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Book v. Nook

For discussion about electronic reading devices and related issues (pricing, formatting, accessories, comparisons, etc.)
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Mythica
Bibliophile
Posts: 1095
Joined: November 2010
Preferred HF: European and American (mostly pre-20th century)
Location: Colorado
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Post by Mythica » Fri January 28th, 2011, 9:20 am

[quote=""MLE""]Unfortunately, my reading time has not expanded.[/quote]

This is my issue as well!

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wendy
Compulsive Reader
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Joined: September 2010
Location: Charlotte, North Carolina
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Post by wendy » Mon January 31st, 2011, 3:51 pm

I don't have any electronic thingy - I love the smell and feel of real (preferably first-edition leatherbound) books. But I'm pleased we can now download certain Kindle books straight onto the computer . . . Best of both worlds!
Wendy K. Perriman
Fire on Dark Water (Penguin, 2011)
http://www.wendyperriman.com
http://www.FireOnDarkWater.com

rebecca191
Reader
Posts: 75
Joined: January 2009

Post by rebecca191 » Tue February 1st, 2011, 6:36 am

I hope not. I really *hate* ebooks. I need the physical experience of holding a book and turning the pages and I love seeing my books all lined up on a shelf. When I tried to read an ebook I just felt detached and I hated it. If ebooks became the standard I would read a lot less books since I truly can't read ebooks, hate em.

Stephanie Dray
Scribbler
Posts: 39
Joined: July 2010
Location: Maryland
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Post by Stephanie Dray » Fri February 4th, 2011, 2:50 am

I wasn't sure that I would like e-reading, but I'm starting to find it very convenient for books that I want to read but don't necessarily want to keep. Whether or not my experience is a predictor of anything I can't say!

I'm conflicted about this as an author because my agent tells me that electronic sales are cannibalizing my print sales, but I'm not sure I would mind if it weren't for the lower royalty rate.
~Stephanie Dray
Author of Historical Fiction & Fantasy
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LILY OF THE NILE -- Berkley Books, January 2011SONG OF THE NILE -- Berkley Books, Oct 2011
DAUGHTERS OF THE NILE -- Berkley Books, Dec 2013

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nona
Bibliophile
Posts: 1149
Joined: September 2008
Location: Oklahoma

just my quick opinion

Post by nona » Sat March 5th, 2011, 1:48 pm

I was very anti reading devices.... I wanted to touch smell and feel my books as I held them and I snickered everytime someone suggested a nook or kindle and mumbled something about technology killing us and our ways. However I recently bought my nook color, darn good salesman to change my mind. So far I've downloaded several interactive childern books, a movie I cldn' t find anywhere and several books that have been out of print 20 years. Don't get me wrong I love all my books and do not plan on stopping my growing collecting but for some of them I might get as ebooks as well. Now I bought the color for different reasons..... has wifi connection, media center, stores thousands of ebooks, movies, I now get my national geographic magazine on here and it does reduce the clutter around my house.

SGM
Compulsive Reader
Posts: 700
Joined: March 2010

Post by SGM » Sat March 5th, 2011, 2:03 pm

What I how found since the electronification of books, is that my ease of access to old books has increased substantially. I can now view online or via an ebook reader items I would have had to have got from a specialist library (and certainly would not have been able to take away with me) and I certainly would not be able to buy them for financial reasons.

I don't see my use of the real thing (which I love) going away anytime soon and non-fiction I would always prefer in hard copy on my bookshelf (so long as I can afford them) but my accommodation is very very small and really cannot find very much more space to store them so that I can easily lay mind hand on them. So electronic copies are a bit of a relief.

Electronic formats have therefore just increased the possibilities for me, for which I am very very grateful and therefore I have managed to withstand my luddite tendencies.
Currently reading - Emergence of a Nation State by Alan Smith

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N. Gemini Sasson
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Location: Ohio
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Post by N. Gemini Sasson » Mon March 7th, 2011, 7:16 pm

[quote=""Stephanie Dray""]
I'm conflicted about this as an author because my agent tells me that electronic sales are cannibalizing my print sales, but I'm not sure I would mind if it weren't for the lower royalty rate.[/quote]

Hi Stephanie - Can you elaborate on that? Just curious. Thanks!

Stephanie Dray
Scribbler
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Location: Maryland
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Post by Stephanie Dray » Mon March 7th, 2011, 7:31 pm

Quote:
Originally Posted by Stephanie Dray
I'm conflicted about this as an author because my agent tells me that electronic sales are cannibalizing my print sales, but I'm not sure I would mind if it weren't for the lower royalty rate.
Hi Stephanie - Can you elaborate on that? Just curious. Thanks!
I'm certainly no expert in the matter, but as I understand the argument, it goes this way. Let's pretend that I earn 12% royalties on the sale of each print book of my novel. And let's pretend that I earn 6% royalties on the sale of each electronic version. Even assuming that both books were priced the same (and they aren't), you can see that I will make more money on the dead-tree edition.

This gets more complicated by the fact that stores like Amazon sell my books at a deep discount whereas B&N sells them pretty much at list price.

However, this argument of cannibalization only holds true if we assume that the availability of my novel in electronic form has persuaded someone to buy it for their device who may have otherwise bought it in print if the electronic version wasn't available. There is some merit to this idea. Certainly, in addition to research books (which I always want in print) there are other books that I might have bought in print if I couldn't get them any other way. By the same token, I'm quite sure that there are some electronic books that I've purchased that I would never have bought in print because I wouldn't want to clutter up my bookshelves. (I think it's a given that there are many more books that you'll want to read than you'll ever have room for in your house.)

Consequently, I suspect it probably evens out. But I have no cold hard data to back this up.
~Stephanie Dray
Author of Historical Fiction & Fantasy
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LILY OF THE NILE -- Berkley Books, January 2011SONG OF THE NILE -- Berkley Books, Oct 2011
DAUGHTERS OF THE NILE -- Berkley Books, Dec 2013

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MLE (Emily Cotton)
Bibliomaniac
Posts: 3566
Joined: August 2008
Interest in HF: started in childhood with the classics, which, IMHO are HF even if they were contemporary when written.
Favourite HF book: Prince of Foxes, by Samuel Shellabarger
Preferred HF: Currently prefer 1600 and earlier, but I'll read anything that keeps me turning the page.
Location: California Bay Area

Post by MLE (Emily Cotton) » Mon March 7th, 2011, 7:41 pm

Whether e-books or p-books generate more revenue for authors is entirely up to the contract for a given book. With the e-books, publishers do not have the expense of producing, storing, and shipping paper books, and the most important, biggest cost of all for a dead-tree book: returns from bookstores. Given that their costs and risks are substantially reduced for an e-book, the author should get more of the cut.

This is what is being hammered out right now in the publishing world. The pubs want a 25/75 split, with the lion's share going to them, in perpetuity, since e-books never go out of print. A writer would be a fool to sign away three-quarters of his/her rights to a company that does nothing more than the initial set-up to earn anything and then for the rest of the life of the book merely processes the checks.

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Margaret
Bibliomaniac
Posts: 2440
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Interest in HF: I can't answer this in 100 characters. Sorry.
Favourite HF book: Checkmate, the final novel in the Lymond series
Preferred HF: Literary novels. Late medieval and Renaissance.
Location: Catskill, New York, USA
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Post by Margaret » Mon March 7th, 2011, 8:19 pm

So far I've downloaded several interactive childern books, a movie I cldn' t find anywhere and several books that have been out of print 20 years.
You can watch movies on the Nook???
Browse over 5000 historical novel listings (probably well over 5000 by now, but I haven't re-counted lately) and over 700 reviews at www.HistoricalNovels.info

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