Hachette Hits Libraries With 220% Price Increase On Its Ebooks

from the we-sell-books-for-a-living!-please-buy-fewer-titles-from-us! dept

Publishers are at it again, levying what amount to economic sanctions against that infamous freeloader hangout, The Library. In a move that will endear it to exactly no one, Hachette is increasing its back catalog prices 220% for ebooks, sticking it to the cherished public institutions whose shelves (including the digital ones) are lined with nothing but Lost Sales (apparently).

Hachette has been hard at work dragging its reputation through the mud. You may remember it from a few weeks ago, when it greeted Tor's announcement that it was going DRM-free with "HAHAHA but no, seriously, there will be DRM." This move seems ill-advised at best, what with some authors banding together to offer their titles to libraries for $dirt cheap, a price that falls more in line with the economic realities of the average library.

Hachette isn't the only publishing fish in the sea (and not even the only fish to jack up its prices -- Random House dialed its prices up 300% in March). Hachette is one of several publishers, many of whom haven't increased prices (or at least, not as severely). Of course, other publishers have gone other routes, including limiting the number of lends on their ebooks, making their digital offerings the equivalent of poorly manufactured physical books (Falls Apart After 26 Uses!). As a whole, the Big Six treat libraries like an intrusive vagrant.

So the current state of the library ebook market is this:

• 2 major publishers which charge high prices (Hachette, Random House)
• 2 major publishers which won’t sell at all (Macmillan, Simon & Schuster)
• Penguin, which is only selling ebooks to libraries grudgingly and with support for the Kindle explicitly blocked
• HarperCollins, which imposed a 26 checkout limit for library ebooks

I realize the publishers are running businesses, not charities, but those on the end of these price hikes are running something much closer to a charity than a business, relying on late fees, used book sales and donations to keep their shelves stocked. Considering many potential customers use libraries as tools for discovery, it would seem to be in their best interest to get as many of their titles in front of readers as possible, rather than price themselves out of a well-respected lending system.

Hachette's pricing "strategy" is doubly disappointing, considering it was once one of the "good guys:"

Hachette used to be one of the bright lights in library ebooks because they charged the regular retail price for their ebooks. And even though they wouldn’t sell their front list titles to libraries, at least we knew the titles would eventually be available. Only now those titles will be terribly expensive.

Christopher Harris, writing for the American Library Association, wonders if Hachette has forgotten how to publish.

Hachette is increasing backlist prices by 220% and … what? And we get ownership? And we get increased simultaneous lending? And we get anything other than another price gouge from a publisher that seems to not comprehend the basic fundamentals of publishing?

Let’s make this really easy to understand. Publishers publish content. Libraries buy content. As long as publishers keep publishing content, libraries will keep buying content. Why? Because libraries buy content. Only we buy it from a relatively fixed budget.

By drastically increasing the price of backlist titles, all Hachette is doing is reducing the funding that can go towards purchasing its new titles.

Harris points out that libraries aren't looking for handouts. They're looking for a mutually beneficial relationship, one that rewards publishers, readers and writers. But trying to turn a back catalog into a cash cow on the back of the library system helps no one.

That is why I cannot begin to comprehend this move by Hachette. Increasing backlist prices must either reduce the available budget for new titles or reduce acquisition of backlist titles—lost sales for Hachette either way. Furthermore, it reveals a lack of focus on the part of Hachette; instead of building profits on releasing the best possible titles every year, the company is stuck looking backwards. Finally, it shows a lack of understanding about the benefit of having more open access to backlist titles as additional entry points into new book purchases.

This short-sightedness seems to be more and more commonplace, especially in industries affected by digital disruption. The focus has shifted from building a sustainable business to concentrating on quarterly reports. Concentrating on immediate results tends to lead toward efforts that do far more long-term damage than any short-term gains can hope to balance out.

Filed Under: ebooks, education, learning, libraries, prices

Libraries Go Direct To Indie Authors, Rather Than Deal With Big Publisher Ebook Limits

from the lending-has-power dept

It is no secret that many people in the Big Six publishing houses do not understand or do not care for the lending of ebooks. This has made the shift from physical to digital very difficult for libraries. Libraries have been a staple of many communities and those people's ability to have access to new books to read. Now that many readers are going digital, libraries are finding it harder and harder to keep up with demand, primarily because of publishers holding out.

Over at Joe Konrath's blog, we learn of the plight of one such library system in Houston, Texas. Mike and Linda, librarians from the Harris County Public Library, explain to Joe that trying to work with the publishing industry can be a big headache for libraries.

Libraries are not able to purchase all of the eBooks we would like to purchase due to publisher and author concerns about copyright protection in the digital format. Only two of the big six publishers will sell eBooks to libraries, and those pricing models either limit us to a low number of checkouts or charge us more than twice the retail price for a book. Very few picture books are available for us to purchase, even though small children are a large part of our customer base and we often use digital books in storytimes. With adult fiction titles, we can't always offer complete series because of format availability or publisher restrictions. Some publishers would even like to implement a plan that would force people to come to the library to check out eBooks, rather than being able to do it online, which kind of defeats the purpose.

Right off the bat, with only two of six publishers willing to sell ebooks to libraries, we have a big problem. Unfortunately for the libraries, buying and lending ebooks is nothing like the physical world in which a library could just pop over to Walmart or get on Amazon and order a couple copies of the latest hit. With ebooks, they have to deal with licensing issues and other restrictions from publishers that would block any such ability in the digital realm.

Second, there is the lack of availability of ebooks in a variety of formats. If a person comes in without a supported ereader, then that person is left unserved by the library, something that most librarians do not like. What is worse is that person who wanted to read a book had to walk away empty handed, thus limiting the exposure of the book and author to a potential new fan. 

All these problems and more limit the ability of libraries to spread the love of books, which also limits the ability for authors to gain the needed exposure and resulting sales.

So what does the library have to offer? Book borrowing habits are changing, mainly because of eBooks. People are more open to impulse browsing and discovery of new authors and titles and the library provides the collection and staff to aid them in this discovery. Once they’ve discovered a new favorite, the quest for reading gratification leads to backlist purchases. (We speak from personal experience on this.)

This ability to try a new author or series without having to spend money is something that we have supported many times. It is one way to battle obscurity as a creator. Without the ability for readers to try out a new author for free, that author may lose out on potential sales. Libraries are important tools in gaining that exposure and publishers are blocking them from doing their job. So what is a library to do? In this case, skip the publisher and go straight to the author.

Public libraries have always selected print books based on professional reviews and public demand. This doesn’t always work with eBooks. With eBooks, we have to focus on availability and public interest. We are also rethinking our relationship with self-publishing. Many libraries, such as ours, are now looking for ways to purchase eBooks directly from authors and independent publishers.

This is the way to go. We have learned over the years that it is the gatekeepers that tend to be the roadblock toward better exposure and better terms for readers and authors alike. By skipping the Big Six and any other publisher that does not want to allow lending on fair terms, these libraries can expand their collections and better serve the public.

In response to this change in plan from this library, Joe Konrath has decided on some very favorable terms for his books, which he hopes other authors adopt as well.

Blake and I are willing to sell our entire ebook catalog to the Harris County Public Library, and to any other libraries that are interested, under these terms:

1. Ebooks are $3.99

2. No DRM.

3. The library only needs to buy one ebook of a title, and then they can make as many copies as they need for all of their patrons and all of their branches.

4. The library owns the rights to use that ebook forever.

5. The library can use it an any format they need; mobi, epub, pdf, lit, etc. And when new formats arise, they're free to convert it to the new format.

In short, the library buys one copy, and never has to buy it again.

Why is he willing to make such favorable terms? Wouldn't doing so cut into his potential sales? Not in the slightest.

No I'm not. They bought a copy. They can do what they want with it. And my hope is because I don't have restrictions, and keep my costs low, the library will continue to buy my new ebooks as I release them. There are a lot of libraries in the US, and a lot more globally. If I sell every library one of my ebooks for $3.99, that's a nice amount of money.

One could certainly make a nice amount selling just to libraries. Add to that the additional sales as you would gain from exposure with new fans and you could make a nice living. All because an author embraces the advertising power of libraries.

This consensus between these librarians and Joe shows that there is little reason for publisher to continue their unfavorable attitude toward libraries. Libraries have never been a threat to publishing prior to the adoption of ereaders, there is no reason to think they will be now. If publishers are willing to embrace the lending culture that has been around for hundreds of years, they could have a far easier and more successful transition to the digital age.

Filed Under: ebooks, ja konrath, libraries

Collection Society To Libraries: No Story Time For Kids Unless You Pay To Read Aloud

from the are-there-no-limits? dept

If there's a common trait of the various rightsholders groups around the world, it is their sense of entitlement. If anyone does anything with a work under copyright, they feel they have a right to regulate it and be paid for it. A good example is the claim by the Authors Guild that owners of Kindles weren't allowed to use an experimental text-to-speech feature, since that would infringe on the entirely made up concept of "audio rights" -- and hence, presumably, require further payment.

On the other side of the Atlantic, the Belgian rights group SABAM has already established itself as a copyright hardliner with its attempts to force ISPs and social networks to set up monitoring and filtering systems to combat copyright infringement. Its latest demand shows the same apparent indifference to the negative consequences of its action:

Twice a month, the library in [the Belgian town of] Dilbeek welcomes about 10 children to introduce them to the magical world of books. A representative of the library in question is quoted in the De Morgen report as saying there’s no budget to compensate people who read to the kids, relying instead on volunteers (bless them).

SABAM got in touch with the library to let them know that it thinks this is unacceptable, however, and that they should start coughing up cash for reading stories from copyrighted books out loud. The library rep calculates that it could cost them roughly 250 euros (which is about $328) per year to pay SABAM for the right to -- again -- READ BOOKS TO KIDS.

It's worth emphasizing that these are volunteers, so this is in no sense a professional "performance". It's just public-spirited people generously doing exactly what parents do when reading to their own children. Indeed, it's not hard to imagine SABAM trying to claim money for that too, one day.

Of course, if SABAM refuses to back down here, the likely outcome will be that many libraries throughout Belgium will cancel these reading sessions for children. As a result, fewer young people will be introduced to the world of reading, fewer of them will grow up to be readers, and writers will have fewer fans and less money. In other words, SABAM's attempt to extend its reach to new areas will harm not only children -- about whom it is obviously indifferent -- but also the very people it purports to serve.

Follow me @glynmoody on Twitter or identi.ca, and on Google+

Filed Under: audio right, belgium, copyright, kids, libraries, story time
Companies: sabam

Libraries Are The Best Counter To Piracy... So Of Course Publishers Are Trying To Limit Them

from the that-other-foot-still-looks-perfectly-functional! dept

Interesting blog post by Peter Brantley over at Publishers' Weekly last week, mocking the big publishers for supporting SOPA/PIPA, despite the fact that it (1) won't stop much, if any, infringement, but (2) will have massive unintended consequences. The first half of the post focuses on SOPA/PIPA and uses the recent Cory Doctorow talk we wrote about to highlight how this is yet another example of old line content businesses not understanding how the technology works. So, he explains how these publishers shot themselves in the foot by not understanding the tech and basic economics:

Instead of heeding Tim O’Reilly’s 10 year old lesson that making content available in desirable places under terms that users accept is the most profitable path, publishing has implicitly decided to attempt to control something they have no adequate understanding of, and can never really control: computing and the internet. They’ve shot themselves in the foot.

But, from there, he notes that they're actually making it even worse... by going after libraries. This is something that we had recently written about as well. Publishers are increasingly trying to limit what libraries do. But as Brantley notes, libraries are actually a great weapon against unauthorized file sharing, so trying to limit them is doubly stupid:

And what I find most darkly amusing is that they weren’t content to stop there. The one place in the book distribution ecosystem where piracy is most efficiently defeated, where users have access to content for free but under carefully controlled circumstances, have been libraries. Libraries have always been the best counter to piracy. And instead of cementing a relationship with libraries that works to the benefit of all parties, publishers have steadfastly withdrawn the ability of libraries to provide free content, even when it is available for only limited borrowing periods, or only a restricted number of titles, with severe constraints on sharing and copying. Instead, they have indicated an interest in the commercialization of libraries by encouraging rental models.

This is all too common in the legacy entertainment business. Rather than understanding stuff, they just keep shooting themselves in the foot. Even worse? They then blame everyone else for it, too.

Filed Under: copyright, ebooks, libraries, limitations

If Libraries Didn't Exist, Would Publishers Be Trying To Kill Book Lending?

from the making-life-that-little-bit-more-diffcult dept

Against the background of today's war on sharing, exemplified by SOPA and PIPA, traditional libraries underline an inconvenient truth: allowing people to share things – principally books in the case of libraries – does not lead to the collapse of the industry trying to sell those same things. But publishers really don't seem to have learned that lesson, judging by this article in the New York Times about the nonsensical attitude they have to libraries lending out ebooks:

In their eyes, borrowing an e-book from a library has been too easy. Worried that people will click to borrow an e-book from a library rather than click to buy it, almost all major publishers in the United States now block libraries' access to the e-book form of either all of their titles or their most recently published ones.

This suggests that if libraries didn't exist, and somebody tried to set one up, publishers would use the same logic to refuse to sell traditional books for that purpose. History shows that's an absurd position, but equally absurd are the efforts of publishers to make borrowing ebooks less convenient:

To keep their overall revenue from taking a hit from lost sales to individuals, publishers need to reintroduce more inconvenience for the borrower or raise the price for the library purchaser.

The article invokes the example of paperbacks published some time after the hardback edition as an equivalent situation. But that's about pricing: publishers don't try to make it "inconvenient" for people to borrow paperbacks from libraries by creating special low-quality copies that fall to pieces after a few loans (essentially what Harper Collins does with its ebooks), nor do they add surcharges to the paperback price to try to squeeze more from the libraries that lend them out.

Sadly, publishers really are thinking along these lines:

Ms. Thomas of Hachette says: "We've talked with librarians about the various levers we could pull," such as limiting the number of loans permitted or excluding recently published titles.

Publishers are so obsessed with stamping out this ebook sharing scourge that they are oblivious to two likely consequences of their current approach. One, obviously, is increased piracy: if potential customers want to try out an ebook before buying it, but it's not available for them to borrow at their local library, it will certainly be available somewhere online, if they look hard enough. The risk is that having procured an unauthorized copy, they don't then go on to replace it with an authorized one.

The other problem for those publishers boycotting public libraries is evident from a comment by a librarian quoted in the New York Times piece:

Ms. Nesbitt adds, however, that many of the library's patrons aren't aware that other publishers are withholding e-books from it.

If library users aren't aware that certain titles are being withheld, that means they haven't asked for them - probably because they haven't heard of those ebooks, or think they won't be interested. Keeping titles out of public libraries makes it less likely that readers will ever find out about them or change their minds. After all, as the article goes on to say, there is no lack of alternatives:

While many major publishers have effectively gone on strike, more than 1,000 smaller publishers, who don’t have best-seller sales that need protection, happily sell e-books to libraries. That means the public library has plenty of e-books available for the asking — no waiting.

A familiar pattern emerges. Small, innovative publishers who are ready to adapt, reap the benefits by meeting the growing demand for ebooks at local libraries – and doubtless picking up knock-on sales as a result. Meanwhile, big, sclerotic publishers resist trying out new business models, preferring to make the use of digital formats for lending as "inconvenient" as possible – in the forlorn hope that readers will just give up and buy something. We all know how that story ends.

Follow me @glynmoody on Twitter or identi.ca, and on Google+

Filed Under: books, ebooks, lending, libraries, publishing

Warner Bros. Hates Libraries, Wants To Embargo DVD Sales To Libraries For A Month

from the oh-come-on dept

The movie studios' short-sightedness knows no bounds, apparently. Warner Bros., which has been the most aggressive of the big movie studios in getting companies like Netflix and Redbox not to rent its movies until 28-days after they go on sale, has now decided to do the same thing for libraries, putting in place a 28-day embargo on all DVD sales to libraries, from the time of the DVD release. To make it even more obnoxious, they're removing bonus features and extras from movies sold to libraries.

Here's the thing, though. What's to stop a library from just buying an official version and lending it out? The whole thing is pretty silly anyway. Is Warner Bros. really thinking that if someone can't take out one of its movies from the library, that they'll really go buy the DVD from WB? Also, doesn't this seem like a form of price fixing?

In the end, though, it's unlikely to actually help. Slightly more enlightened studios, such as Paramount, actually tested such 28-delays and looked at the data, which said Netflix and Redbox don't cannibalize sales, and appear to "expand" the movie business. Too bad Warner Bros. hasn't seen that movie yet. Perhaps they're still waiting for the 28-day delay to pass.

Filed Under: delays, dvds, libraries, rentals, windows
Companies: warner bros.

Unfortunate: Novelist Joins Lawsuit Against Libraries; Would Apparently Prefer His Book Rot In Obscurity

from the short-sighted dept

After the Authors Guild decided to prove that it's really against education by suing University Libraries, it also began a disappointing game of "gotcha". Specifically, the Guild found J.R. Salamanca, an author who the HathiTrust had been unable to find. The HathiTrust had listed a novel by Salamanca in its list of potential orphan works. The list actually worked as intended -- providing time for any such authors to identify themselves and to stop the orphaned work from becoming available as a scanned work.

Still, this made HathiTrust look bad, and it put the project on hold. The best response, though, was from Duke University's Scholarly Communications Officer, Kevin Smith, who wrote an open letter to Salamanca urging him not to join the lawsuit:

It is not a comfortable position to be a pawn in a game of “gotcha,” especially when it involves litigation. What I want to say to you is the same thing I say to faculty authors at the institution where I work: “Consider carefully where your own best interests lie, and manage your copyright to serve those interests.”

[....]

I am sure I do not have to tell you that libraries, including those that intend to participate in the Hathi Orphan Works project, are not your enemies. We are in the business of helping authors find readers, which hardly seems like it should be an objectionable activity. So let’s think for a minute about The Lost Country and what might be best for it and for you.

The sad fact is that The Lost Country has become a pretty obscure work. Amazon.com shows only two used copies available for sale. In the Duke Libraries, the last transaction record we have for your novel is in 2004, when our copy was sent to high-density storage. It has not left the facility once since then, and our system shows no circulations in the prior decade, either. One of the famous “laws” of librarianship is that every book should have its readers, and the current system, I am afraid, is failing to connect your book to new readers.

It has to be said that the Authors Guild is not going to help you in this regard. They are not going to publish a new edition of The Lost Country for you, nor will they pay you any royalties on the out-of-print edition. The Authors Guild simply does not have the ability to create a new market for your book. Even if they were to succeed in a grand strategy to impose a licensing scheme for orphan works in general, there is no reason to believe that you would profit from it. With such an obscure work, potential users who had to pay a fee would probably just skip the planned use.

Where you can find help for this problem is with the HathiTrust. Their goal, and the goal of the libraries that plan to participate in the orphan works project, is to make it easier for readers to find works like your novel, which might otherwise languish on shelves or in large warehouses of books. Digital access to low-use titles through our catalogs will encourage users to discover resources, for study and for entertainment, that they might not have bothered with before.

It appears that the rhetoric from the Authors Guild won out, and J.R. Salamanca has gone in the other direction, joining the lawsuit against the universities and the HathiTrust. What a sad legacy Salamanca is adding to his career. Rather than embracing greater access to his obscure and out of print works, he's chosen to attack learning institutions who sought to make his works more accessible. As a professor himself, he ought to be ashamed.

Filed Under: copyright, j.r. salamanca, libraries, orphan works
Companies: authors guild, hathitrust

Why Does The Authors Guild Hate Education So Much? Sues Five Universities For Providing Access To Orphan Works

from the shame-on-authors dept

It appears that Scott Turow is really trying to cement in place the reputation of the Authors Guild as a luddite, anti-education, anti-learning organization. What a shame. A decade ago, the Authors Guild stunningly told its authors not to link to Amazon, because Amazon dared to also show used books alongside new ones. It also freaked out when Amazon allowed people to search full text of books. Over the intervening decade, the Authors Guild has consistently come out against progress, such as when it freaked out about the text-to-speech feature on the Kindle, bizarrely claiming that this feature was infringing (it's not).

For many years, the Authors Guild has been involved in a legal dispute with Google over the Google Books scanning project. And while the two sides came to a highly questionable settlement that was thankfully rejected by the court, it appears that the Authors Guild is doubling down on a new lawsuit -- this time suing five universities for daring to try to provide access to digital scans of orphan works -- those works for which no copyright holder can be identified.

You may have heard a few months ago that the University of Michigan's libraries, sick of waiting for Congress to get its act in order and deal with the orphan works problem, said it was just going to start making such works available. Last month, some other universities joined the University of Michigan to create a consortium of universities who decided to provide access to scanned orphan works. These libraries had to know they were daring the Authors Guild to sue, and now it's happened.

The University of Michigan, the University of California, the University of Wisconsin, Indiana University, and Cornell University, along with the overall consortium group, called the HathiTrust, has been sued. Oddly, there are a few other universities who stated they were going to take part in this effort -- including the University of Florida, Duke, Emory and Johns Hopkins. I'm not sure how they avoided being lumped in to the lawsuit.

This is related to the Google book scanning project, because these university libraries shared their collections with Google to scan, and it's just that now they've decided that they're going to make orphan works available. The universities are claiming that fair use lets them share these works. The Authors Guild, obviously, disagrees. On top of that, the universities and the HathiTrust makes it pretty clear that they're bending over backwards to make sure that these works truly are orphan works where copyright holders cannot be found:

The story starts with Google’s scanning agreements with the libraries: each time Google scans a book, it returns both the physical book and a digital copy to the library that gave it the book. The libraries then gave their scans to the HathiTrust, which functions like a digital version of a shared off-site storage warehouse. HathiTrust makes multiple copies of each file, storing versions on hard drives and tape backups at both Michigan and Indiana. It offers the public bibliographic information about the books, and provides a full-text search engine. Unlike Google Books, however, which shows “snippets” from the books as search results, HathiTrust will only tell users the page numbers where the search terms occur. If a book is in the public domain, HathiTrust turns on full view, letting users read it online. (If you’re affiliated with one the member institutions, you can also download the book as a PDF.)

This spring, HathiTrust announced the “Orphan Works Project,” which aimed to investigate the rights status of the books still in copyright. It would investigate the author and publisher information available about the book; if they could not be located and the book was unavailable, it would be flagged as a possible orphan and put on a list of candidates. If at any time a copyright owner is identified and located (e.g. because they step forward), the book is removed from the list.

In other words, the only way a book gets displayed through this system is if no copyright holder is found after a fairly extensive process. And if the copyright holder ever shows up, the work is immediately removed. All of this makes me wonder if the Authors Guild can really prove it has standing in this case. If the actual copyright holders cannot be identified, how can the Authors Guild claim standing over these works?

Either way, this is yet another in this long line of disputes in which the Authors Guild is coming out on the wrong side. It's not helping authors, it's doing the exact opposite, by acting like a massive luddite, attacking any form of innovation or any system that encourages the reading of books and the sharing of knowledge. Shame on the Authors Guild, who seems to only be living up to the reputation of guilds from the Middle Ages, which were focused on economically-suicidal protectionism, rather than innovation.

Filed Under: books, copyright, education, libraries, orphan works, scanning
Companies: authors guild

Halifax Library Boycotts HarperCollins eBooks

Comboman writes "It's taken a couple of weeks, but libraries are starting to take action against publisher HarperCollins' plans to make their eBooks self-destruct after 26 reads. I'm happy to report that my home city of Halifax appears to be the first in Canada to boycott HarperCollins' eBooks (though libraries in other cities are likely to follow shortly).

Debbie LeBel, the manager of acquisitions for Halifax Public Libraries says she is not buying new e-book licenses from HarperCollins even though demand for eBooks has grown steadily in recent years and HarperCollins titles account for about one in every five e-books in the collection of more than 6,000."

Filed Under: boycotts, ebooks, libraries