ebooks

There's been a lot of debate in my little corner of the writing/publishing world of late - I hold strong opinions on the matter - I'm a bit of a Luddite on the subject I guess *g*.

Actually I don't really mind ebook publishing - even though I seem to hate it - I think anything which gets books into the hands of the reading public is a good thing.

No - my chief concern is that niche publishers - who work on very thin margins - may get carried away by the vocal few who are so very much in support of ebooks (without realising just how privileged they are to be able to have ereaders at all) and decide that issuing only ebooks is a good thing. After all - it cuts costs, gets the books to the customers quicker and more cheaply (no shipping) - why shouldn't it be a good thing??

Well - in recent debates I said why it isn't a good thing. And I wanted to assemble my arguments in one place for easy reference. So here they are.

It's a straight c&p job so it might not flow quite as well as it could.

comment on a FB page asking hard copy or ebook

Hard copy. Until they can design an ebook that won't be impossible to read as the technology becomes obsolete in less time than it takes to type this, I don't want to consider ebooks.

Betamax?? 8-Track?? Reel-to-reel?? Cassette?? And whatever happened to the mini-disc??

I can buy a book once and still read it in ten years, twenty years, a hundred years time. Ebooks?? Won't be able to read them in two years let alone ten. I don't want to buy the same book over-and-over unless it because I wore it out with re-reading

second comment - same discussion

I've got a copy of Heart of Midlothian published 170 years ago - yep one-hundred-and-seventy years (it's not my oldest book it just the most convenient to use).

I can read it with ease. I don't have to convert anything, change anything - or for that matter charge anything. And if there's a power cut (or a zombie apocalypse which ends civilisation and thus electricity) I can still read it by candle-light.

The day I can do that with a ebook I might consider buying one. Until then I'll read free fanfic on the web and my paid-for reading with be in paper form.

Third comment - same discussion

I think that's what worries me. That there may not always be those options.

You're ok - you can afford several different types of ereaders - and more power to your elbow for being able to!! But there are people who can't. Who can't even afford one. People who look at their finances and say "if I walk to work this week and skip lunch on Tuesday and Thursday I can buy a book this month. Yipee!!". And they go to the library to use a computer for minimum rate and order the book they've chosen.

And I'm worried that in this rush for ebooks, if people start believing Amazon's crap about selling more ebooks than paper books, that niche publishers (like those who publish lesbian fiction) who are working on slim margins will say to themselves "People want ebooks more than paper books. It's cheaper for us to produce ebooks and there's no waiting time and no postage costs. We'll switch to ebooks only".

And then the people skipping lunch and walking to work will no longer be able to access niche books.

And some isolated soul in a minimum wage job in a small town somewhere will no longer be able to read the books that tell her she's not alone.

I know publishing's a business and not a charity. But I'm old enough to remember before we were ok, and to remember the start of feminist publishing and to feel that "the community" should also be a social service too sometimes. So I get very vocal about keeping paper books.

I hope we will always have that choice - but I see a lot of titles already where we don't.

Reply to a personal message sent by someone as a result of that discussion

Hi. thanks for your comments. As a writer myself I understand your concerns but do you really believe that writing and publishing lesbian fiction is *ever* going to be that lucrative?? Yes - selling ebooks may increase your sales a fraction - but substantially?? Probably not by much. You may find that print sales decrease by a similar margin. I realise a sale is a sale is a sale but if your overall sales remain the same you haven't really benefited by much.

I don't think anybody in Lesbian Fiction writing makes enough to give up the day job - not even Karin Kallmaker or Lee Lynch (or even Radclyffe - I'll bet Rad the publisher makes enough - Rad the author - no so much) - so if you're in it for the money rather than the love of writing you stand to be very disappointed. *g*.

I write because I must. I publish because I can. I make my living as a painter & decorator.

And ebooks might not hold the opportunity for increased income that you believe - they might even cut your sales eventually - because they're so much more easy to steal. Have you read Karin's blog??

http://blog.kallmaker.com/2010/07/lesbian-fiction-fans-to-rescue.html

http://blog.kallmaker.com/2010/08/sunday-day-of-leisure.html

http://blog.kallmaker.com/2010/07/ye-olde-myths-of-piracy.html

http://blog.kallmaker.com/2010/07/pirates-avast.html

That said - yes I see a future for ebooks. Yes I'd like to see ebooks become more easily available. But as I said - alongside print books. I'd hate to see print books disappear for the very reasons I stated - that minimum-wage worker who goes without meals to buy a print book and who has more chance of flying to the moon that she does of buying an e-reader *at all*, *ever* - let alone the three or four varieties of e-reader (and a new one every couple of years as the standards changes) that are currently required.

I can't afford an e-reader. If a book is only in ebook format I can't buy it. Therefore I don't buy it. That's a lost sale. And I'm not unusual in this. There are more folk who can't afford one - or live in countries where they aren't common or don't exist at all - than who can and do. That's a lot of lost sales.

It might be nice for a writer to sell a few copies of an ebook - but what is the point of publishing *at all* without readers?? Without readers writers are writing for themselves alone.

Without readers I would still write.

But without readers you would have no sales at all.

Further points.

The Kindle in the UK & Aus is twice the cost of the USA. There is no Amazon in Aus. All Amazon order are sent from the USA. Import duties are a factor. In the UK there is no tax on print books. There is tax on ebooks (VAT is currently 20%) this pushes up the price - which already tends to be like-for-like.

There is no Kindle in Germany, or France, or pretty much any other non-English-speaking country. There is no Nook in the UK.

I'd hazard a guess we still wouldn't have the Kindle if the iPad hadn't come along.

Self-published authors of ebooks are just as likely to be ripped of by pirates as bigger publishers are - just ask Lynn Ames.