Nice New York Times piece on Amazons distortion of a George Orwell quote that is, well, Orwellian. For the record, folks: Authors like myself arent against lower prices, but rather are in favor of flexible and appropriate pricing according to actual demand, so we can continue to make a living. After a decade of e-book pricing experience, we know that sharply lower prices simply dont significantly increase the book-buying consumer base. Each book is unique, and each has to be priced in a unique way according to its specific market and production costs. I ask you: Should a project that consumed seven years of an authors life, resulting in a 750-page definitive work with scores of photographs and maps, be priced the same as a 200-page rush project with no index, maps, photographs, etc., that is forgotten after a year? Do the two books have the same value, let alone production costs? Is their market likely to be the same? Of course not. But Amazon is essentially arguing that if theyre read on a screen they are the same, and neither is worth very much. Im tired of these luddites who say digital works have no value. Amazon simply lied by saying that eliminating the printing, warehousing, and distribution of print books makes e-books radically cheaper. Most of the cost of producing a book is in development, not buying and collating paper. Its in advances, royalties, editing, copy-editing, indexing, proofreading, marketing, etc., etc. Printing and distribution are less than 20% of the cost—more like 12–15%. Paperbacks are cheaper because they are delayed a year, allowing hardcover purchases to absorb the fixed costs of acquiring and developing a book. E-books arent delayed, by the way. It dismays me when I read defenses of Amazons behavior that are essentially attacks on commercial publishers. Sure, self-publishing is great for some authors, but not for those of us who spend years researching and writing a major nonfiction work. We need advances to fund our initial work. We need the institutional expertise required for a book with extensive supplementary material—photos, maps, indexes, etc. Authors like myself still need traditional publishers. And lets not forget that the large majority of books published by legacy publishers fail. In other words, theyre subsidizing careers, allowing authors to get a start even when theyre not big successes right out the gate. Theyre not perfect, by any means, but there are plenty of reasons why authors and readers still need them around. Its totalitarian—some might say Orwellian—to suggest that Amazon should be the only outlet for authors, and that we must allow this gigantic corporation to use its vast market power to crush out any other means of getting published. Amazon has done some innovative and helpful stuff for bookbuyers and certain categories of writers. If it was competing on its positive virtues, Id never say a thing against it. But its not. Amazon, the everything store, no longer depends on books for much of its revenue. But authors and publishers are now hostage to its whims. Its abusing that imbalance of power like the classic robber barons of the nineteenth century, to amass even more power. And I know a little bit about that.
Posted on: Wed, 13 Aug 2014 07:29:54 +0000
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