Book Publishers Don't Get The Internet Either

from the no-surprise-there dept

It appears that the folks in the book publishing business haven't quite learned from any of the various mistakes made by their colleagues in the music and movie industries. Rather than recognizing how technology can be an opportunity, they're freaking out about how it's going to hurt their business. Constitutional Code notes that a publisher is warning other publishers to stay away from Google's plan to digitize books, noting that: "We are being given an opportunity to undermine our industry. It may not seem inherently scary at the moment. But my concern is what this will lead to in 10 years. We are opening a Pandora's Box, and we have no idea where it will lead. We just don't know, once they have this material, what they will do with it." Of course, what he doesn't seem to recognize is that if they don't embrace this, people will simply route around them. The real threat isn't from embracing the technology and moving on to new business models -- but in fighting the technology and losing complete control over where things go.
Hide this

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team


Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread


  1. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 20 Apr 2005 @ 3:02pm

    Some do get it...


    Look at Oreilly. They offer their entire collection available online for a monthly fee.
    http://safari.oreilly.com/
    I used to buy books by the pound. Not any more...

    link to this | view in thread ]

  2. identicon
    Ray Trygstad, 21 Apr 2005 @ 8:13pm

    Some Publishers Get It....

    Baen Books gets it; they have about 80 books on the Baen Free Library site that you can download--in five different formats--for free. They are convinced that they make MORE money as a result--and so am I. Many of the books there are part of a trilogy or an extended series. So I download and read the first book (or first two or three books) on my Pocket PC and end up buying the rest. Because of this stellar marketing I would guess that 80% of the fiction I have bought over the past two years has been Baen. Baen has a stable pool of authors, and I have started reading books by some of them because I was introduced to their work online at no risk. So really, some publishers get it--even if most don't.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  3. identicon
    thecaptain, 22 Apr 2005 @ 4:53am

    Re: Some Publishers Get It....

    I agree.

    I LOVE to read on my Palm but shopping for online books has been an exercise in frustration and futility. Imagine, getting a "deal" such that if you buy the paperback you get a dollar off the electronic version, yet that e-version (usually in the crappy MS format) is STILL 2 bucks MORE.

    Also, most books I already own simply aren't available, pushing me to the file-shares for e-reading material (and there's a LOT, in pdb, txt or PDF).

    link to this | view in thread ]


Follow Techdirt
Essential Reading
Techdirt Deals
Report this ad  |  Hide Techdirt ads
Techdirt Insider Discord

The latest chatter on the Techdirt Insider Discord channel...

Loading...
Recent Stories

This site, like most other sites on the web, uses cookies. For more information, see our privacy policy. Got it
Close

Email This

This feature is only available to registered users. Register or sign in to use it.