Slashdot Mirror
Amazon & Used Books II: Bezos Strikes Back
theodp writes: "Last week's call for authors to de-link Amazon from their sites has reportedly prompted Jeff Bezos to fire off a letter to all Amazon Marketplace sellers, asking them to help out by sending e-mail on Amazon's behalf in response to the Guild's call for Amazon to stop placing prominent used book ads on each title's main web entry and soliciting new books purchasers to resell their books through Amazon shortly after purchase.
Bezos wants everyone to be 'super-clear' that Amazon.com is supportive of and good for authors, indicating that Amazon's steep discounting of new titles and royalty-less sales of used books are two examples of how Amazon helps the book industry and
authors. Good to see Jeff's found a new cause, since it looks like he's done with up patent reform."
Good god, I wonder if writers buy all their books new?
love is just extroverted narcissism
A call to get rid of libraries as they damage sales? Actions like this are going to make the changes which are going to come for copyright law all the more popular with regular joes.
The more you know, the less you understand.
"Bezos wants everyone to be 'super-clear' that Amazon.com is supportive of and good for authors," - so that's why the Guild of authors wrote:
"Amazon's practice does damage to the publishing industry,.."?
Video Game cheats, hints a
No used books? Just imagine if the car industry was going through the same thing.
Everyone, not just the rednecks, would have used cars sitting on their lawns.
"I only speak the truth"
Karma: null(Mostly affected by an unassigned variable)
There may come a time when book publishing starts to think seriously about used sales. They tried long ago to capture a portion of secondary sales but failed when the Supreme Court said that the purchaser actually got something for the money.
If Amazon gets more successful at this, we may have only a few copies flying around the country as people resell books. This would be great for the postal system but bad for the author.
I'm not in favor of giving the copyright czars any more power, but I do get a bit creeped out by the "buy it used" button on Amazon. If authors make less money, there will be fewer books. I would rather the authors get the money than the post office.
Eventually, Amazon and Half.com are going to really hurt the publishing industry too. We need to find some balanced, middle ground. I wish someone could suggest something.
I also know a few authors and as far as they are generally concerned they prefer to see books in print sell befor used copies, if it's out of print then they're usually more supportive of the used book market, as they'd like people to read and become acquainted with their works. It's a two edged sword, and I'd prefer not to think of anyone as being greedy, in particular authors as many don't make en entire living by it.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Ok, not in the way that you think. However, I have bought MANY MANY books online, as opposed to going to a book store and browsing. I don't have time or patience to drive to a book store and buy a book that way. So, for me at least, they have made it easier to buy a book, therefore I buy more.
Sent from your iPad.
The Author's Guild had their chance when the first-ever used bookstore opened however many decades/centuries/millenia ago. Just because Amazon.com can sell used books on a much larger scale than Mom&Pop Used Book Store doesn't change the fundamental issues about selling used books.
I say to the authors, "Too bad." This whole supposed scandal just reeks of the same Napster fiasco odors, where the proposed solutions just don't fix the underlying issues. Publishers, authors, record labels, musicians, etc., just need to think harder about how to live in this modern world. If they can't deal with it, they should just become Amish or find some 3rd world country that is stuck in 1400AD and move there.
Healthcare article at Kuro5hin
Replace 'attacked' with 'attracted'... too much video gaming lately :-)
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
How?
I mean that authors receive royalties for the books sold after the publisher takes their cut for the advance and publicity for the books.
Now, I suppose you could attempt to claim that you sell new books cheap ... so you "help" the authors by getting to their royalty payments a bit faster (by paying off the publisher faster).
But how does this help the authors for used books? Hmmm? They don't receive ANY royalties from these sales ... nor does the publisher. So what's in it for them if you do this? Now ... if I could find a new book for $30 (which pays royalties, and Bezos loses money) or a used book for $15 (which pays NO royalties, and Bezos gets $$$ for the listing) ... certainly the $15 book would probably get sold. Personally, I don't normally buy used book, except in very good condition, and a title that I want.
However, the only thing this helps is your pocket, profit, and the bottom line. NOT the author or publisher.
Karma? Karma? I don't need no stinkin' karma.
Goodness, not even the Sonny Boner-o Copyright Act is going to protect the owners of THAT work!
If the Author's Guild can't get enough money off of first hand books, the problem is the publishers not paying enough royalties.
If they could sell a new book for the same price as a new one, I'll gladly buy the new one. Until then, it's the cheapest for me (unless there's a reason I need it new, ie book collections, gifts). They made their money off the book when it was first published; I don't feel bad about buying used.
"Shared pain is lessened; shared joy is increased. Thus we refute entropy" - Spider Robinson
Offering customers a lower-priced option causes them to visit our site more frequently,
I don't doubt it, Jeff.
which in turn leads to higher sales of new books
Does it? Or does it simply lead to higher sales of used books?
while encouraging customers to try
authors and genres they may not have otherwise tried.
Absolutely.. too bad used books give no indication to the publishers that these authors and genres deserve a second book contract.
I've got no problem with Amazon selling used books. More power to'em. But when a book published in April 2002 already has a used book link offer up *right beside* the new book.. that strikes me as hurting the author and the publisher.
At least have the courtesy to separate them out for a few months so that publishers can have a more accurate indication of what's selling well and what's not.
That Jesus Christ guy is getting some terrible lag... it took him 3 days to respawn! -NJ CoolBreeze
Yeeeaaaa...
Create giant online book distribution, get exclusive contracts from publishers to sell product. Destroy every other bookstore in North America (Amazon is just part of this, not directly taking part. However, they exist BECAUSE of this... not because it's 'better' in any way for anyone... except the Corp. Publishers who tell Amazon what to sell). The market is now yours.
Congratulations, you have managed to destroy years of independent literary commerce and turn it into a Wal-Mart.
Now, many Slashdot readers seem to think Wal-Mart, and thus any Corporate market control, is OK and I'm just a whining flame bait bastard.
90% of the books I buy used are out of print!
love is just extroverted narcissism
Would someone who can see the site post a mirror? All I get out of the link is an infinite forward loop.
What makes used books apealing to people, is that they cost significantly less than the dead-tree-publisher bloated prices of real books. A smart author, could be sell HTML copies of his book at a vastly reduced cost and make still make a profit.
And nobody would buy a 10 cent 'used' HTML book, when they could securely and convenetly order a 'new' HTML book from the author for 50 cents.
What stands in the way of this utopia:
1) Preception by the masses that inexpensive=cheap crap
2) Many authors are locked into contracts with dead-tree publishers
3) Micro-payments are a pain in the ass.
Moneyed corporations, non-working 'poor' and criminal prisoners are turning productive citizens into tax-slaves.
...but I agree with Amazon on this one. This is such a throwaway culture, it really pleases me that reselling used books has become a real, mass-market movement. Until recently, you were pretty much screwed if you lived in an area where you didn't have any good used book stores.
...and frankly, if you're just in it for the money, you probably shouldn't be a writer. It's just not a good way to get rich.
reduce, reuse, recycle: even on just an enviromental basis, isn't reselling books the best of ideas? How many trees have been saved because people bought used books?
just a thought...
You catch enchiladas by picking them up behind the head and holding them underwater until they don't kick anymore -VeGas
"but I do get a bit creeped out by the "buy it used" button on Amazon"
Why? Do you get creeped out by the used car lot? How about the used software bin?
By your reasoning, nobody should be allowed to sell something used because it hurts the sale of new.
I've got news for you. Its too damned bad. Forcing people to pay for everything they do every time they do with it will be the commercial death of books, music, and entertainment. You're advocating a place where you've got to pay a lot of money to be part of popular culture. Maybe that's for the best (because it will kill off popular culture), but in the long run it will destroy the book and entertainment industry.
It isn't the government's job to "protect" industries (although they seem to love trying). And as to your assertion that less books will be written....GOOD! The world can live without a new stephen king novell.
I think you're screwed up in the head or trolling for the industry.
Books have real lives, they wear out, they get damaged, they get burned by christian fundamentalists. I fail to see the problem with encouraging people to use those books to their fullest.
If I were the Author's Guild, I would shut up ASAP. The only reason I read today is due to Amazon dot bomb. The ease of ordering books online beats finding a bookstore and dealing with the pretentious, egghead twits that work in the store. I never bought a book before Amazon that wasn't required for a school course. Now with Amazon, I pour through at least 12 to 18 books a year. Up from zilch before Amazon came around. I am sure I am not the only one that has gained a love for reading from online bookstores.
Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government.
... I've discovered by picking up used copies of their books. I'm more willing to risk $0.50 - $4.00 on a used book by someone I'm not familiar with than $7.00 - $25.00 on a new book by same. And when I discover someone whose work I really like this way, I go out and buy everything I can from them new -- because I know that's the best way to ensure they keep writing.
I'd also talk about the number of bands whose work I discovered via Napster, and whose CD's I then bought new, but that's a dead horse.
The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
We have found a disturbing trend among car owners, when they no longer want a car they are not just storing it on a shelf to collect dust.
Used car dealers are actively working to divert customers shopping for new cars into their used car lots by prominently placing used car ads on websites and newspapers.
This is affecting the quality and diversity of new cars available to car dealers.
We believe it is in our members' best interests to de-link their websites from dealers who sell used cars. There's no good reason for car makers to be complicit in undermining their own sales. It just takes a minute, and it's the right thing to do.
I hope that someday we will be able to put away our fears and prejudices and just laugh at people. - Jack Handey
If Amazon gets more successful at this, we may have only a few copies flying around the country as people resell books. This would be great for the postal system but bad for the author.
If this happens, it will only be because there are no books being written that are worth keeping or re-reading. If that is what the industry is churning out, maybe it deserves a kick in the shins.
Takahashi Rumiko made beats! DON, taku, DON, taku. . .
"that strikes me as hurting the author and the publisher"
I good 2x4 to your backside would hurt you plenty. But in the end (ha ha), you'd be better off.
So what's the moral dilemna here?
Are you sure used books have hurt sales?
--
I was just writing in regards to your recent call for authors to de-link amazon.com in regards to its practice of selling used books, particularly right alongside new books.
I am definitely of two minds on this issue. Certainly I don't think Amazon is doing anything inappropriate, unless they have signed specific contracts stating not to offer used books in the given fashion.
And I certainly believe the Guild has the right to organize a boycott if it believes that doing so will further enrich its membership -- that's what any collective labor unit (be it guild or union -- I think there's a difference) should do.
I suppose I am wondering whether the proposed boycott will do that. Certainly amazon.com makes far more money on new book sales than on used book sales. So why would they continue to offer an option which reduces their profits?
I would argue that the upper-bound of any damage Amazon might be doing to new book sales is matched (or nearly so) by the amount of commissions generated by the partner links from author sites to their book listings on Amazon.com. Why else would an author link specifically to Amazon.com if not to generate the commission? They could link elsewhere if they got a higher commission there.
Perhaps that's the point you are trying to make. If so, I applaud you for so educating the Guild membership. If not, I would ask you to reconsider where the money is going in a total systemic sense.
I wouldn't be surprised if a small minority of Guild membership who is disproportionately harmed by Amazon's practices is the one generating most of the pressure for this campaign. If so, some may think the high-minded Guild is acting more like a mindless union whose leadership is dominated by the political machinations of a few noisy children who are not grown up enough to realize that life does not always dole out fortune in precisely regulated, homogenized chunks.
I disagree. I think this will, in fact, help the industry.
First, let's clear something up. If someone is buying a book used (or even selling a book used), then the author already got money for the book sale. Beyond that, they don't deserve anything.
Second, if someone is buying a book used (or, again, selling), that means someone else bought the book and for some reason found it not to be worth keeping. They then make this book available to others at a cheaper price, who in turn may or may not feel that it is worth it, until:
- Someone finds the book worth keeping, and keeps it.
- It sits on the shelf of a used book section, and no one ever buys it.
In any case, each time the book is bought used, it devalues the overall worth of the book to the author. This is a good thing. It means that if they wrote a crap book, then the market compensates then at the rate for crap books.This means that yes, we may see less books. Authors who write books may see less money. The qualifier is that these authors are the ones who are writing crap books, and the should be making less money.
Books have been passed on and sold used for centuries. I don't think we have any fewer books today because of it.
Don't think of it as a flame---it's more like an argument that does 3d6 fire damage
inefficiencies exist. one such inefficiency is related to locating the book that you want, used, at a price you're willing to pay. the new-book market has been determining its pricing and its revenue model on the basis of the fact and magnitude of this inefficiency for, oh, let's call it *EVER*.
amazon is presenting The World with one way to eliminate (or at least greatly reduce) this inefficiency, by removing the fee-for-convience that is built into new books, rendering them no easier to get one's hands on than used books.
is this going to hurt new books' sales? probably. i don't see why it wouldn't. do we, as people who have been pissed at record comapnies for the last five years, have any tolerance left for individuals who choose to whine when their business model is exposed as outmoded by advances in technology? no. because when one's business model is threatened by changes in the environment, one can either try to turn back time, or one can embrace this change, and figure out how to best serve their customers given the new set of conditions. the former approach is pathetic and doomed, the latter, in the end, both more viable and admirable.
whether amazon, on the whole, is good or bad for authors is academic here -- although as someone mentioned above, the general increase in availability for both used *and* new books certainly has me buying more. all we need to keep in mind here is how ridiculous the RIAA looks going to court instead of updating its business model, calling on the public to pity them when a new technology makes it clear that they've been riding on an inefficiency for quite a long time.
ladies and gentlemen of the publishing industry, the ride is over, please exit to your left.
god is just pretend.
If I go to a book signing an author I do not expect the author to tell me to check the book out of the library. I fully expect them to try to get me to buy a book from the book store they are signing in front of. I don't feel they are against libraries or used books for doing this.
This doesn't make them "anti-library" any more than the Toyota dealer not sending customers to Tony's Used Toyota Dealer makes them anti-car-rental-agencies or anti-used-cars. It's common business practice not to recommend customers shop somewhere else!
What the guild is saying is that Amazon by pushing used book sales on the same page as the new book sales for recently released books damages an authors sales by pushing customers to used books. Authors should consider linking to Barnes and Noble or some such site instead of referring potential readers to Amazon.
There is no slippery slope here, move along.
I think the guild is well within their rights to try to maximize their sales by referring potential customers to new book sellers (where they make money) rather than to used book sellers (where they don't). I think Amazon is well within their rights to push their used book sales.
Frankly this whole thread is pretty stupid.
Thing is, you really don't hear these complaints from musicians any more. Why? Because: (1) someone eventually noticed that the big music boom of the '90s neatly coincided with the big boom in used CDs; sales weren't being cannibalized, or at least not noticably; (2) digital music formats continue to move the battlefield from issues of resale to those of duplication; Garth's original worries are no longer as pressing.
I can see the whole used books thing following a similar path over the next couple of decades. I wholeheartedly believe that used books help develop audiences for authors -- hook them on older books at an afforable pricepoint and they'll be more willing to buy the newest must-have title by that author at full price. Eventually, the powers that be will realize this and ease off the "anti-used" pressure somewhat. Moreover, once a company successfully gets viable ePaper out on the market, we'll see a shift of the debate from resale to duplicaiton, just like with CDs.
So in the meantime -- sit back, enjoy the debate, and know that this too shall pass.
WOW, look how much money I can save! Thanks to the authors guild for bringing this excellent service to my attention!
mp3's are only for those with bad memories
Go to www.addall.com to do a mass search online for the cheapest book (this includes half.com, B&N, Borders, etc.)
Go to www.addall.com/used in order to find even better deals. This searches mom and pop sites and helps you find things that are out of print.
I have bought so many books this way. Almost all of the prices BEAT any used price that you'll get at Amazon, Half.com, etc.
There's plenty of proof that used books help the publishing industry. The idea that there should be no aftermarket for books is far more ludicrious.
In truth, the ones that are most hurt by used books are authors who either have a niche market or are so small-potatoes they only get one press run. But how much they get hurt is open to discussion; if people find a used book and find they like it, they're far more likely to buy the next one by that author new. If they don't, they recycle the book back into the used market. An author can build a pretty good following through the used market, sometimes enough to get larger print runs of new books and reprints of older books.
What the publishing industry is doing harkens back to the Garth Brooks' boycott of used record stores. To try to curtain the aftermarket on anything is just plain silly. If this logic were to pervade, one's choices would be to either hang onto a book or bin it, and throwing out all those trees is very ecologically unsound. Imagine 10 or 11 Fresh Kills full of the contents of Powell's.
If these publishers were smart, they'd come up with a simple and easy to work with system that would allow for one person to buy personal-use rights to a book and compensate both the publisher and the author, then allow for that person to transfer those rights to another person temporarily or permanently. Or, maybe they can have a group of people pool their money and buy these same rights, then house these books in a centrally located public building with a method of allowing these people who have paid to borrow these books once or multiple times. I think these are great ideas, and I'm sure the publishers will get right on it....
get exclusive contracts from publishers to sell product.
Never happened.
Takahashi Rumiko made beats! DON, taku, DON, taku. . .
Hmm.... looks like the RIAA and MPAA lawyers have started moonlighting.
By selling used books, Amazon.com is also helping to save the environment. If you are not going to use a book any more, pass it on (or sell in this case) to the next person. Don't go kill a tree just to make a brand new copy. The content isn't different.
These authors are making themselves look like real jerks in the public light. They will only get the bad PR, and Amazon will get the good.
It seems unlikely that you could increase the sales of used books by a non-trivial amount without having the side effect of increasing the sales of new books.
Yeah. But it also seems unlikely that people would purchase higher priced new books when the lower-priced used book link is right there.
and when the public library has a book published in April 2002 already on the shelf for people to check out or read, that strikes me as hurting the author and the publisher. NOT!
Where do you live that your library gets new books that quickly?
Around here, the book has typically been on store shelves for a good two/three months before our local public library gets its copy. So either your library system is a hell of a lot better than what I'm used to, or you don't actually use your library and are simply talking out of your ass.
Next you'll tell us that people shouldn't be allowed to lend lawnmowers to their neighbors, because that deprives the lawnmower manufacturer of revenue.
Guess what, I never said that used book sales shouldn't be allowed - that's the second part of my post - but because that doesn't fit into your desired vitriol, perhaps you simply ignored it?
All I suggested was maybe Amazon could have the decency to say "Hey.. this book is new.. let's give the publisher/author a chance to make some decent sales numbers out of it before we start trying to pull in the used book trade." I don't see how a separate section would hurt Amazon or the consumer terribly - it'd still be there after all. Those who really want the discount can just go into that section, but those who are on the fence, maybe buy new, maybe buy used, that extra step might be enough to convince them to buy new. Thus increasing the chances of a publisher seeing high enough numbers to justify a second book from the author.
That Jesus Christ guy is getting some terrible lag... it took him 3 days to respawn! -NJ CoolBreeze
Amazon is the Napster of the book business and the Guild is the RIAA? Oh, I get it now...
In Soviet Russia, Chuck Norris will still kick your ass.
The book industry seems to be doing its own thing here: jacking up prices madly. So it is very appropriate to resell books used, however one wants.
sulli
RTFJ.
What exactly does the Author's Guild want, people to not be able to buy used books at all?
When I purchased the book I purchased material that I should be able to sell whenever and *whereever* I please. This whole thing seems to be suffering from a bout of favoritism. Are they telling Mom&Pop used book stores to close? Are they petitioning ebay to prevent the sale of books? They seem to be going after a company who is only doing what everyone else is doing.
If one considers that the foundation of our economy is based on barter through currency - what they Author's Guild is proposing actually goes against the whole idea of capitalism and the consumers/businesses right to sell goods.
It's too bad, but books are not the biggest moneymakers right now. Most books sell about 30,000 copies, so it's pretty easy to see how the "Buy it used" thing could hurt sales. Amazon really needs to find some royalty deal that will please publishers, or it'll be th eauthors (and customers) who suffer.
I honestly don't see what the guild is kvetching about.
I'm an author. I have a book on Amazon, and although the used price on my book is still fairly close to the new price, there's a chance that used sales will start to cut into new sales at some point.
So, does Amazon have a right to sell used copies of a book, or not? If not, then they are breaking the law, and should be sued. If so, then the Author's Guild is interfering with legitimate business, and is exposing itself as a bunch of whiny brats.
Books are SOLD, *NOT LICENSED*. If you buy a book, YOU OWN IT. There is no contractual relationship; it is your book. You can sell it, rent it, burn it, or make paper airplanes out of it. The only things you can't do are copy it or claim its contents as your own, due to copyright law (which I mostly agree with, except for the DMCA). If the Author's Guild wants to claim that this is not true, then they have an uphill battle against hundreds of years of tradition. But frankly, I think they're just bitching, and should be ignored.
-John
...most new car dealers actually make more money from used car sales than new.
Any open market system that is based on these simple rules is going to, somehow or another, distribute money to individuals beyond the original inventor/author/whathaveyou. The only way to keep money going back to the original creative mind is to institute strict policies that go against straight up supply and demand thoughts...
It'd be nice if everyone reaped the profits that they deserved, but when you're out to make a profit in the economical system used in this country, you have to accept the way things work. Trying to limit the ways other people use the supply that you've helped provide is just whining, in my opinion anyway.
This is not to say I like or support the idea of starving authors, but it's a choice made by the authors themselves. I don't know what can be done about that.....maybe the solution lies in eliminating things like agents/publisher fees/etc. I dunno.
What about this well known book?
...(insert diatribe about scientific discovery and education here)...
Any author can stay in at the Holiday Inn and get a *gasp* free complimentary copy of an equivelent from the Gideons.
This is info hoarding at its worst, IMHO.
It's enough to make the Baby Jes...ummm, nevermind.
Soko
"Depression is merely anger without enthusiasm." - Anonymous
There are so many reasons that disallowing the sale of used books is silly that I can't even begin to list them all.. so I'll just elaborate on my own personal experiences.
I read a lot. And do I ever mean a LOT. I average two to three books a week, I'm a card carrying discount member of four bookstores, and I'm in two book of the month clubs. I buy a lot of new books.
I also buy a lot of used books. Why? Because while I make a good salary, I'm far from rich. A new book in paperback costs in the range of 9 - 12 dollars canadian (first one that makes a 'what is that, 10 cents US joke?' gets a huge smack). For hardcovers, my preferred format, you're looking at 25 - 40 CDN. My book habit ends up costing me more than most addicts' crack habits.
So where do i turn? Used books. Roughly 25% of my books are used. When I want to try a new series, or the book kinda looks ok but i'm not sure, or i'm looking for something that's out of print, I'm going to head to the used book store.
Does this mean I buy fewer new books? nope. In fact, the opposite is often true. If I like a new author (new to me anyway), i'll often go and buy an entire series of their books, all shiny new, dropping as much as 1 - 200 CDN in a single trip, and if i don't like the book, then most likely it was under $5 so no harm no foul.
It's a lot of money, but for a book junkie/collecter, there's nothing quite so satisfying as an uncreased, undamaged book sitting on the shelf that you know will be there for years. As great as getting a book at a discount is, they're rarely in pristine condition. They're usually dog-eared and slightly rumpled with creases in the spine. For display-phobes like me, I want that clean, crisp cover with the perfectly preserved dust jacket. A silly obsession i know, but hey... how many stero fanatics out there spend thousands on getting 'just the right sound'?
I also lend/borrow/trade books with friends. Better place me on the top ten wanted list.
Hell, even the RIAA doesn't try to regulate the sale of used CDs and casettes.
Moral indignation is jealousy with a halo - H. G. Wells
Seriously, where do they think used books come from? Someone had to buy them new at one time. People who really want a book and can afford to buy it new generally will, and people who want the book, but go for the used book generally wouldn't buy the new book if it was all that was available.
This is the whole point of contention.
Personally, I believe that people are, on the whole, lazy and cheap. So I think that when you get to the Amazon page and there are two prices there, one for the new and one an extra 10-50% off for the used, people will probably go for the used.
However, if there was some minor impediment like a single link saying "Check our used section", than most people wouldn't bother clicking into it to get the discount. Even if that click was the only extra thing between them and the used book purchase.
This all relies on the idea though that people in general are lazy and cheap - unfortunately, there's a lot of evidence for this position.
That Jesus Christ guy is getting some terrible lag... it took him 3 days to respawn! -NJ CoolBreeze
The problem is the fact that the purveyors of intellectual property want to get paid for our experiences, and are trying to stuff what should be a service model (the time/energy it takes to write a book/play a song/etc) into a unit-sales model (x bucks per consumer). And sadly, they, via the RIAA and the MPAA, have enough political clout to keep trying to stuff that broken model into our legislative craw. IMO, we have to communicate to our lawmakers, not merely the practical problems involved, but the very core philosophical fallacy in which the problems are based.
Am I breaking the law because I go to Cracker Barrel and take advantage of their used audio book program?
For those of you who don't know, CB allows you to purchase a book at any their Old Country Store/Restaurants and then return that book at any CB OCS for a full refund minus a $3 restocking fee. This works out great for me because I LOVE to audio books. My commute to work helps me complete about 3 novels a week. CB's program saves me about $100/wk over the cost of new books. That's a moot point however because I wasn't buying that many books because I couldn't afford it and didn't have the time to go by the library. In addition, I work out of the state where I reside so getting to a library to which I have a card isn't easy. Is CB gonna be sued next? How about the local library?
When will the madness end?
My $0.02 will always be worth more than your â0.02, so
Bezos wears some serious blinders. Most notably is the "We've also helped authors by discounting hundreds of thousands of titles by 30%..." line.
That may have been true in the past but it's not the case with most of the books I want to buy today. I wanted to purchase a number of books this weekend. Only _one_ had any kind of discount on Amazon. The rest said "List Price: X.XX, Our Price: X.XX." Same number in both spots. Some savings.
He asserts that people who sell used books have money to go buy new books. Yeah, right. People who sell used books buy used books. If I take a load of books to a used book store, I'm not going to take my cash and walk over to Barnes and Noble. I'm going to get the most for my money and buy some used books.
I'm not saying the used book trade is bad. Far from it. But Bezos' arguments don't hold water and they are irrelevant. There is nothing illegal about selling used books and Amazon can do it however they see fit. Conversely, the Authors Guild can take whatever action they see fit to protest the sale of used books. In the end, the new/used decision lies with the customers.
I wish the book publishing paradigm would change, and the music industry, too. What you really should be paying for is the right to content, not a lump of silvery plastic or a block of dead tree. The profits from both of those go mainly to the publishers, not the artists or authors. The artist or author should get money from every user (not USE) of their material for unlimited use rights. And each new user should have to pay, too. The fee should be small and proportional to its real worth to the user.
I've sold a lot of books at full retail (where I've received a very small royalty proportional to the selling price), and I've seen a lot of my books sold on remainder tables (where I've received less than nothing - remainders are actually logged as 'returns' and counted AGAINST your sales!)
Do I buy used and remaindered books? Yes. Many of the books I buy are out of print, and frankly I buy so many books I could never afford to pay full price for all of them. But I try not to buy a used or remaindered book if it's still in-print (though I DO still comparison shop). Why? Because I want the author to get at least his paltry royalty, even though the majority goes to the publisher. I don't pirate music, either.
Unfortunately, until we come up with a new content-based (rather than media-based) distribution system, I don't think there's a solution. Of course, book and music publishers DO NOT want a new system! The current one allows them to legally steal from artists, authors, and consumers alike.
Serving your airship needs since 1995.
...since it looks like he's done with up patent reform.
What does this sentence mean?
Wasn't it last week we did this? It is great that Bezos got involved -- but we should all be involved. Selling used books is just a symptom. A couple of posts were spot on -- this is about making money... and writing books (and singing and acting..) are not good money-making careers. A writer/author/singer/actor does it because they want to, because they must express themselves or die an insane death. The publishing companies (or the recording industry, whoever else likes to screw the artists) should go piss up a rope... Selling used books will not hurt the industry; overpaid corporate lawyers hurt the industry, overpaid undertalented corporate producers hurt the industry. Perhaps everyone should boycott buying new books, but contribute some small donation to their favorite author everytime they buy a used book.... hmmm...
...we are from the government - we are here to help...
These publishes have to realize one thing: Something is only worth as much as someone else will pay for it!
Don't whine, COMPETE! Offer us something unique with a new book that doesn't come with a used one. Think outside the box. Offer us a chance to meet the author, updates, discounts on new versions, sofware, login to web site, the chance to get connected to a community of others who bought the book, etc.
This is just the marketplace taking care of certain inefficiencies. This is a GOOD thing! You can't expect people to not take advantage of this.
This is not necessarily true. Publishers have other options: PDF books, digital ways to cut costs, independent publishers, etc. in order to encourage people to buy a new version.
This is a moral appeal? Don't confuse a practical $$$ decision with a moral one. "Right" and "wrong" arguments have no place in an appeal like this.
Sure...go ahead and do that. I'll still shop at www.addall.com and www.addall.com/used and www.abebooks.com to get better prices on USED books than new ones.
If you want me to do otherwise, then GIVE ME SOME SORT OF VALUE ADD FOR BUYING A NEW BOOK!
I've been waiting for the last installment Brian Herberts Prequel Trilogy to Dune. House Corrino. But I was clear I wasn't going to cough up the $25.00 for the hardcover given the quality of the first 2. They were entertaining but not something i'd read twice. But I've been waiting for the paperback version forever. So once this story came out, I clicked on over to Amazon and got the hardcover used for $6.00, the price of the paperback. So i got to spend the amount I wanted to (demand) for the not new version (supply). Nevermind the painless recycling.
Now Brian Herbert didn't see a dime, but neither did Corning when i bought those used dishes from the salvation army. And I'm ok with that.
Perhaps the quality of writing will go up, if there is more access to used books. Or perhaps they need to provide some other incentive to justify me spending $25.00
But the authors guild would have me believe that if there was a manual on how to make dishes, I shouldn't be able to buy that used. bah!
fucking faggots. always bragging about their "poles".
I was happy to find my Photoshop book [associate link] available used through Amazon. $45 new is too much for students and the book is now 3 versions out of date anyway. But at reasonable used prices people still buy and like it and the fact that its still talked about puts me in a better position to negotiate the next edition.
The used price of a new (as in not-yet-outdated) tech book is a useful indicator of much people value it. Horrah for people's ability to dump crappy books. It will encourage better writing.
When you buy a new car, you know that it will have a resale value when you are done with it. You are more likely to buy a car with a good resale value. (This is often given as a reason to buy a Honda, for example.)
If I know that I can resell my newly purchased book when I am done, then that new book is cheaper for me to buy. Once folks get used to it, this may help to increase new book sales.
Also, publishers may start charging more for new books, to help reflect their increased resale value.
It is actually pretty hard to predict how this all turns out in the long run.
Amazon fucking rules, and you know it. Faggot hippies! Take your mom 'n pop bookstores and cram 'em. Amazon is here to stay, and United We Will Stand!
how the fuck is the parent "offtopic"? it details a trend that hasn't been brought up elsewhere in this article: that (some) people are buying more books due to easier access. this is on-topic!
First, let me say that I really like libraries, and I go totally bananas for used book stores. And what Amazon is doing is perfectly legal, no question about that. I would not deny Amazon the right to sell used books, any used books at all. But ...
I think they are being a bit insensitive - to the authors - by prominently marketing used copies of just-published books. There is a fairly small window of large sales (and another one later when the paperback comes out) which is going to generate most of the royalties. After a few months it won't matter, but having a "buy used" button next to a brand new book does not sound very "author friendly" to me. The Author's Guild is going a bit overboard, but it wouldn't be a bad idea for Amazon to backpedal just a bit on this one.
Teen Angel - a Ghost Story
Isn't it funny hwo amazon jumps back and forth across the copyright line depending on which will make them more money ??
Amazon: NO! You will not use out copyrighten method of a standard web development technique.
Amazon: HOW DARE YOU say we can not use your copywritten material to make us money !
??
Given a situation where there isn't necessarily a win-win situation, Amazon's loyalty should be to authors and publishers, not their customers?
Or maybe it's that Amazon should dumb down their UI to trick their customers into buying new books when it's perfectly legal (and cheaper) to buy used ones, just "as a courtesy" to publishers / authors?
Either way, I'm not sure I can agree with that one. Amazon is offering a valuable customer service, and if their priorities shift to ensuring maximum profitability for publishers and authors, I'm finding another bookstore.
-b
Amazon has been selling used books for some time now. Where are the statistics regarding nationwide new and used book sales, relative to Amazon's new and used book sales? Are we really talking about Amazon's used book sales making up a significant fraction of total nationwide book sales each year? If not, why is there such a fuss?
Bob
Science, like Nature, must also be tamed, with a view turned towards its preservation.
If you put constraints on how Amazon sells used books, then fairness dictates those constraints apply to all other parties including "bricks & mortar" bookstores, used book collectives, individuals, ebay sellers, and other internet marketers. Perhaps the Authors Guild would like to see a law prohibiting the resale of any book within 180 days of its first publication. Perhaps they'd like to see the same law applied to all private property. They suck.
You've mixed up the parts in the analogy...
Manufacturers make cars. Dealers sell them.
Publishers and authors make books. Bookstores sell them.
The manufacturers/publishers are complaining about the dealers/used book shops
The current situation on Amazon is that for even a recent Book X's individual page, there is likely to be a very high-profile link saying "Buy this Book X used for a lower price!". This is...
...VERY prominently placed
...not delayed (e.g. if somebody buys the book the day it comes out, decides that it's not worth finishing within an hour, and offers it for sale on Amazon, it'll show up quite soon)
...competing with the new book (the prices are usually lower)
So the Author's Guild asked that its members remove their affiliate links to Amazon. It did NOT call for the banning of used book sales; instead, I got the impression that they would be mollified if Amazon delayed the 'used book' links for some months, or if the links were less obvious...
Only the dead have seen the end of war.
No, that is not what they want.
They don't want a link to used book sales for recently released books prominently displayed on searches for those new books.
They don't give a fig about used book sales, they just don't want them prominetly pushed when people are searching for newly released books.
There are four principals here: the author, the publisher, the bookseller, and the consumer. The economic dynamic between these groups is complex (though, like most complex things, defined by simple forces and relationships). The forces exerted between the parties results in a high degree of tension in the overall system. To a large degree, this high tension is the result of publishers increasing book prices (note I am not placing blame here or discussing the reasons for the increase). Consequently, just like any other system whose structure is established by strong opposing tension between elements, the publishing industry is ripe for a realignment of relationships and forces. The effect of Amazon.com's recent actions could trigger drastic change in the economics of the publishing industry. Publishers realize this and that is why they are screaming bloody murder.
There are two components to a book's price: the intellectual property and the physical object. If you reduce the price of the physical object by sharing it, you liberate more money to pay for the intellectual property.
When the contents of a book are shared, by reselling used books, the net average price for each user is reduced. When price goes down, demand goes up. Thus there is more demand for the contents of books.
However, note that the price for the book contents is what went down, so demand for the contents is what increases. Fewer actual physical books are needed, because each book transports the contents to multiple users. So demand for books goes down, and the price goes up.
Thus, in the end, an actual book will cost more, but fewer will be sold. The income for publishers will decrease. But the intellectual property value has increased, and market forces should result in authors getting more money.
It is really a simple effect: When you make a process more efficient, both the supplier of the actual value and the consumer benefit, because they no longer have to pay for the inefficiency. It is only the supplier of the previously needed inefficiency that suffers.
Everyone seems to think the authors are trying to outlaw used books. They are doing no such thing. They don't like the fact that Amazon is selling used books almost immediately when the new ones go on sale (and I can understand their frustration with this). The Guild's response is to encourage it's members not to link to Amazon, but rather one of the other online bookseller that does no do this. It makes perfect sense for them to do this. Why send people to site where they may end up buying a copy of your book used (and you will get no money from it) when you can send them to another online bookseller where this isn't likely to happen? They don't like how Amazon is doing business, so they are trying to send their business elsewhere. There is absolutely nothing wrong with this.
"Information wants to be expensive" - Stewart Brand, the same guy who said "Information wants to be free"
Do you think that THIS took anything away/hurt the author?
I Know....jesus hung on the cross because everyone gave away the bible....
As ridiculous as that sounds, this is the angle that these people are taking on this issue.
The most LAUGHABLE part about this is that the same organization that is complaining about AMAZON selling used books wanted to charge royalties to LIBRARIES.
Are these people serious? Are you KIDDING me???! Next thing you know, every time you tell a bedtime story you'll have to send mothergoose a check.
jeez these people make me sick....please support amazon, these greedy deplorable people shouldn't get away with this.
...there wouldn't be as much incentive to purchased used books.
I'm serious. When I was a kid, I could go to the bookstore and buy any number of books for $1.95-2.49. Cover price. No discounts. Now I go to the bookstore and paperbacks sell for $6.99-7.99. That's almost 4 times what I paid as a kid. We're talking about less than 20 years here.
Why the huge increase? It's not as if it's become more difficult to publish books.
Oh, well. I may as well ask why new CDs still cost $15-$17. The answer is the same.
How badly is amazon even affecting the industry?
.01% or less?
What percentage of people buy things online? maybe 5% (in america)?
Then of those people who buy online, what percentage of them buy books from amazon.com? maybe
then.. how many people are going to make a switch and buy used instead of new? (who knows)
my point is, in the overhead view, is amazo really affecting anything at all?
--------------------------------------------
Customers are taking to many free napkins...
A new industry group ("Manufacturers Of All New Equipment & Retailers", or MOANER) announced today that they are urging newspapers across the nation to stop advertising yard sales, garage sales, and community group rummage sales. An unsigned letter from the organization, a coalition including Walmart, the RIAA, the Authors' Guild, and Panasonic, states "We believe that the practice of selling stuff more than once must be stopped. We build obsolenscence into our products, we market new styles each season, yet somehow these pirates keep selling clothes, books, appliances, and compact discs after they had already been sold at retail. We believe these practices hurt retailers and manufacturers, cost badly needed jobs, and leave perfectly good landfills empty."
...Nothing interesting here. Just move along...
"There has grown up in the minds of certain groups in this country the notion that because a man or corporation has made a profit out of the public for a number of years, the government and the courts are charged with the duty of guaranteeing such profit in the future, even in the face of changing circumstances and contrary to public interest. This strange doctrine is not supported by statute or common law. Neither individuals nor corporations have any right to come into court and ask that the clock of history be stopped, or turned back."
Robert Heinlein's Life-Line
nuclear iraq bioweapon encryption cocaine korea terrorist
You see, a publisher will only produce a second book from an author if enough copies of the first are sold.
So unless car manufacturers routinely hire and fire car designers based on if a particular model sells particularly well, your analogy fails.
It seems everybody has this idea that my problem with Amazon's actions is that it cuts into the profit of publishers and authors, but that's not the problem at all. The problem is that it cuts into the raw sales numbers, so that good niche authors simply don't get the opportunity to publish a second book.
My problem is that by having day-old used book sales available right next to the new books, we inadvertently end up feeding the mainstream mass market, and hurt the ability of new authors to be able to create and distribute non-mainstream work.
Of course, another alternative is for Amazon to supply used-sales numbers to the publishers as well. I'd be absolutely fine with that - if the publishers took the short-sighted view of not taking those into consideration, then it becomes the publishers fault, not Amazon's.
That Jesus Christ guy is getting some terrible lag... it took him 3 days to respawn! -NJ CoolBreeze
Okay, let's say I shell out $45 for the latest and greatest book about, say, Microsoft Word. The book comes, but it turns out that it covers Word for Windows, whereas I was looking for a book that covers Word for Macintosh. So, I sell the book to a buddy for $40. Now, I'm sure that the publishing industry would be much happier if I kept the book, ate the entire $45 instead of just $5, and my pal had to buy a brand new copy for another $45. I guess I'm just not quite that generous.
Now, let's say that I don't sell the book to my friend, but instead I sell it to some guy I meet on the street. Or better yet, I sell it to some guy I meet while browsing the computer section at my local bookstore. ("Psst! Wanna buy a book?") Does the fact that I never met the buyer before have any real bearing on the matter? In my opinion, no, none at all.
Next, imagine that the guy I meet doesn't actually need the book himself, but knows someone who does and who, furthermore, is a little short on cash and would rather have a slightly used copy and save $5 than pay full price for a copy untouched by human hands. I sell the guy's friend the book for $40, and I give the guy $2 for helping me out. I'm out an extra $2 now, but I'm still happy to have the $38 rather than a book I don't need. Does the publisher have any real complaint? Again, I don't think so.
Now, to make things interesting, does it matter what that intermediary's name was? Does it matter whether the guy has helped out other people in my shoes in the past? I don't think so, even if his name is Bezos.
Finally, what if I read the book before I sell it? Does that make a difference? Again, I'm no lawyer, but my sense is no.
The material nature of books gives them an inherent form of copy protection that software publishers the world over would kill for, but book publishers aren't satisfied with that. As I see it, used books provide a competive force to balance the otherwise unchecked greed of the publishers. If publishers (and authors) are really all that unhappy about used books, they can do the following:
- produce books of sufficient informational quality that people won't decide to sell them shortly after the buy them
- ask reviewers to refrain from selling review copies for at least a few months after publication
- lower prices, so that people have less incentive to buy and sell used books
Additionally, if the Authors Guild or any other authors' advocate wants to help authors, they ought to put pressure on publishers to increase royalty rates a little bit. It seems to me that technology has dramatically decreased the costs associated with publishing a book, while the costs associated with writing a book haven't changed nearly as much. Perhaps Mr. Bezos himself could help authors by putting a little pressure on publishers to pay authors a bit more.
The economic and social good that exists from the practice of selling books supersedes the initial impact of revenues owed to the author.
Selling used books contributes to a greater good and always has. That the guild is trying (and from the sympathetic responses they're getting here, perhaps succeeding) to reprioritize the consideration of this benefit is shocking.
Besides, as they said, trying to make a living as an author is probably one of the weaker reasons for ever writing a book. Authors certainly are entitled to it if their books sell, but all representative organizations for the marketing and distribution of "content" seem to shifting focus to these "revenue maximizing" issues in light of the controversy that is slowly gaining illumination regarding their true efficacy: they don't do their jobs well, rely on "blockbuster" sales instead of supporting their larger product ("talent") pool, etc.
I've bought plenty of stuff from Amazon (realizing the reality that boycotts are not an effective means of change).
In many cases they've had used copies of the same book I was buying - but I still bought new. If the difference is not much (escpially on paperback) it's nice to have a fresh copy of the book where the only wrinkles you have are the ones you put there. And that used copy up on Amazon would have been in a used bookstore anyway, so I don't see it hurting sales.
There is another aspect you discount, that Amazon knows if you bought the book and that factors in to reccomendations and ratings. So even if a bunch of people are buying the book used from Amazon that might lead more people who didn't know about the book to buy it new as a result of link from some other book. People greatly discount this kind of networking effect that can have a lot of promotional impact.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
First, their assertion that used books hurt the book industry and
authors is not correct. We've found that our used books business
does not take business away from the sale of new books. In fact,
the opposite has happened. Offering customers a lower-priced option
causes them to visit our site more frequently, which in turn leads
to higher sales of new books while encouraging customers to try
authors and genres they may not have otherwise tried. In addition,
when a customer sells used books, it gives them a budget to buy more
new books.
(Emphasis Mine)
Actually, it sounds like selling used books is good for Amazon.com, not the lit industry. Look, Amazon uses very predatory tactics to get their remainders, which they then sell as "used". These books never made their authors any money via royalties because they were sold as remainders and the publishers took a loss.
No one is arguing against anyone's right to sell used books. It's about treating your business partners nicely. If you're an author with a personal website, or a publisher, you'll want to link to an e-commerce site that will get someone to by your book new and make you a buck. That's only natural.
Actually, this is more of a pissing match between the publishing industry (corpulent, unimagninative and greedy) and amazon (just greedy). Who do you think funds the authors guild? Authors. Please... what authors do you know (megastars aside) who can support a "guild". The author's guild is funded by publishers.
In a perfect world, authors (and other content creators) wouldn't need greedy-stupid publishers and distributors to get their work out there. That's the promise of xlibris, but it's yet to really make an impact, mostly because the people who publish via xlibris couldn't get published anywhere else.
How I long for a day when artists and scientists don't need corporate patrons.
Howard Dean for president
It's a legit question. I used to purchase used textbooks when I was a student at the University of Washington (the university of a thousand years and a million laughs) and so did everyone else. Hell, I once had a basic psych textbook that had been resold a dozen times. Buying used textbooks, especially for all of the shit courses I had to take where I just wanted to forget the course as soon as the quarter ended, saved me a lot of money and as far as I can see the authors of these overpriced tomes never got dime one off of the sale of the used volume. Where are the self-righteous jackoffs in the Author's Guild on this issue? This has been going on for years at colleges all over the United States and has to add up to a significant chunk of change.
cheap labor conservatives - they want to keep you hungry enough to be thankful for minimum wage.
Here's my letter to the Authors Guild:
Dear Mr. Aiken,
I'm writing today to voice my support for Amazon's innovative used-book program. I'm a professional science fiction writer and journalist, the recipient of the Campbell Award for Best New Science Fiction Writer at the 2000 Hugo Awards, and the author of two novels forthcoming from Tor Books and a short-story collection forthcoming from Four Walls Eight Windows. I also spent my adolescence working in book stores and libraries.
I'm quite distressed at the Authors Guild's reactionary position on Amazon's used-book service. As a new author whose books will be published as $25+ hardcovers, my principal challenge will be to find a way to introduce my work to new readers. The intershelving of used and new books has been shown to be an effective means of driving sales of new authors -- I discovered this myself when I was a bookseller, and it's an experience that has been replicated in many bookstores, from corner operations like my local genre bookstore, Borderlands Books, all the way up to Powell's Books, the largest bookstore in the world.
What's more, the Amazon used-books service does not push the bounds of established copyright law or practice *at all*. The right of a consumer to resell the property s/he's lawfully acquired (called the Doctrine of First Sale) is the reason that we are able to have used bookstores at all. Also, yard-sales, charitable donations, library discard sales, collectibles sales, etc and so forth.
Indeed, one of the most revolting characteristics of many e-book technologies is that they abridge this right -- think of all the tens of millions of books donated to schools and libraries, sent to prisons and literacy programs, passed from friend to friend or within a family. The Doctrine of First Sale makes all of this possible.
Amazon's used-book service only reduces the friction involved in a used-book sale. When I worked at Bakka, a science fiction bookstore with new and used stock, young sf fans with tight budgets would often request popular titles that were available new on the shelf as used copies on their wish-lists. These are precisely the readers whose disappearance that we science fiction writers lament at every sf con as we look around at our greying ranks and wonder whether the genre is disappearing. Amazon's service makes this kind of thing easier and better for those readers -- why would we, as authors, wish to stop Amazon from extending the service?
Arguably, this is what the Internet is *for* -- connecting people at low cost, finding new market niches and exploiting them, reducing friction.
Copyright is a bargain between the public domain and creators -- we are able to create well and profit by our creations because we are able to benefit from the commons created by the works of those who came before us, which have entered the public domain. The bargain allows us to be effective creators, and it allows others to be innovative consumers.
Here Amazon and its customers (who are providing every one of those used books!) are building an innovative secondary market that will improve the overall economy. The bargain allows our *creative* expression, it allows their *innovative* expression.
To quote one of my colleagues:
> Companies should be lauded for extracting additional value from the formerly
> fallow copyright resources that belong to the public (like first sale and
> fair use).
In short, keep your disapprobation to yourself -- I want to work *with* my readers, not *against* them.
Thank you,
Cory Doctorow,
Former Canadian Regional Director,
Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America
Hmm.. the used books vs. used cars is a poor analogy. Car manufacturers/dealers do make money on used/new car purchases. I would bet they make most of their money from replacement parts and repairs at the dealer. The auto industry will make money throughout the life of a car.
A book on the other hand the profit is made when the book is originally purchased. Not many people would go back to the publisher to repair a binding , torn page or remove that coffee stain.
Eventually, Amazon and Half.com are going to really hurt the publishing industry too.
The appearance of Half.com and Amazon.com used book sales pulled millions of used books off shelves and threw them back in the market. This happened right at the beginning of a recession. As a result, the programs have magnified the hurt of the recession. Who knows, there may even be publishers that go under because of the double witching.
In the long run, however, cleaning off all the bookshelves, and putting a little more money in the book buying public will probably not be that big of a hurt. I face book buying with a totally different attitude now that I know I can unload the books I don't want to keep.
Printing and distribution technologies are changing quite rapidly. So it will be impossible to say what caused publisher a to go under while publisher b survived.
I just bought a Weber grill on Amazon. I noticed that I could have also bought the grill used via the button that Amazon provides right next to the button to buy it from Amazon .
I wonder if the Grillmakers Guild is going to go after Amazon for allowing rascals such as myself to buy used grills on Amazon instead of purchasing them new.
For what it is worth, I bought the new grill.
mbbac
I'd like to suggest that the value of a book is often in the _having_of a book and not the _having had_ a book. That is, many books are of no value to me if I can't reread them in toto or look things up in them, either for pleasure or as a reference. In my opinion, the only books that carry their full value from owner to owner are "throw-away" entertainment, true crime stories, and other ephemera.
Economics may postulate that everyone gets full value from a re-sold book, but if I want to look up a fact or re-read a story that in a book that I sold when I was done with it, then I do not possess that value any more.
Then again, I was an English major, and economics always confused me.
First, I applaud your basic message. This reply is not meant in any way to detract from the meat and bones of what you said.
I only wanted to clarify the difference between "has a right to" and "is legal".
First, whether Amazon has a *right* to sell used copies or not is a debatable assertion. You may very well have implied *legal* right, in which case I'm just being a PITA.
But in so separating "right" from "legal", while they are IMHO the "bunch of whiny brats" you describe them to be -- I fully support their innate right to protest Amazon's actions.
People forget the cornerstone of the free market is being able to debate, argue and cajole people where it hits hardest -- in their wallets. The Author's Guild feels it is being hit in the wallet by Amazon, and it is striking them back in the wallet -- with the time-honored boycott!
Freedom is great -- please don't condemn someone for exercising what I feel is an innate right to disagree with others. Argue *why* you disagree, not that the opposing party has no *right* to speak!
That is very true - for a while I was selling used books on eBay, and when I was active I found myself buying a lot more books (used and new) as I knew it would be easy to be rid of them even if I didn't like them.
If you make it easy for people to sell used, and as you said they know how much they can get for the book later, then they might think of it as only spending $3 for a book instead of $7. Perhaps it would even lead to people treating books a little better overall!
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Let authors and artists(musicians mainly) to register and whenever their used books or cds are sold buyers are given an option to tip them. Good or bad idea?
"America, I smoke marijuana every chance I get."
Book Crossing lets you set your unwanted books loose in the wild, with a tracking number in case someone finds it. Basically like Where's George or PhotoTag crossed with GeoCaching.
And nobody makes a buck. Is that any better?
This sig intentionally left justified.
How about increased mindshare? By having their work read by more people, an author increases their fanbase and their potential market for sales of future writings.
For example, I remember back when I was in high school, a friend recommended Riverworld by Philip Jose Farmer. I found a copy at a used bookstore. I enjoyed it and ended up reading the entire series when later books were published. Most of the books were bought new since I didn't want to wait until a used copy might become available. And since I enjoyed Farmer's writing I ended up buying a lot more of his other books, most of them new.
Did my buying used books hurt Farmer's income? No. If I had not been able to buy that first book for cheap, I probably wouldn't have risked so much of my limited teenage income to speculate on a new (to me) author. As a result of that used book sale, Mr. Farmer gained a new fan and sold more books.
Trickster Coyote
Ideology is for ideots.
--The more people who read an author (including used books), the more exposure he/she gets, and that's a good thing because that promotes or cuts future sales of the author (democratic AND capitalistic).
This is an exact duplicate of what is going on in the music industry. If you are an artist worried about making money maybe you should get a job.
Nobody ever told me i had the right to make money doing what i like. ive got the right to do what i like if it is within the law and ive got a right to make money.
Thanks to the above artist/writer who makes it clear that doing both independently is possible!
Now back to your regularly scheduled rant already in progress...
disclaimer
boring personal anticdote about book purchases
generalize above through transparent argument proving that desired behavior (which just happens to support my ethics) helps book industry
sideways stealth attack against arbitrary organization, either because they don't agree with me, or because they do for the wrong reasons
dumb sig
Maybe the state's highest function is to grind out insoluble problems. (Zelazny, Hall of Mirrors)
I spend between USD$4-6,000 annually on books, 90% of those purchased new. For storage and interest reasons, I don't keep them all. Previously I took them to the used book store or the library give-away.
Now I sell some fraction of them (in the several hundreds a year) on Amazon -- the rest go to my traditional local outlets. So I ask: what's the problem? The money I get goes to buy other (typically new) books. The books would have ended up at a used bookstore anyway. Many of the sellers on Amazon are used bookstores themselves (including Powells, the famous bookstore in Portland).
Amazon is being criticized for making it even easier to do something that people have always done: sell and buy used books. Yes, let's go punish all those companies who introduce efficiencies in the marketplace. How dare they! Used bookstores promote more widespread reading and allow people to investigate authors that they would not (yet) pay new book prices for.
Used book sales may cannibalize some small part of new book sales, but it's got to be minimal. After all, we don't see the big box booksellers collapsing from the market pressure of all the little local used bookstores -- quite the opposite.
Most of my early books are out of print, and I always have people e-mailing me asking for copies. I don't have any to sell, but I can direct them to a used bookstore. I already received my pittance (a couple bucks on a $40 retail computer book) for the book, so why should I insist on getting paid again?
If someone doesn't need one of my books any longer, I encourage them to sell it through a used store. I want some of my old books to be available to new readers!
On the other hand, there are a couple books I wrote (at publisher's insistence) that I wouldn't mind seeing vanish from the planet! ;)
All about me
What about books that are Out Of Print? Regardless of how badly I want a new copy, the publisher won't provide one.
Is it ok to sell THOSE books used, or should we not be allowed to have that title until the publisher decides there's enough market demand to make another printing profitable?
Face it, dudes. You can't rule by controlling the physical distribution of junky paper anymore. Publishers should improve the quality of their paper, ink, and binding. Perhaps in-retail-store custom printing/binding on demand. With digital copying and distribution costs heading toward zero, a book's material/build quality will soon be the only way to justify buying retail books.
"If you buy one of my books (or are sent it to review) it's yours. You bought it (or were given it). You can sell it on. I don't have any more of a problem with Amazon listing the used copies than I do bookstores having used book sections. It's their store.
You can buy a book new, buy it in hardback or wait for the paperback, find it used or as a collectible. I don't mind. What I care about most is that people are reading.
As I said when I discussed this at length in the piece I put up on this journal, that was quoted in Wired, last month, books don't come with single-end-user licenses, and I think that's a good thing."
Makes sense to me.
The Writers Guild has determined that governmental organizations are buying limited quantities of original copyrighted works and lending them to the public without compensating writers for each viewing or "reading".
Its called a library. They're worried about used book sales?
Sheesh.
Here's a working link, http://www.ibiblio.org/bgreek/archives/greek-2/msg 00137.html.
We the authors' guild have found another disturbing trend in literary circles: in certain cities and suburban communities in America, so-called "libraries" actually make books that we worked hard to write available for free to anyone who wants to read them!
If a "library" is allowed to purchase one copy of a book and share it with many people, they will undermine book sales because these people will never buy the book -- depriving hard-working authors of their money.
If you read books from libraries, you support communism.
I'm afraid it might be a little late for this comment, or someone might have said something along these lines already, but here it goes:
Wouldn't you buy a book easier if you knew it would also be easier to sell it, in case you do not want to keep it? So, wouldn't making reselling easier would also have a positive effect on book sales. Maybe, this sounds farfetched, but imagine you want to buy a book which is somewhat expensive. You check your library and see a couple of books you might live without, you sell them and get the book you want. I wouldn't sell my books for dining outside, but I would feel OK if I am selling them to buy new books.
ato
"Third, when someone buys a book, they are also buying the right to resell that book, to loan it out, or to even give it away if they want. Everyone understands this." Too bad the RIAA has paid off Congress so this doesn't apply to CD's any more.....
Publishing houses are to writing as the MPAA's charter members are to movie making.
Publishers screw over just as many people as the MPAA, but since their media isn't as wide-spread in piracy, and they don't really make that much money off books and other publications, you don't really hear that much from them.
But I've seen some contracts where the author would give up all rights to the book, which some he should reserve, for the life of the copyright itself, whether or not the publisher decided to publish the book. It's insane contracts like that which are becoming more frequent (mostly by lesser known houses, but hey, someday Tor or Random House may have them), which make publishers just as untrustworthy as media conglomerates these days.
Listen to what authors have to say about their books, just as you would listen to directors and producers have to say about their movies. Go to the source, not the people trying to amass as much money off others' work as possible.
Human nature is the same everywhere; the modes only are different. -- Earl of Chesterfield
What the authors want is to sell TWO copies (or more) of the book instead of one, when two people could derive all the use out of one copy. They are advocating a wasteful approach simply because it profits them and benefits no one else.
Robotiq.com is heavily tested on animals
Publishers sometimes pay an up front payment, and that's all the author receives for the sales of the book. If it sells 7,000 or 7,000,000, the author earns the same. These are reserved more for larger talents, of course, like Stephen King and John Grisham.
Imagine, then, if you propose that authors should receive additional money from sales of books that are used, when they normally would not receive money from sales of new books. Publishers are trying to recuperate their payments by pushing sales of the book.
Of course, I've never really liked that business strategy, but I doubt many publishers would rid themselves of it, banking on the hopes that they'd come out ahead.
Human nature is the same everywhere; the modes only are different. -- Earl of Chesterfield
I wonder if Amazon plans to start selling used electronics or any of the other stuff they sell? I really doubt it, because that would cost *them* money as opposed to other people. That argument about used books helping authors sounds exactly like something a dot com executive would say. Maybe he should compress the files (.bp3s?) and stick them on his site, since according to other sage internet executives that also helps spur sales. This is certainly about greed, but not on the part of the authors.
Let us extend this wonderful logic a bit further. Invariably allowing the resale of used items "takes" away from those who would have profited has the item been bought new. So therefore why not just set an outright ban on the selling of used items ? I mean the loss for BOOKS is negligible, but how about something bigger ? Say.. HOUSES and CARS?? Just think how many architects, laborers, carpenters, etc.. lose business every time someone is allowed to resell their home ?
So let me propose we offer one way of unloading your home, as to "preserve" the interest of all the hardworking American plumbers and carpenters: if you don't want it, you can burn it or blow it up. But you can't give it away or sell it.
So much for property rights, you fucking retards.
One correction to the blurb I'd like to make: the used-book sales aren't royaltyless. No royalty is paid to the author on this sale because the author has already received the royalty on that copy of the book the first time it was sold (as a new book). The Guild is complaining not that the author isn't being paid, but that they aren't being paid multiple times for a single copy sold.
but for every used book sold, it has to have been bought once new. If someone is going to buy a cheaper used book, what does it matter if they buy it one month, or ten months, or a decade, after the book is released?
The timetable matters because publishers generally decide whether to give an author a second book deal based on the sales numbers they get from the first one.
I'm like you. I prefer new. I'm worried about those who when they get on the Amazon site see that if they click one link they get it for some price, but if they click the link just below it, they get it for 10-50% cheaper. I tend to feel that a lot of people who aren't as into books as you and I will see that extra savings and think "Why not.. it's not even been out a month, how much damage could have been done to it?"
Now this isn't going to affect established authors one iota. The publishers know they can sell those authors and so have a lot more leeway in what they consider a "failed" book. But for new or niche authors then this could wind up being the difference between them getting a second book or not.
A lot of people say "Well, I buy the first book used, because I don't want to risk the money, but if I like it, I buy the rest new." Which is great! The problem is when you buy that first one used, decide you like it, but then never see another book from that author again because their sales weren't high enough for the publishers.
I'm not saying don't buy used. Bigger audience and all, more exposure. Good things. But buying used when the book is still on the "New Book Rack" at wherever (be it Amazon or the local store) can wind up hurting the authors.
That Jesus Christ guy is getting some terrible lag... it took him 3 days to respawn! -NJ CoolBreeze
The reason is simpler than that, publishing companies are greedy. Second hand sales (and civil disobedience) are the only thing curbing the monopoly power of those companies, if you support outlawing second hand sales then maybe the government should determine the pricing huh? Seems only fair.
... the major publishers lost a court case in 2001 versus shops selling used games. Are you quite sure you are correct? Did they win an appeal recently?
Anyway, to the point
I download all my movies and music, because if I could not I would never have it because I would not pay for over the overpriced crap, but I always buy new books. Who wants someone elses shit, that is if it aint digital. Some people gonna bitch unless they get all the control. get over it.
The first thing I tought of was used car sales. Like many other /. readers But as one wrote that it was illeagal to re-sell software in Japan and its reason to be the creation, effort being sold, I thought of artists and then in a wider perspective school teachers, free software etc. Internet as the vehicle is damaging, too. Hey! Where do we stop? Where do we draw the line?
A novel purchased cheaply at a used book store just cultivates another fan and reader for that author.
Just throw books away when you're done with them! Keeps the economy moving!
If you really like a book, you'll get copies. I read Snow Crash in a library, I'm sure that any decent library would have it, but I still bought three copies of the book.
May we never see th
>>>> And, that leads us to the answer.
Sharing is illegal. Both giving a copy to someone else, and keeping one is illegal, be it a book, wav file, or MP3.
Publishers need to start going after people doing the crime. Treble damages are perfectly acceptable in today's world, so your typical Napster type can be hit up for $18 x 3, plus costs for each CD they "share". Computers are generally traceable, and tools are being put into place to make that all the easier. The cost to "nail" a few hundred college kids would probably average $100 - $400 each. Word would spread, and the problem would be solved.
But, the content providers aren't simply looking for just compensation of their work. If they were, the solution is clear. Rather, they are looking to loot the situation, and codify their right to that looting, before the general population becomes properly informed.
His letter to the Authors' Guild is at http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/wlg/1291
> and frankly, if you're just in it for the money, you probably shouldn't be a writer.
When was any of this about the writers?
This is about the monolith we call the publishing industry. Nothing more.
Here's their problem. One writer writes a book and 50 wannabes have a job. Unfortunately, the writer gets paid "dick", as do most of the other 50. But most do better than min. wage, and a few make out well enough to buy a congressman, like say, the "Senator from Disney".
Those 50 people are looking redundancy in the eye, and don't like it one bit. They vote. They have a united politial base. Compared to the write, they are a majority. Do they want to join that "I have two min. wage jobs to support my family." class?
Not if they can help it. They'd do most anything to force you to buy only fresh dead-tree copies. Gunpoint, law, whatever works. Reduce, recycle, reuse be damned when it comes to your job.
"Last week's call for authors to de-link Amazon from their sites has reportedly prompted Jeff Bezos to fire off a letter to all Amazon Marketplace sellers, asking them to help out by sending e-mail on Amazon's behalf in response to the Guild's call for Amazon to stop placing prominent used book ads on each title's main web entry and soliciting new books purchasers to resell their books through Amazon shortly after purchase."
Sweet Jesus!!! Now THAT's a freaking run on sentence!! It took me an extra brain to hold the first part of the 'sentence' (more like a novella, really), just to remember it while reading the end!
Now that's... REDICULOUS!!!
Weee!!!!! Slashdot english r00lz!!
w00t w00t!
So when you're done with a book, why not recycle it ?
Editor Emeritus and Senior Writer, TeleRead.org
Wow, I was really surprised to see the level of savagery used in dismissing the Author's Guild's concerns. Most of you seem to be concerned with your own hip-pockets, and not the author's. (I said the 'author', not the 'publisher')
I am going to say a few things now - a little incoherently and with more passion than factual evidence - that will probably upset a lot of you, but I want to say it anyway.
The general tone here seems dismissive - because publishers are perceived as charging too much money for books, people seem prepared to trash authors' rights to get paid for their product, and to demean the profession of writing itself by holding up second-rate authorship as the benchmark, and the reason why books cost too much and we shouldn't have our access to second-hand books restricted in any way.
Perhaps this may have something to do with the fact that we're in an IT/Computer community here, where it seems that the fact that most of the information on the internet is free, albeit sometimes second-rate, seems to be coloring people's perceptions about what a book is worth. A lot of people also spend their own personal time and energy for free in projects such as open source, purely for the love of what they're doing, and seem to expect others to do the same for their career as they do for their hobby.
I don't know much about the publishing industry, or the community I'm in right now, but I do support authors. This business of doing your art for art's sake and not worrying about the money is insidious, idealistic garbage, possibly put forward by people who aren't talented enough to dedicate their lives to their art, and therefore don't care if it's possible to make a living by your art or not. Why the hell shouldn't an artist get paid properly for their work, instead of having to do it just for the love of it? People who have non-authorship day jobs shouldn't be undermining others' efforts to make a living as an author. Why do people always view arts as something where people should be idealistic, and not hard-headed businesspeople as well as creative artists? Authors get little enough, and they deserve to be paid for their efforts just like everyone else, just like they have their rent and mortgage and bills to pay like everyone else.
I fail to see the connection between not paying for royalties and stopping the proliferation of garbage literature. While it may be true that authors must keep up with the times and the changes, and if there are changes that threaten their living, the industry must adapt or die, there is no reason why they have to go down without a fight.
It seems to me that the rapid implementation of Internet and related technology, the dissemination and proliferation of information, at perhaps for the user only the cost of someone else's efforts in putting up a website, an ISP connection and a phone call, is forcing many enterprises and industries to find new ways to earn or recoup their money, and new legislations are being fought over all the time. However, does this mean that the only people who are going to be able to make big bucks are the advertisers, web sites and peripheral industries who get their money by basically hanging around good content, or by selling good content?
Are we going to accept that we are going to be inundated with mountains of second-rate material for free because the nature of information dissemination and access these days is such that no one wants to pay for it, and the people who make the money out of good content are the people who host the good content, not necessarily the writers?
I realise that a lot of the above has nothing to do with the question at hand, which is whether or not Amazon should be re-selling second-hand books right next to new ones, but that's because a lot of the above was in reply to comments I've read on this issue. So if you think its off the track, so have most of the comments been.
As for the selling of second hand books - well, second hand books have always been sold, but usually by dedicated second-hand bookstores. Don't ask me why bookstores haven't amalgamated first and second hand in one store before Amazon.
I think Amazon should not solicit and advertise the second hand books right next to new book titles, but move it elsewhere. If people want second hand, they go second-hand. If they want new, they go new, but not put second hand in competition with new, when there is the issue of royalties in there. That way they'll still get the second-hand book traffic, because of course they'll make sure everyone will know the service is there. If Amazon claim that they are so supportive of authors, then they should work more closely in consultation with organisations for authors (not publishers). Then if they are able to persuade authors its in their best interests, there'd be no problem, would there?
Let's start with "right to content". How did you learn to read? From using books in the first grade? Ok, are you allowed to teach your kids to read? Or, do they have to pay the author of your first grade primer a royalty? After all, you're sharing content with them, aren't you?
The reading thing might be a little abstact for some. So, let's try this. You heard something on CNN last night. Can you discuss it with your friends without them paying a royalty to CNN?
Now, what is this "real worth to the user" thing? Bill Gates learned to read, as did many a welfare case. I assume Bill has found real worth in that knowledge, while the welfare worker might be said to have gained negative value. What value do you ascript as "real worth" to these two users?
Get the idea?
If you have a earth moving idea, patent it.
Otherwise, the "content" of your book amounts to little more than a compilation of "content" that is a matter of public domain. I understand it takes effort to write a book. I do. And I understand you don't get paid fair per-copy royalties. That's life.
I was recently laid off. I designed a major software system that is making some corporate types millions, and millions, of dollars. Without me, they may well have lost a major chunk of their Fortune 500 business. They took the idea, are making their money, and I'm on UC. So, welcome to the club, we're glad you came.
But, you see, I'm not ready to basiscally destroy society by shifting compensation to "content" vs. the "tangible media" standard.
Once law defines a right to compensation for a thing, that right cannot be limited to "money". So, you would end up with Micro-book EULA's on everything. Insane, you say? Well, some are already pioneering the idea. Can you imagin the disaster of a life where "self" is defined by whatever collection of EULAs you had to agree on to educate, inform, and entertain yourself?
Your problem is either the pricing of your book or the value of your book. One copy of a book cannot sustain a nation, used or not. So it isn't about maximizing the number of copies you sell, but knowing the value of your work and size of your audience, then estimating from that the fair price of each copy you're likely to sell. If your book is a high-level college math, you charge $250+ a copy. If your book is "Joy of Cooking", you charge much less.
Either way, some non-zero number of copies will be needed to saturate your market. Price accordingly.
If there is a full supply of used copies of a 1-month old book, then that says something: noone wants to keep this book. Why on earth do authors deserve high sale numbers when the book that they sold has so little future value (i.e. virtually noone wants to re-read it or look anything up in it or lend it to a friend)? If a mere 500 copies of a book are enough to satisfy everyone because it doesn't take long to read and it's not worth having when you're done, why should the author sell 50,000 copies?
Used books are typically not in as good condition as new books, they don't typically have the same physical feel (e.g. a new binding feels different than an old binding), and if there is really that good of a supply of used books, the book can't be worth much, regardless of what is being charged for it. Why should bad authors be subsidised by unnecessary inefficiencies. After all, the reason that it's copyright and not a tax is so that good books get rewarded more than bad books, in order to encourage good books.
They laughed at Einstein. They laughed at the Wright Brothers. But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown. -- C. Sagan
Considering they are planning, with all other media outlets, to make books and other paper media into eMedia with pay-per-read, I think they should just "suck it up".
"Though it may take a thousand years, we shall be FREE."
Let me first state that between books and magazines I probably spend about $300-$400 a month. When I travel the stores I check out are CD and book stores. When I go to New York my travel itenerary basically consists of arriving around 10 a.m. on Sunday, parking in front of Academy Records on 18th Street, getting breakfast and showing up when Academy's doors open thereafter filling my car's trunk with used CDs (relax oh keepers of the digital copyright--Academy is almost all classical and opera CDs, which rank very, very, very low in the Napsterizing and CD-R world. Find me someone that has copied Schabel's Beethoven recordings and traded in the orginals.) I then proceed to the Strand bookstore on 11th (?) & Broadway--a half-block sized warehouse of used and remaindered books. Then onto St. Marks place, for further used CD and used book purchasing. Then on to the West Village for more of the same. Oh, and if I get done fast enough, I can stop at Princeton Record Exchange on the way home.) Anyway, to make a long story short, I'm 33 and the only difference from when I was 10 is that back then I was riding a bike around instead of a car and I was riding around Hollywood, FL instead of NYC.
The reason the Writer's Guild's petition is so ridiculous is that used books shopping has been the regular course of behavior for book collectors back a few generations. Find me a real writer that didn't spend most of their pre-royalty check days trolling used bookstores and, likely, working in them. Particularly genre writers, who live in the places.:)
It was riding my bike around from store to store twenty years ago that I found the Lensmen and Skylark series by E.E. Smith, back before I realized they were unreadable.
I rememebr times my backpack was so weighed down with used books that I had to be careful turning corners that I wouldn't tip my bike over.
Used book shopping is completely ingrained in the book collector's behavior. Suggesting that used books be driven off of amazon is like suggesting that people shouldn't buy in thrift stores because of all the jobs it costs poor textile workers, and think of the manufacturing jobs lost in North Carolina when people buy used or antique furniture!! It's just silly--go to any writer's place and were did their books (at least the non-promotional copies) come from? Used bookstores.
Amazon's practice of selling used copies side-by-side with the new copies isn't even a new idea. Jeez, Powell's in Portland, OR has been doing it for decades--Amazon probably got the idea from Powells.
For anyone not familiar with Powells (and if you aren't you shouldn't be posting on this topic anyway): the fellow that owns Powells opened a book store in Portland after his son opened a store in Chicago. Dad didn't know much about selling books, and didn't know that used books are supposed to be shelved separately from new books. So he shelved them together. He also couldn't see how multiple used copies could be priced the same--the more copies that show up on the used shelf the less desirable the book, so each extra copy should be priced a little less than the one before it. So Dad went on his merry, stupid way. The main Powell's store now takes up a city block in Portland, burrowing its way through the existing buildings on the block in such a fashion that they publish a map of the store to guide you around its catacombs. Powell's and Strand are the Meccas of the East and West Coast for book nuts.
Amazon's sales look to me like just the Powell's system brought online, which makes some since as Powells is one of the online stores Amazon competes against. Other online used book sources are the Advanced Book Exchange, bookfinder and alibris. ABE and bookfinder are searchable databases of used bookstores around the country, which albiris is a (sometimes pricey) centralized fulfillment warehouse where people send their used books for sale (also used book sellers that have gotten tired of running stores or going from flea market to flea market just put their inventory there for sale.) I have purchased _many_ books through Powells and bookfinder. Too bad Portland is a little far from Philadelphia--wandering around the store is a great time.
Anyway, I've rambled on and on, but one final point, and it has been made earlier in the discussion--unlike digital media, there is no cost-effective way to duplicate printed media while turning the original into a used store. When you see a book in a used store, or on amazon's used lists, it means someone has deemed the book disposable and is relinquishing all interest in the book. Same as a table, or used car, or sofa, they're giving up the whole thing and the buyer has the only instance of that copy running back to the original purchase. The point? The only way used sales can make a dent in new sales of the work is if a large enough percentage of previous purchasers deem the book disposable and not worthy of keeping. If enough purchasers of your book believe it isn't worth keeping, then maybe you should loose out on some royalties! After all, I still have those Phil Dick and Harlan Ellison books I bought when I was 12 (nothing a 7th grade teacher likes more than seeing a student reading "Love Ain't Nothing But Sex Misspelled" during study period). I still have the same $2 used Book Club Edition copy of Lathe of Heaven I bought years ago after seeing the PBS movie. (Too bad I loaned the Lensmen books to someone that never returned them, and then bought the new printings last year when I was then old enough to realize they were unreadable!) The idea that someone who doesn't want a book should be stuck either a) throwing it in the trash or b) using it to get the fireplace started is offensive. Better the book should be taken to Ye Used Booke Store or sold through amazon to someone that want it.
By the by, I checked amazon and, for example, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, which sold 60,000 copies just from Amazon pre-orders a couple of years ago, has a grand total of 72 copies available used--.12% of just the number pre-ordered from one source, amazon. Guild member Judy Blume's Blubber, which the Judemeister has been earning royalties on for 26 years, has a grand total of 22 used copies available. I think Judy's gonna make the car payment without a problem from amazon.
But still not really seeing it for several reasons:
.NET and CLR - I just want it as cheap as I can get it.
1) There would only be a small number of used books out there.
2) As a consumer I would want a used copy of certain books if I could find them (especially on release day) so anything that denies me those savings puts me at a disadvantage
3) The economy of scale doesn't seem to really make much of a difference I guess between this and say students buying used books when they register for class.
Guess I just won't get this one. Amazon should be able to do the same thing eBay can and sell used merchandise as it comes into inventory. If I'm buying an OpenGL programming book - or some other professional reference, I want a new one. If I'm just taking a gander at like
What's wrong with that?
University of a thousand years and a million laughs? Is this like Bozo's Third Reich or something? I'd like to know, because I'm about to find myself on that particular campus. ;-)
> What very few people are realizing here...
You are right, and I am very surprised. BMW had an advertising campaign, aimed at the company car fleet market, saying that although their cars were more expensive to buy new, they held their value better. So when the company sold them after three years, they got more money back. BMW's big claim was that their cars held there value so well that it more than made up for the higher purchase price, thus BMW's were cheap cars for the cost conscious buyer!
In the car market sellers are very well aware that a strong second hand market supports the price at first sale. This makes authors look stupid as well as greedy. Who wants to read a book written by a stupid writer?
You've hit the nail on the head. That is exactly what they really want. The law is on the side of used books so they will use any pressure they can to make it as difficult as possible for the used book buyer. If a book shows up used the day after it is released, maybe there is a good reason like the thing is a big turkey and the author doesn't deserve to sell any more copies. It becomes a free speech issue as well. I may want to express my opinion by selling a book ASAP.
Profanity - The sign of a small mind trying to express itself.
I think my responsibility to ensure an author's income is the same as the author's responsibility to do the same for me. Zero. If I can't afford to buy his book, then he doesn't get my cash. If he can't afford to make a living on selling copies, then I don't get his works. Simple stuff.
Why do we always have to justify or excuse exercising our first sale rights on the grounds that this will be good for the industry?
According to this logic, if someone can show publishers are seeing declining revenues, well then kiss your first sale rights goodbye. And say hello to the big brother world of realtime, privacy-invasive, content controls on every damn thing you buy.
Finally, and to balance the debate a bit, we need to reestablish the legitimacy of sharing, borrowing, loaning, and conserving the things we use. Share a lawnmower with the neighbors. Carpool. Loan out the books you aren't reading, make mix compilation CD's of your favorite music and give them to your friends, invite your neighbors over for dinner. Buy a newspaper and then pass it on to your coworkers when you are done with it. Loan a friend some of your DVD's or VHS tapes. Trade videogames. Borrow that cool salad bowl the old lady upstairs uses. Loan out your fishing poles. Be part of a community.
When in doubt, have a man come through a door with a gun in his hand.
Yes, sales of used books hurt sales of new books to some degree. But the affordability of used books is a great benefit to consumers.
There are a lot more consumers than authors. So the trading of used books has a large net positive effect for society -- and reducing friction in this (and any) market is to be commended.
That that is is that that that that is not is not.