Should second-hand book stores pay royalties?
I had not been aware of this until a LiveJournal post from Steve Miller brought this to my attention, but after checking around (and being pointed to a link by Sharon Lee) I was able to find a fair amount of supporting evidence. It seems there is a movement to require second-hand (or “used”) book stores to pay royalties on books they resell.
Here is a page from the website of Novelists, Inc., a group which claims to be “the international organization of multi-published novelists” (although I have never heard of them to this point), in which they advocate amending United State copyright law to require that used book stores pay royalties on books they resell for up to two years after their publication. (A quick search also pulled up a pair of blog posts by authors who are for and against this position.)
In Europe, this idea is called droit de suite and has been in force in France for some time and over the rest of Europe more recently for resale of original works of art. (For example, it went into effect in the United Kingdom in 2006.) However, it has not been applied to books (though writer A.S. Byatt argued in 2005 that it should).
A Moral Quandary
The argument goes that, with the advent of high-tech, high-volume Internet booksellers, used (or remaindered) copies of books can compete side-by-side with new copies—even from the very moment of the book’s official release date. Thus, if a consumer sees a listing on Amazon.com of a book for $20 new, along with “7 used copies available starting at $13,” he is more likely to buy the $13 used book instead of the $20 new, and the author and publisher lose out on royalties. (The Authors Guild kicked up a fuss back in 2002 when Amazon first began offering used book sales on the same page as new.)
Some people consider this to be a serious (or, conversely, a tongue-in-cheek) moral issue. However, the Doctrine of First Sale, enshrined in American law these last hundred years, states that we can resell anything we buy—including books—without limitation (provided we don’t violate some other law by doing it). This applies not only to consumers, but to stores.
A number of people with relatively low budgets make much use of used bookstores. (My parents almost never buy any book new, for example.) Tacking a royalty onto used book resales would increase the barriers to book ownership for these people, making it harder for them to buy books in an era when many already lament that reading is dying out.
It would also mean that bookstores that don’t have to worry about tracking used books now would have to retrofit inventory tracking systems, increasing their costs considerably (and guess who would end up eating those increased costs? Hint: Not the bookstores). Some stores, such as charity stores or flea markets that simply don’t have the time or money to devote to keeping track of used sales, would either have to get an exemption or stop selling books altogether.
“Spillage” and Exposure
In the LiveJournal entry mentioned above, Steve Miller notes:
From a practical standpoint, for me and us, when one publisher gave up on us, it was the used bookstores that hand-sold our used books and kept us in front of readers, and when we went to conventions we autographed thousands of used books … for readers who wanted more. So, we support used bookstores, we sign used books at conventions, bookstores, and fleamarkets. Readers deserve the opportunity, especially in these times when jobs and cash are at a premium, to buy a used book. Yes we need to sell new books, too,but used book dealers are not taking food out of our pockets.
Eric Flint makes a similar point in his Salvos Against Big Brother column about “Spillage”—the idea that letting customers “try before they buy” ends up leading to greater sales:
What I like to see are copies of my books available all over the place in editions that bring me no direct income—whether that’s in a library, a used bookstore, a remaindered table, or simply being passed from one person to another. Because I know that that "spillage" is simply the necessary lubricant for this very opaque market that my livelihood depends upon. It’s that spillage—that penumbra of free or cheap copies, if you will—that makes everything else possible in the first place.
What I don’t want to see are those books piling up, because they aren’t moving. (Or the library equivalent, which is not being checked out.)
Flint notes that the death knell for authors is when libraries, used book stores, and remainder tables won’t stock an author’s books because there is no demand for them. He adds:
It’s the author’s job to write books that are good enough—at least, in the eyes of enough people—that no matter what form of sale or distribution any given copy of a given title winds up having, it will have enough turnover to keep making it attractive to the distributor.
The E-book Angle
These arguments over fairness of authors getting paid versus getting broader exposure echo very similar arguments over the harm that e-book “piracy” does to authors by “stealing” sales. In fact, Eric Flint often compares them directly in his Salvos and Baen Free Library Prime Palaver columns. Both of them serve to increase exposure for authors, leading to a greater chance that the person not paying the author now will buy something that pays him in the future.
And in both cases, if the used-book buyer or illicit downloader had been prevented from buying or downloading the book, it would probably not have led to a new sale for the author instead. Rather, they would probably have bought used or downloaded illicitly something else instead, and checked the author’s work out of the library—another use that would not have led to the author getting paid (at least in America; the UK and Canadian library systems do both pay royalties for library book checkouts).
I wonder whether used book sales might end up being an issue that drives publishers further toward e-books. As I pointed out a few days ago, the prospect of a second-hand sale market for digital media such as e-books is considerably dimmer. While not very exciting from the consumer’s standpoint, it is highly likely publishers and authors could see this as a feature.
Regardless, there should be more awareness of—and opposition to—Novelists Inc.’s attempt to amend copyright law to require used book sellers to collect royalties. The last thing we need in our current economic situation is to place even more burden on people who are not well-off enough to afford anything but used books—and on an entire sector of business that isn’t doing too well as it is.
December 25th, 2008 at 4:39 pm
I live in used book stores. The reason I purchased the origional rocket ebook was because my better two-thirds was sick and tired of getting heavy UPS boxes from my trips.
I have run into cases where the covers were torn off of books because they were listed as “returns”. This is not legit. However charging twice for a purchase is awful.
Sorry - but used book stores do not need the overhead of paying more tribute to the publishers. How about charging the origional buyers extra $$$ - that would not go over well. Supposing I sell my car - should I pay the manufacturer because I am selling the car?
December 25th, 2008 at 4:56 pm
Keep in mind that many of those “used” books you see listed on Amazon for in-print titles are simply businesses that have their own sources for new copies. And heavily discounted used books (say ten cents each for a mass-market paperback) often aren’t really that cheap when the shipping and handling is added.
Amazon takes a big bite out of each sale, so they can’t really undercut Amazon that much on most books.
December 25th, 2008 at 8:16 pm
Nonsense! You sell a physical item one time. The buyer can resell it if he wants to. Should you have to pay the manufacturer every time you sell a household item at a yard sale? What if you give away or sell some old furniture because you bought new? The reseller is probably already taking a loss on the item.
They’re already selling books for way too much money, and now they want money each time the same book is sold? Ridiculous. Please tell me this isn’t going to become law.
December 25th, 2008 at 10:50 pm
One avenue that independent bookstores are using to survive is either converting to or increasing their holdings of used books. Frequently, they can’t compete with the large discounts that Amazon and the big box sellers can give new books, but with a used book they can beat those discounts.
December 25th, 2008 at 11:25 pm
Absolutely a good reason to move to eBooks. Used books deliver the original buyers virtually nothing (I think my nearby used bookstore pays about 5% of cover and sells for 50%). It’s all margin for the bookstore (or for the seller plus Amazon in the case of Amazon). Affordable (non-DRM) eBooks let readers have and keep their books, don’t clutter the house, and don’t pose moral dilemmas between saving money and making sure the author gets her few pennies.
Rob Preece
Publisher, http://www.BooksForABuck.com
December 26th, 2008 at 9:17 am
I believe the argument that used book stores give authors greater exposure is a valid one. I have “discovered” many authors at used books stores that I’d previously never heard of. I picked up Neal Asher’s “Gridlinked” at half price books because it looked interesting. I loved it and have gone on to buy new editions of every one of his books. I could list a dozen other authors where this has happened as well. I’d hate to see the used book stores be put out of business because of royalties cutting into their already low profit margin.
December 26th, 2008 at 10:16 am
Requiring used bookstores to pay royalties would pretty much eliminated the used book trade. Most used bookstores are struggling even more than independent ones are; rather than try to implement complicated inventory tracking systems most would just shut their doors. I buy most of my books used, and most of them more than two years old. Requiring used bookstores to pay royalties will backfire in a big, big way: if it goes through, and most used bookstores close, it will become increasingly difficult to find books published more than two years ago. Many of the authors now clamoring for their second royalties will find that, once their books go out of print, it’s harder for them to find new readers (as they once would have through used bookstores)… And thus many will find that their books will *stay* out of print!
December 26th, 2008 at 10:25 am
The second hand booksellers through Amazon tack on a heavy shipping charge that almost always nullifies that as a first option. Far better to buy new and in enough quantity to avoid those shipping charges. The Amazon cost is almost always a better value than what I can find at resellers.
December 26th, 2008 at 10:55 am
Eric Flint is right. I had never read or bought one of his books or any book by David Weber until I got my Sony Reader and found the Baen Free Library. I tried a couple of books by both Flint and Weber and have now started buying hardcover versions of their new books as they are published, as well as some of their ebooks. Used bookstores serve a purpose — they introduce readers to new authors by making books available at a price someone is willing to pay to “gamble” on an unknown-to-them author.
December 26th, 2008 at 12:25 pm
Selling something second-handed, physical or digital, shall never be seen as a feature, but as a consumer right.
December 26th, 2008 at 3:01 pm
Current pricing trends on used books vs. ebooks are improving. Brick-and-mortar stores sell at 50% of the sticker price, and online bookstores sell at 5-
10$ each (with the etailer making a consider sum through shipping and handling). However, ebook prices are going down (on some books at least). Once the majority of ebooks sell for $5-10, the second hand book problem will no longer exist. My guess is that a publisher would much rather have a book that stays at a single price, rather than one that is priced exorbitantly (and is gradually discounted until it sells for nothing, at which time it increases as a rare book).
The trend I see is for the sticker price to be closer to the long term price and for less discounting to take place.
December 26th, 2008 at 3:05 pm
I still buy 60% of my reading material on half.com, 30% at local bookstores and 10% in ebook form (mostly not for purchase). More often nowadays, the price of discounted used books if you factor in shipping is higher than the cost of ebooks. The main reason I don’t buy more ebooks is 1)lack of availability and 2)they are dominated so far by big publishers who are afraid to offer a lower base price.
December 28th, 2008 at 6:29 am
Honestly, the emphasis should be on author’s being able to own any returned copy of their novel rather than the publisher pulping them. Those lost sales are more detrimental to royalties when compared to UBS sales, I would think. And how would UBS’s keep track of royalty statements? What about deceased authors? Not to mention the fact that if author’s got a slice of the pie from UBS sales, don’t you think publishers would eventually want to horn in on that game?
December 29th, 2008 at 12:04 pm
This would make college students very, very unhappy.
December 29th, 2008 at 1:02 pm
No, this is Amazon’s call. If you notice, the shipping charge on all used books on Amazon is $3.99 for a standard mass market paperback.
December 30th, 2008 at 3:05 pm
You know, come to think of it, this idea has been proposed to textbook publishers, but to date not a single one has been interested in dealing in used textbooks.
December 30th, 2008 at 3:35 pm
Ninc’s proposal makes so little sense and is so bad for publishing, authors, readers and the economy it inspired me to write a 2,000-word blog post / rant.
December 30th, 2008 at 7:43 pm
Nice article, though I could wish you’d linked back to this one.
December 30th, 2008 at 8:53 pm
I can’t remember if Teleread has posted on this, but the videogame industry is considering DRM-like “features” to put kill the used videogame market.
Today, I can go into Gamestop and buy a used copy of a game for my XBOX 360, bring it home and we’re good. That really pisses off game companies.
So the proposed “solution” is tying key content to the original purchaser. So say I buy some first person shooter and activate it at home. I’m good — I can go through and beat the sucker.
Then I get bored and sell the game used either through Gamestop or give it to a friend. With the online components the XBOX knows he’s not the original purchaser and say makes it impossible for him to play the final boss…instead when he reaches that point he gets a message that he can get to that final area if he ponies up $10 or something similar.
BTW, in the book example, if a used book store selling a book is a bad idea, isn’t me giving a book I’ve finished to a friend even worse? There’s no barrier to entry there…should books ship with EULAs saying that once I open the cover I’m not allowed to retransmit, etc., etc??
This is getting to sound a lot we’re living in Richard Stallman’s “The Right to Read” world…and here I always thought that was a bit on the histronics. I guess not.
January 3rd, 2009 at 12:01 am
Chris:
Apologies for not linking to this post in my blog post; there were a number of blogs where I read about this issue, including this one. Nothing intentional about the exclusion.
Best,
Matthew Wayne Selznick
January 3rd, 2009 at 2:11 pm
Well, then I could wish you’d linked to them, too.
I only saw a couple of other recent blog posts about this, and they were both inspired by this one. I’d rather like to know who else is talking about it.
January 4th, 2009 at 11:15 am
The drive by publishers/writers to milk royalty fees from second hand book buyers is another insidious effort in a continuing tyrranical money grabbing campaign by artists and writers who are not satisfied with the extraordinarily generous control they already have over their product - and want even more.
No other field of human activity offers this kind of control and beyond the grave earnings.
We need to go back to first principles in this whole argument and ask what kind of world we want to live in. Are we seriously suggesting that every person who produces any object or who writes any item of original writing is then imbued with a lifelong, and 70 years beyond their lifetime, right to make money each and every time it is sold ? to follow it down through it’s lifetime through each and every individual passing of the object ? what an utterly appalling, big-brother and nonsensical vista this is, and what a shockingly greedy and grasping attempt this is to earn more and more and more money.
Yes, we need to go back to first principles and go back to the principle of the one-off sale. You sell something and it now belongs to the buyer. Simple. You get one chance to earn whatever profit you believe you are entitled to and then it ends. If you do not earn enough from this sale then it is up to you, the producer/writer, to persuade the buyer to pay more, or to produce a better product in order to earn a higher price. Whether it is a book, a painting, a carving, a painted saucer, a model airplane etc etc.
This is basic, simple, fairness and justice and it leave everyone knowing exactly where they stand. It allows individual people to get on with their lives without the long grasping arm of the producer reaching down, perhaps from the grave, to pick pocket yet another dollar from us.
Howard
January 5th, 2009 at 1:01 pm
Are the book publishers returning the royalties to the people selling the books to second hand shops (or records/CDs, since record companies have talked about the samething)? If they’re not returning the royalties that they were paid before, they can get stuffed.
This is not about receiving fair payment, it’s flat out greed. Just as a customer can only have one copy of a book, computer program or song paid for, the company selling it has no business asking to be paid twice for the same single item.
All they will accomplish or cause is justifying piracy of ebooks by readers the same way DRM justified it for music listeners. I say screw ‘em - honesty begets honesty, and ripping off the customers in this way cost them profits. Trust pays more than distrust ever will.
January 11th, 2009 at 1:15 am
I am a published author some of my books are given away for promotional reasons. I do not receive royalties on books given away for this purpose. Some of these are sold as used or rare copies.
Should I receive royalties on books I did not get paid for?
I have no problum when I have been paid you can sell a book a hundred times it’s when I haven’t been paid.
If they want to give the book to someone else without payment, I do not have a problum. But if you are going to profit from my work shouldn’t I recive some of that profit?
January 11th, 2009 at 4:10 pm
As an owner of a used bookstore , This topic really upsets me .
Every used store is different .
The increased costs of inventory management and so forth would be prohibitive , for my store
It would simply not be feasible to pay royalties to authors on used books . If it were to come into effect ,we would simply refuse to carry books by authors who were part of what ever organization that was policing the law .
Or if the law was to pay royalties on books newer than 2 years we would simply not take newer books . This is not much of an issue , as it normally takes 6 to 12 months b4 a current issue paperback book will show up with any regularity anyway . some categories like science-fiction , and children s books it takes even longer .
Furthermore , I doubt very much that the new bookstores would seriously support this . We have an excellent relationship with the local new bookstore in my area ,and we often refer our customers back and forth between one another . People often discover an author in my store , and once they have tried them , go to the new book store to buy them , sometimes they will have us order the book in from the new store .
We rely on having a good new bookstore in the area , to put new books into the pipeline , and keep our stock fresh . We share the same customer , many of whom have told me they are more comfortable buying new books , because they can get something out of it after they have read the book by trading it into my store . This adds extra value to the new books , which are getting prohibitively expensive for many customers .
In my system , we give a trade credit of 50% of what we price a book in the store for as an in store credit which you can use to buy more books . This quasi cash system would be a major problem as well , I am not going to pay a royalty on a book i did not get cash for .
The access issue is a serious one , used bookstores really are a huge part of the book industry , and provide access to a much bigger variety of titles than any new store can , thus keeping authors works available to the consumer . I was in a Chapters bookstore recently , ( I like chapters ,I am not trying to criticize them but using them as an example ) you could fit my books store into their store 10 times over , it is huge , and they have tons of books , but not many titles . The thing that struck me is that while they have huge quantities of books ,they are all the same few books . they do not have a huge selection of titles ( for a new book store they have a good selection ) but compared to even a small used bookstore they do not . I have way more titles than they have , even though they are 10 times bigger than me .
Authors who think they are being cheated because they don’t get a cut of the used business , would be surprised how much they would loose if the used industry was not there . Used bookstores keep authors current . without us , there would be an awful lot of authors who only ever get to publish 1 book , and never get discovered in the 6 month window where that book is available on the new shelves , then fade away into obscurity .
Most authors take years between writing books , and their books usually are off the store shelves long b4 their next book comes out .Authors should look at the used book stores as either a 2nd chance to be discovered by a new reader ,and keep interest in them high enough that someone will buy their next book . They should view the used book stores an bonus publicity , once the new stores dump them , for what ever is hot this month.
January 12th, 2009 at 2:44 am
Not my real name I don’t want to irritate the people that sell my books.
I am a published author and I like used bookstores. When I look up my book on the net I find used copies for as much as three times the new price on the same web page. I write because I love to write. I receive $0.40 for one of my books sold for $4.00 wholesale, my book retails for $12.00 and on the same web page used $40.00 (the numbers are rounded). What are Chapters, Amazon and others doing? I wonder how many of the books marked as used on the net really are used, or are these sales technique to boost there profits or to promote making used bookstores pay royalties to put them out of business.
Used bookstores sell books for as little as ¼ the price of new. This promotes my new work and sometimes my old work as well. Used bookstores should not be paying royalties on books that the royalties already are paid. Although tracking used sales would give authors an idea as to how many people read there work. As it is now only royalties keep track of how many people they touch. I believe each person we touch we influence, each person we influence we become a part of. When we touch another with words that we write, we influence them. Should what we write survive our demise, our ability to influence others survives and for all intent and purposes. A part of us lives forever in those we touch we remain a part of the circle of life.
March 21st, 2009 at 10:25 am
I have read the article and the replies with great interest. Wouldn’t have done it otherwise, I just like the pomposity f that statement.
I was looking for wholesale second-hand book suppliers to add to the selection in my (soon to be relaunched) bookshop in Spain. I would like to get my oar in the water before it freezes over even if it is superfluous.
As I understand it, the publishers, at least in England, maybe elsewhere, give large bookshops books on credit and do not claim for ninety to one hundred and twenty days. At that point, the large bookshops return all of the unsold books, thereby leaving the publisher taking all the risk and all the financing.
The books returned are no longer considered new and farmed to remainder and overstock wholesalers. They want, and need to get at least their costs back and they do not always get that. Part of that cost is the author’s royalties or advance.
The author has been paid for every copy sold and maybe even some extra if it did not make its advance. If the system worked as (here) proposed, pulping would be the cheapest solution.
Let us not fool ourselves, the power of the large shop is pressuring the producers and the producers have to pressure their suppliers. The farmer that wants more for their milk may be speaking about one sent a litre, but if that is a five per cent increase, everybody else takes a five per cent increase and the end of the game includes a twenty five per cent increase on the retail price and the farmer is still struggling. Meanwhile, Tescos is posting huge, record breaking, new profits on retail milk.
A S Byatt is asked for in second hand bookshops, (here in any case) and she has decided she is losing something. Success often brings the view not of “I am doing well”, but that “I can be doing so much better for the same effort.” The previously mentioned Tescos put on discount copies of Harry Potter when it came out. They offered a price that the independents could not match and the chains did not try to. I was open then and I remember the hype and pressure the publisher gave me to get my order in early, knowing full well they had a sweetheart deal with Tescos and were prepared to slit my throat with a dull razor; as they did to so many bookshops in England. Tescos is a large food shop chain that has no social conscience, or at least does not seem to have.
But, doesn’t the United States still have Reagan’s inventory tax in place? Doesn’t it still cost text book publishers to store extra textbooks they produce? From what I have heard it nearly doubled the price of textbooks.
It might also interest the readers to know that the copyright laws in most of Europe still restrict the royalties to the authors’ children and grandchildren (50 years) and have not allowed them to spread to the great grandchildren (70 years).
I remember the plant breeder’s rights wars that so bothered so many governments.The USA won that fight and now you have process patents that mean not only do you pay if you produce the same medication, but you have to pay if you use the same process anywhere along the line in doing so for a different medication.
Imagine taking a patent on fire. The process patents would cover picking up two sticks, A bow and string, lightning, even if you are not responsible for it hitting your property, even smoke and heat if they have a good lawyer.
What exactly do the writers of this law really want? What do they really have in mind? I think it may go well beyond second hand books; just like it went way beyond cross ferilisation in flowers.