On this
morning’s television show of The Wright Stuff, best-selling author Jodi
Picoult gave her views on the current debate about the pricing of eBooks,
pointing out that the main reason that readers do not believe they should pay
as much for an eBook as they would for a print book is because `it’s not a book
– it’s just a `file' transmitted to the buyer’s eReader.
`But what
readers don’t realise,’ Jodi went on, `is when they buy a book, it’s not pulped
paper they are buying – it’s a work regarded by law as the author’s
`intellectual property’. Just as real in law as any bricks-and-mortar property.
Hence, the copyright notices on all editions – just as real in law as the deeds
to your house.
On the same
panel, ex-MP’s wife, Christine Hamilton, opined, `Yes, but there is
nothing quite like holding a book.’
Is that
really what readers are paying for – to hold a heavy wad of paper? I always
thought the same main rule for Hollywood applied also to books – `What’s the
story?’
When I first
started reading books as a youngster, the wad of paper I was holding meant
nothing – the story was all. The story took me into other lands and other times
and each book was like a holiday away from it all.
Of course I did not realise way back then, that all my
little holidays away from it all were due to the talent and hard work of the
authors who had written the books. All my appreciation went to the local
Library who let me read them for free.
Okay, eBooks are just ‘a file’
transmitted onto an eReader – so let’s look at the actual cost of both. The
last traditionally printed novel I had published cost £2,500 for the first 2000
print run and every 1000 copies printed after that cost 23 pence a copy.
In the bookstore the buyer paid £7.99p, of which the
bookstore took 50% of the selling price – the publisher took 42.5% – and the
creator of the product (the author) got 7.5% of the publisher’s cut = 26 pence. And out of that 26 pence per
book, the author’s agent takes a further cut.
No wonder 90% of all authors struggle to make a living
from their work – although for decades they have been making a very good
living for publishers, bookstores and agents who live off the sweats of their
work.
Then along came the techno experts and changed the world
in so many ways, including the world of books. Now, thanks to those geniuses,
the ‘content provider’ of the book (author) can sell directly to the ‘content
consumer’ (reader) without having to support all those ‘main beneficiaries’ in-between.
Everyone is moaning and complaining these days about how
publishers rip off authors, but hey – why is nobody complaining about the
disgraceful way bookstores – especially the chain bookstores –
are ripping off both publishers AND authors?
Some chains are now demanding 55% - 60% of the selling
price from publishers, some even demand more than that. And worse, they also
demand the right to return all copies of books they do not sell.
So publishers and authors are filling the shelves of their
stores at no financial risk to the bookstore. If it doesn’t sell after 6 months
– they can just fling it back to the publisher. In most cases, the cover is
just torn off and sent back, because the books have been handled by book
browsers and are no longer in the new and pristine condition sent by the
publisher.
In what other business would this be allowed? Hey, fill your shop with my designer clothes and any you don’t sell you can fling back.
In what other business would this be allowed? Hey, fill your shop with my designer clothes and any you don’t sell you can fling back.
In any other business? No way!
Bookstores have though, in the last few years, attempted to remedy the situation to some extent – by bringing back apartheid to the world of books.
Now they will only stock best-selling brand-named authors on their shelves. The top 10% that are pushed and publicised to the hilt, no matter how bad their latest novels have become; and the other 90% can go and stand forever outside the huge gates locked to them.
The reader, of course, is not given a chance to discover anything new, although they don’t yet realise that their choice has long been censored by the bookstores.
What many of us book-lovers are now wondering, if this no-risk strategy of bookstores continues – where is the new generation of brand-name authors going to come from? Or is it their plan to occasionally open the locked gates a fraction and let the odd apartheid author inside in order to help build up the stock?
No wonder book chains like Borders have crumbled and died, and others will follow – the blind leading the blind over the cliff to doom.
But back to eBooks. They really are going to be the best
way of reading in the future. I learned this just a few months ago while in
Australia and got pneumonia and was confined to bed for over a week. The sun
outside was blazing and my husband and son had gone off sightseeing, but I was stuck
in bed. I tried to read a novel but it was heavy, and at the beginning I needed
two hands to hold the first pages back, so I threw it down, too weak to be
bothered.
Then my daughter handed me her new Kindle and told me to
order any book of my choice from Amazon. I ordered `The Help` and the
story was there for me in less than a minute, and the Kindle was so light I had
no problem lying back and reading the story with one hand.
And `The Help` was everything a novel should be – it took me to another country and another time and was so engrossing and so entertaining I actually got better while reading it!
For me now, eBooks are my new way of reading – but a
problem still remains: which brings me back to Jody Picoult’s comment on TV
this morning that readers feel they should not have to pay as much for a
transmitted `file’ as opposed to a paper book.
I agree with the readers – they should not have to pay as
much for an eBook edition, because the costs for travelling Publisher’s reps and
greedy bookstores has been cut out – but it is also unfair for readers to
expect the price of eBooks to be dirt cheap.
After all, readers are getting the same novel, the same
intellectual property belonging to the author, as they would in a print book,
and authors of books are just as entitled to be paid a fair rate for their work
as they are in any other profession.
Sadly though, some people think writing a book is as easy
as reading one. And that dumb bunch of people seems to also include a lot of
publishers who make their living from the work of authors.
The eBook has to go through the same formatting and
editing processes; a cover still has to be designed and made; and the
technology of uploading an eBook is not that much different to the same process
used by traditional printers.
So, readers are getting the same stories to read, but in a
different container to the hallowed wad of pulped paper – and those piles of
pulped paper do seem a bit outmoded in this congested and lack-of-space world
most of us now live in.
Bookstores have been riding on the King’s white horse for too
long. Amazon and others have opened the gates and put an end to their system of
discriminatory and literary apartheid. The ‘content provider’ and the ‘content
consumer’ of books have a free road with no gatekeepers blocking the way or
censoring their choice.
But to believe that eBooks must be dirt cheap in
comparison to the print edition? Cheaper than a cup of coffee? Well, that’s just being mean!
So eBook or paper, whichever
you choose, happy reading.
