Well, I was commenting both on ad-supported and your arguments that ebook should drive prices down to the $5 range while eliminating DRM. Although you say you’re in favor of gradual change, you’ve become almost a Johnny One-Note in your criticism of the Kindle, which is the next step in the gradual change we’re all hoping to see.

So much so, in fact, that I may soon stop bothering to keep up with TeleRead. It’s starting to feel pretty strident around here, and I say that with respect.

Local public library. (Which is now doing ebooks! And audiobooks — and video — all online/downloadable.)

Let me tell you: Many of those now-free thirty would be *purchases* at $5/each in e form. At $15-$20 in e? I’ve got my library card.

How many authors will sign up to be part of the experiment, David? Publishers, even those open to the suggestions you make, will need to move into these areas gradually and with adequate financial failsafes. It is not going to happen overnight.

It seems to me that many people looking for a specific title, would pay more for instant gratification, to save the effort of poking around used bookshops, or the risk of getting an unusably tattered copy online.

That’s notwithstanding the people for whom poking around used bookstores is a pleasure, of course.

1. Your million-book mention is missing a verb. SELL. That’s the current, known model. Free ad-supported books by name writers might find new audiences. Please note, meanwhile, that you and I are not as far apart as you might think. While I believe it’s risky for the industry NOT to experiment with ad supported books, they’re not a panacea. Not every title is suitable. Most probably aren’t.

2. Sustainability with low prices won’t be easy but it isn’t impossible, either, and publishers really should experiment, given all the free content competing for readers’ time. As I’ve said elsewhere, low-cost books may result in new readers for publishers—far, far beyond the usual bookstore patrons. Book spending per capita is pretty pathetic in the U.S. Imagine the chance for people to get highly publicized best-sellers for much less than they have in the past. Plus, they can download them instantly when they’re promoted on Oprah. Not bad in terms of potential. Yes, there’ll be bombs–I’ve already talked about publishers’ hopes vs. actual successes in the context of “free” and it applies to “low-cost,” too–but some extra-affordable books could actually take off in a major way when the tech is simple and attractive enough. If publishers don’t splurge on advances, they may stand a chance of sustainability in time even though most publishing won’t ever be a high-profit activity (never really has been in the majority of cases). Also keep in mind that publishers currently must try hard to get the stores to stock the big p-books–planning months ahead in many cases. With E, an obscure low-advance title can instantly be a best seller without a risk of running out of stock. Result? More efficiencies and chances of success.

Again, no miracles promised via ads or low prices, and I totally agree with you about the BW piece being off target. But I don’t think the situation is as gloomy as you think.

I’ll welcome your further responses. Thanks for dropping by.

David

And tell me again how many books are going to get a million readers?

BTW, my point isn’t that ebooks won’t go for $5 or less, it’s just that publishers are smoking something if they think that will increase volume enough to offset the reduced price!

I’d think the tech books would be easier sells. I have dozens of O’Reilly books and only handful have I ever read cover-to-cover. If they were, say $1/apiece, I’d buy all of the hacks books, for example, just to have for reference purposes.

I know people who do use it, but I’ve never been a fan of Safari. I don’t think most people want an ongoing subscription model to a single publisher anymore than they’d want an ongoing subscription model to a single label (fortunately, my institution picks up the tab to make Safari free to me, so I don’t have to make that choice!)

One eBooks drop below the Amazon used price plus shipping, and appear with more titles than I can currently browse at a local second-hand bookshop, THEN things will take off for me.

But, Tim, you’re forgetting about the ever-hopeful ‘tude of trade publishers. They will just keep pumping out books in hopes of being the big exception, whatever the biz model. Notice the obscene advances they pay? I’m not saying that’s right or sustainable. But it’s the mindset of typical trade publishers, who, alas, are not as savvy as you or some other tech publishers.

Re math: You say the regular model brings in $125,000 with 50,000 sold and the ad-supported one brings in $15,000. So if you can get 10X the number of readers, you’re up to $150,000. And you’re at 500,000 readers–or well below the “millions of readers needed to break even with its current revenue.” Even with your fudge factors, my hunch is that a million might do the trick. My apologies ahead of time if I’m missing something.

I of course agree with your big point that advertising isn’t for every book. Maybe even not most books. But it should be there as an option–ideally with a pay alternative so readers can turn the ads off.

As for costs, many small publishes are slashing them to the bone by eliminating DRM in cases when they have a chance. Certain costs such as editing won’t and shouldn’t go away for any book, but in general E has the chance to be cheaper.

Happy holidays,
David

And have you really done the math on how many copies a free book would have to have read in order to generate the kind of revenue that is now generated by print? For the sake of argument, take 50,000 copies of a paperback romance novel costing $5, say, generating $2.50 per copy, or $125,000, to the publisher. Now consider the same book, free, with an ad on every page. Assume the book is 300 pages, for 50,000 copies read, you get 15 million page views. At a very generous $1 per thousand impressions (and Romance novels are probably worth less than that), you get $15,000 in potential ad revenue. So you need to have at least eight times as many readers to break even.

And that $1 is very generous. Ads would be more likely to be cost per click (a la Google), with a few pennies per click, and quite likely generating only a few hundred dollars from all those page views. Suddenly, that 50,000 copy book needs millions of readers to break even with its current revenue.

And don’t get started on how you don’t have the cost of paper etc. You now have the cost of ad serving, and middlemen who will take a significant fraction of anything you generate.

I’m sure that there will be ad supported books, even successful ad supported books. But don’t expect it to become the norm.