Thank Apple and the big six publishers for their collusion in fixing e-book prices and coming up with the agency model for ebooks. Pet peeve of mine too, but long term it's going to be the big six's downfall.
Literature Ebooks Vs Paper books
- Thread starter RascalsMom
- Start date
Thank Apple and the big six publishers for their collusion in fixing e-book prices and coming up with the agency model for ebooks. Pet peeve of mine too, but long term it's going to be the big six's downfall.
AeryFairy
Anachronism
I'll send them a nice ecard to say thanks. What's next, postage on emails?
Although, amazon (and others maybe?) lets you self publish and fix the price yourself. I plan on doing this when I finish my novel.
That's why I think long term the legacy publishers are toast when it comes to ebooks. Amazon pays a higher royalty rate to the authors and I believe the authors can still make more even with lower priced books than what they are getting from the legacy publishers. I'm sure there will be some big name authors jumping ship as soon as their current contracts are fulfilled with their current publisher. That and the book industry hasn't learned from the music industry when music went digital. Consumers don't want DRM and they want a reasonable price or they will just download it for free via the darknet.
Muggle
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I used to be a kindle-hater. But I got given a kindle two weeks ago as a birthday present. Person who gave it to me did say that it was because I have too many books. (I am having trouble storing them at the moment. My clothes live on the floor because my chest of drawers is full of books. )
I kinda love my kindle. While it will help with the aforementioned space issue, it's very bad news for my bank account. My rule was that I could only buy books from second-hand/charity shops (not even second-hand from amazon) unless they were new releases from favourite authors and/or a series I'm following. It worked quite well because I only go into town about once a month now and I don't always find the books that I want or ones that I think I will like. But now? Already spent £40 on kindle books.
It's not going to stop me going into the bookshops and buying proper books though.
If I come across a copy of a book I already have on my kindle that is less than £1 I will probably buy it. Mainly to complete my collections. (Take my Terry Pratchett collection. I have about 16 proper books by him and most of the kindle books I've brought (7 of them) are by him. But if I see them for really cheap I will buy them again because I want to look at my bookcases and see them. I'm strange like that )
I kinda love my kindle. While it will help with the aforementioned space issue, it's very bad news for my bank account. My rule was that I could only buy books from second-hand/charity shops (not even second-hand from amazon) unless they were new releases from favourite authors and/or a series I'm following. It worked quite well because I only go into town about once a month now and I don't always find the books that I want or ones that I think I will like. But now? Already spent £40 on kindle books.
It's not going to stop me going into the bookshops and buying proper books though.
If I come across a copy of a book I already have on my kindle that is less than £1 I will probably buy it. Mainly to complete my collections. (Take my Terry Pratchett collection. I have about 16 proper books by him and most of the kindle books I've brought (7 of them) are by him. But if I see them for really cheap I will buy them again because I want to look at my bookcases and see them. I'm strange like that )There are tons of free out of copyright books available, reasonably priced kindle books, etc. , quite a few libraries offer digital check outs as well though the selection is still somewhat limited and there are waits on the popular titles.
Muggle
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Go to MobileRead Forum. They're based out of Canada, tons of international members and volunteers who have converted out of copyright books to the various ebook formats. They go off of Canada's copyright laws which are less stringent than US copyright. Don't know what the UK's rules are, they only ask that you respect the copyright laws in your country, not that anyone probably does, but whatever. Go to the ebook link (top center) on this page and start browsing.
http://www.mobileread.com/forums/index.php
Also Project Gutenberg is worth checking out.
http://www.gutenberg.org/
As with any digital media, piracy especially of popular titles runs rampant, YMMV. Certainly not endorsing/condoning piracy but it is out there, especially given the higher price on ebooks vs paper by the big publishers.
Kitties
Forum Legend
Paper books and I'll probably stay with that. I'm also a slow reader. I don't get through a book very fast. So I don't really need the instant download of an e book.
I'm big into eBooks. I own an Ectaco Jetbook lite and the majority of my reading is now done on it.
However I still back up the books that I like with the hard copy versions.
I have a personal library of over a thousand books and growing.
The big difference that eBooks have brought to me is that I'm reading more new authors, more often.
After I moved away from the city that I grew up in, and away from my favorite used book store, I wasn't getting new (used) books as often as I did while growing up (I would fill a grocery bag with paperbacks every week). I went into a downward reading spiral. I had a collection of around 600 books at that time, and I re-read every one of them at the very least 15 or more times (I read very fast). During this time I also (for some odd reason) lost most of willingness to experience new authors and had a hard time doing so.
It felt like my brain slowed down for years and it's actually just now starting to run up to normal operating speed again.
This is due in some part to my Public Library, but in a large part I feel it's because of the eBooks and my greater willingness to experience new authors in this format.
However I still back up the books that I like with the hard copy versions.
I have a personal library of over a thousand books and growing.
The big difference that eBooks have brought to me is that I'm reading more new authors, more often.
After I moved away from the city that I grew up in, and away from my favorite used book store, I wasn't getting new (used) books as often as I did while growing up (I would fill a grocery bag with paperbacks every week). I went into a downward reading spiral. I had a collection of around 600 books at that time, and I re-read every one of them at the very least 15 or more times (I read very fast). During this time I also (for some odd reason) lost most of willingness to experience new authors and had a hard time doing so.
It felt like my brain slowed down for years and it's actually just now starting to run up to normal operating speed again.
This is due in some part to my Public Library, but in a large part I feel it's because of the eBooks and my greater willingness to experience new authors in this format.
