Rob Lister’s Comments

• Aug 25th, 2011 @ 2:51pm

  Re: pirating

  on Author Says eBooks Will Hurt Authors Because Of Royalty Rates
  Tim, thanks for that and yea, $1 (minus distribution fees) is still better than 20 cents.
  
  For 'meat' books, what is the believed ratio of bought to read? Do you think ebooks will have as low a ratio for bought to pirated?
• Aug 25th, 2011 @ 1:42pm

  Pirating

  on Author Says eBooks Will Hurt Authors Because Of Royalty Rates
  I'm surprised that the loses associated with pirating didn't get more [digital] ink in either the article or the comments. I bought my Nook when I saw others at work lugging theirs around. When I finally bought one, an associate gave me a cd. I asked what it was and he suggested I put it in my computer and have a look for myself. I did. It was roughly 1500 [mostly new] ebooks from about 300 authors. All the current nyt bestsellers were there. Further investigation on google reveals that any book I might want is available from the day it is purchased, for free, at one site or another. So you writers here don't hate me, let me just say that I didn't save the disk or any book on it (though I was very tempted, admittedly);I returned it to the lender with just a thanks.
  
  So, I see $15, $10, and even $5 ebooks from the majors (publishers and sellers) as being a distant memory pretty soon. $1 will be the new standard, just as it is on iTunes. And you'll be lucky to get that (sadly).