Joe Carter at First Thoughts passes on excerpts from a Financial Times article, about how Amazon’s and Google’s pricing policies are destroying the market for hardcover books.
Arnaud Nourry, chief executive of French publishing group Hachette Livre, said unilateral pricing by Google, Amazon and other e-book retailers such as Barnes & Noble could destroy profits and kill the lucrative trade in hardback editions.
Most of my book buying is in softcover, mainly because I’m poor. I made it a project, years back, to get most of my C. S. Lewis in hardcover, though. I suspect that if I checked closely, I’d discover that the majority of the hardcovers I own have been bought used or from clearance tables.
But still…
Here’s what Eric Flint had to say on this article in Baen’s bar:
The most striking thing about the report — assuming it’s true, which you always have to wonder with anything in Drudge — is that it indicates that the chief executive of one of the world’s largest publishing corporations is abysmally ignorant of the most basic facts concerning electronic publishing. You can start with his belief that a $9.99 e-book is going to automatically drive down the price of a hardcover.
Gah. This is on a par with arguing that the world can’t be round, because if it was the people living in China would fall off.
There is very little relationship between the prices of e-books and hardcovers. This, for several reasons:
The first and simplest is that for e-books to determine the prices of hardcovers would be a genuinely surreal instance of a tiny little tail wagging an enormous dog. The sales of e-books, whether measured in terms of units or money, is miniscule compared to the sale of hardcovers.
Secondly, they are two very different products, rather than being — as he obviously believes — essentially the same product with a minor packaging difference. What actual experience demonstrates is that the BIG market in e-books is complimentary to paper editions, not in place of them. What most people want is _both_ formats of the same title, because they use them for different purposes.
Thirdly, we have the experience with e-ARCs, which demonstrates quite clearly that many people are willing to pay a premium price for an early release of a title.
But… never mind. It’s been my experience that people in the upper echelons of corporate publishing have wants amounts to mystical religious fervor on this subject. They know what they know, don’t confuse them with the facts.
Eric is a Socialist (capital S, been a union organizer before he became an author). But his point that people use hardbacks and e-books for different purposes makes sense.
BTW, if you really want one of your books in hardcover, I can put the ones I have as e-books on Lulu so you’ll be able to order it in hardcover (but nobody else will be able to, except me). I’d offer to buy you a copy, but money is tight and I don’t see it getting better any time soon.
What does Eric mean by wondering about anything on Drudge? Did he see original reporting by Drudge? Wasn’t this an AP article or from another news service? That’s like crediting The Internets as a primary resource.
This was in reply to somebody else posting in his forum (Mutter of Demons) in Baen’s Bar with a link to Drudge.
This came originally from Financial Times. Eric was just a bit careless, probably because he’s so busy writing.
I’ve met Eric. Decent guy for a Commie. He’s generally pretty sensible about the publishing business, so far as I’m able to judge.
Just my two cents, but I can’t believe even the deepest evil-ness of the mega booksellers will really destroy the market for hardcovers. The people who buy books tend to like books, and want some of them in an edition that will last.
But perhaps it does mean hardcover quality will have to go up? I have a number published in the last decade held together apparently with glue and good wishes, that certainly weren’t worth the $30 asking price. (Used bookstores, yay!) I’m not too heartbroken about seeing those profits reduced somewhat…
RE: Your book, Westover Sea; I bought it from Amazon and will start reading it as soon as I finish and alternate Civil War novel I’m in right now.
And, I can fix that, “…maybe I will never see one my books in hard cover…” statement you posed. After I read your book, I will get some glue and heavy cardboard, slap the cardboard onto the glued up covers and there ya go! One hard cover. I’ll mail it on back to you and then you’ll be able to see it!