Forum - View topicNEWS: Independent Bookstores File Suit Against Amazon, Major Publishers
|
Goto page Previous 1, 2, 3, 4 Next Note: this is the discussion thread for this article |
| Author | Message | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
Maidenoftheredhand
 Posts: 2633 |
|
|||
I used to be anti e-book until I got a kindle and saw how much more convenient it was to carry that when I travel. And while I still love my collection of paper books and will still probably buy my favorite titles in that format, space is an issue. |
||||
|
||||
marie-antoinette
 Posts: 4136 Location: Ottawa, Canada |
|
|||
|
I have a Kobo, which I mainly bought because libraries have ebooks in the Kobo format so I can borrow them for free and then buy the physical book if I actually like it. Plus I have filled it up with the free public domain books ... I think I have a library of 30 or so books and only one of them cost me any money.
Anyway, this law suit is absolutely ridiculous. I get that it is not a good world out there for the independent bookstores but I can't see them getting the ability to sell ebooks as helping much/at all. |
||||
|
||||
|
ConanSan
Posts: 1818 |
|
|||
Same thing with Comics and Comixology (All the awesome of comic books and none of the wednesday crowd? Thanks ta) and Manga, if Viz wern't idiots about it. |
||||
|
||||
chrisb
 Subscriber Posts: 622 Location: USA |
|
|||
My textbooks at the bookstore averaged 180 dollars each. Google Play sold me some of them for as low as 20 dollars in ebook form. E-books definitely have a place! |
||||
|
||||
yamiangie
 Posts: 465 |
|
|||
Oh text books are just a scam in general. They come out with a new edition every two years forcing everyone to update constantly. Though I do get why English Profs get annoyed when you've not got the edition of Do androids dream of electric sheep as they listed. |
||||
|
||||
|
darcerin
Posts: 330 |
|
|||
THANK YOU. A voice of reason! I've said this time and again, my books don't require chargers, batteries or a specific device. I just need my eyes, hands and a comfy chair! Power goes out for days? Still have the book to read. 
|
||||
|
||||
RyanSaotome
 Posts: 4210 Location: Towson, Maryland |
|
|||
Good luck reading it in the dark, while with an e-reader you can have a light. |
||||
|
||||
sunflower
 Posts: 1080 |
|
|||
I own a lot of print books, about 7000. Probably more since I last counted for insurance purposes. They take up a full room plus half another room in my house. These are, for the most part, books I've read and might want to read again, or are non-fiction reference material. If my library burns down I'm screwed, because it's hard maintaining such a large inventory of books on my own. I do have a list of my rarest books. But still, there's no guarantee I could find other copies of them. I also own over a thousand ebooks. They fit on my phone, my computer, everywhere. I have them backed up a couple of places. If my phone breaks, I copy them over from my backup. The ones I've bought via Amazon, B&N, Kobo are all stored in their cloud so I don't require backup though I do so anyway. If I buy any with DRM, I remove it so that the books are under my control. I can carry them everywhere. I can search all the reference books at once, and can read whatever I'm in the mood for at the moment I am. I can travel with my entire library, and add to it in an instant if there's some book I "must have". Most paper does last longer than the electronic media that files reside on, though average paper quality these days is poor. But it's easy to move files to a new home: click a button and a few hours later, a copy of your library. Sadly, my physical library is such that I don't even see me buying a new house because moving it would be so cumbersome. I do love my older hard cover books. I love holding them in my hands and wondering about the people who held them before me and reading with that bit of connection with the past. But mass market paperbacks never held that kind of magic for me, and these days they represent dead trees and space I can reclaim. Most new books I buy are eformat. I'm saving my shelf space for the really special books I find that I buy in good quality paper editions that will last (go Subterranean!) and that someone else may hold in their hands some day, wondering about me. |
||||
|
||||
|
ConanSan
Posts: 1818 |
|
|||
|
Well that's fine, the meteor called "Progress" is coming and you can stay with your paper like the dinosaurs you are or you can become men and drill that meteor along side Bruce Willis with Aerosmith blearing at high volume and reading all the books I want in one book. A superbook if you will. Only without the tatsunoko robot.
I know what camp I'm in. edit: Not counting sunflower, s/he's a cool dood who knows what's what. |
||||
|
||||
Mohawk52
 Posts: 8202 Location: England, UK |
|
|||
|
@Conan-san: Remember you said that when your "superbook" blacks out, and you have to start all over again. or you have to buy a new one every 18 months, or so when the manufacturers change their designs and programmes that just won't work with the "dinosaur" e-reader you have now.
Last edited by Mohawk52 on Sun Feb 24, 2013 3:14 pm; edited 1 time in total |
||||
|
||||
|
katscradle
Posts: 469 |
|
|||
Choice is always good for the customer. Amazon uses a specific format for their e-books that no one else does. Therefore the books you buy there can only be read using a Kindle or a device with a Kindle app installed. They also have a vague content policy that has caused authors, publishers, and customers headaches about books being rejected, discontinued or sew-sawing in availability for Kindle. Which is a BIG issue when Kindle is a huge share of the market. It's even worse when some things are Kindle exclusive. Barnes and Noble is the same way except they haven't had the issues over objectionable content like Amazon or Apple to my knowledge. They seem to want to attract customers by their Nook products and customer service itself, along with the fact they can't afford to be moral police. (50 Shades of Grey is one reason they're not losing as much money as they could.) Whereas Amazon relies on tapping into its huge customer base to keep the prices of its devices low and be a serious competitor. I think a lot of people are misinterpreting what the lawsuit is asking for.
I don't thing they're completely anti DRM, or frivolously trying to strike back at Amazon. They're against exclusive specific formats that companies uses for e-books. The "open source" is a bit of a misnomer. In my mind the bookstores are basically wanting something in a similar vein to what Kobo is doing to be more of the norm for the market. Selling e-books that still are protected but, that can be used on just about any digital device. |
||||
|
||||
|
ConanSan
Posts: 1818 |
|
|||
And that's thier problem. Not mine. |
||||
|
||||
|
marcos torres toledo
Posts: 269 |
|
|||
|
I with you Mohawk 52 and darcerin how long can a e-book battery hold if you have no power in you house after a storm like a Hurricane here in Puerto Rico for over a month. What you say the e-books not being compatable is a big problem like the different VCR,DVD formats before. They shot up the price of paperbacks to prevent people on a fix income from being able to put together their own private library and to get rid of brick and morter bookstores what a scam.
|
||||
|
||||
|
ConanSan
Posts: 1818 |
|
|||
|
||||
|
||||
supercreep
 Posts: 526 |
|
|||
I've had my Kindle for over three years. E-book formats do not work that way. I read on the go a lot, and having my Kindle is a hell of a lot easier than carrying a giant hardcover, or paperback. I keep all of my e-books on my Kindle, my laptop, and the cloud. I think I'm going to be okay. |
||||
|
||||
 |
All times are GMT - 5 Hours |
|
|
|
Powered by phpBB © 2001, 2005 phpBB Group