DVD and put a copy in there. Now we have a media safe and Carbonite.

With ebooks, the machines are just the 'cover'. Ruin a cover, and if you've been backup stuff up, the 'contents' are fine. I have more faith I can recover those than the pbooks I still have all over the place.

True, true. It does depend on the book. An acid-free hardcover, properly cared for will last a lot longer than most computer files. Your average MM paperback that you take to the bath or the beach, probably not so much.

The thing about the ebook files is, their usability is dependent on software and hardware that support that file format. Also, a hard drive crash is a lot more likely than a house fire (probably).

[patrickt]

For 13 years I bought used books, mostly paperbacks, that tourists brought to Oaxaca, Mexico, where I lived, and left them here. Three years ago I got a Kindle, donated my paper books to the English library, and quite haunting the two used paperback dealers. A few days ago I checked the larger of the two, the English Library, and pickings were slim. The library folks say that Kindles are eating into the number of books brought and abandoned.

[GreenMonkey]

Originally Posted by covingtoncat73

True, true. It does depend on the book. An acid-free hardcover, properly cared for will last a lot longer than most computer files. Your average MM paperback that you take to the bath or the beach, probably not so much.

The thing about the ebook files is, their usability is dependent on software and hardware that support that file format. Also, a hard drive crash is a lot more likely than a house fire (probably).

There is indeed a big problem with technological obsolescence.

I had fun trying to open some of my dad's old writings from the late 1990s on from a 60mhz Pentium 1. It was very difficult to find a program that would parse them correctly (I believe they were WordStar files then later opened in MS Write but still saved as .doc - but definitely not MS office files despite the file extension).

Ditto with trying to use 16-bit software from the DOS/Win3.11/Win95 era - it simply won't run on a modern OS without emulation or VMs.

IMO a hardcover is a lot more likely to still be good in 30-40 years than any particular file type we have floating around now.

Good quick summary of the problem:

http://www.naa.gov.au/records-manage...olescence.aspx

Obsolescence – a key challenge in the digital age

There is a widely held perception that information recorded digitally is secure forever. This idea has been reinforced by marketing messages for products like audio CDs, personal computers and digital cameras. This idea is appealing, but it is completely untrue.

The rapid pace of development in computer hardware, operating systems and application software, coupled with the short effective life of most storage media, means that decades of digital data are at risk or already lost. The long-term accessibility and authenticity of digital records can only be assured through proactive preservation measures.

Digital records are subject to three potential forms of obsolescence:

1 - The physical carrier of the record becomes obsolete. Standard media of the 1980s, such as 8 inch and 5¼ inch floppy disks, are no longer commercially available. Over time, current media such as CDs and DVDs will also become obsolete.
2 - The hardware needed to access the record becomes obsolete. Both the drives needed to read the media and the computers required to operate them have become obsolete in our rapidly changing world. It is almost impossible to obtain working drives for 8 inch and 5¼ inch floppy disks. Most new computers have a usable life of only three to five years and are not fitted with floppy disk drives.
3 - The software needed to access the record becomes obsolete. This includes either the software to read and write the record or the operating system to run the software, or both. For example, during the 1980s WordStar was widely used, but it is now no longer readily available. The fact that WordStar used a closed data format makes continuing accessibility even more problematic.

That said, epub (open standard, fairly popular) and mobi (popular) are probably going to be readable for quite a while, but not forever.