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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Thu Apr 12, 2012 17:03 
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Dimrill wrote:
Was quite sad to read pTerry's no longer able to do personal messages in his book signings due to his Alzheimer's. :(


:-(

I have recently sold all my signed pterrys and have a pile of others which are probably just 'to be gotten rid of' (when i have sorted out what i have to go i'll stick a thread on here to see if anyone wants them for P&P but given the weight its probably cheaper to go to your local charity shop and pick them up).


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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Thu Apr 12, 2012 17:05 
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Tsk, I don't know. It was me that was supposed to get all angry in this thread.

Zardoz wrote:
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If I ever decide to get fired I'm going to hide in the library and make that overnight on the top floor. I'll also defend it with fire against anyone coming up the stairs.

Paperback books rock. Penguin books all the more. I'm just in love with the entire concept and design of a papery book, so yeah, no Kindle for me.

EBG, save them for my fort. Or, alternately, write your email addy in the front and drop them off in cafes, asking people to send you their thoughts. Maybe even as part of that Book Tracker thing.

Terry Pratchett accused me of being a goth due to my Neil Gaiman Sandman t-shirt, when I got Good Omens signed by him at the tender age of 19. Nowt could have been further from the truth guvnor. Still, relished it, and got it cosigned by Gaiman later on.

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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Thu Apr 12, 2012 17:12 
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NervousPete wrote:
Terry Pratchett accused me of being a goth due to my Neil Gaiman Sandman t-shirt, when I got Good Omens signed by him at the tender age of 19. Nowt could have been further from the truth guvnor. Still, relished it, and got it cosigned by Gaiman later on.


Apart from signing the books Pterry also put something extra in each one , a little line of text or drawing or similar and he did the same line for each book.

For Good Omens he and Neilhimself had an agreement that whoever signed first would write 'burn this book' and the other would write 'light here' and draw a little match


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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Thu Apr 12, 2012 17:14 
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I've got a signed copy of Terry Pratchett's 'Reaper Man' back from when he could remember who he was.

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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Thu Apr 12, 2012 17:17 
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Slightly Green wrote:
Grim... wrote:
I have signed books by Mick Foley and Mil Millington.

Why did you sign them?

Didn't I allude to that joke in the bit you chopped off?

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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Thu Apr 12, 2012 17:21 
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Grim... wrote:
Slightly Green wrote:
Grim... wrote:
I have signed books by Mick Foley and Mil Millington.

Why did you sign them?

Didn't I allude to that joke in the bit you chopped off?


damn, sorry i forgot you are a allusionist.

Am all full of manflu so sorry for missing it Mr G....

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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Thu Apr 12, 2012 17:22 
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For this one its not the Pterry sig thats special its the one above from 2001 just a few months before he died

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josh_Kirby


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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Thu Apr 12, 2012 17:34 
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myp wrote:
I've got a signed copy of Terry Pratchett's 'Reaper Man' back from when he could remember who he was.

I liked him better when he could remember who he was.


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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Thu Apr 12, 2012 18:23 
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I always assumed that authors made decent money. I mean I know that they don't all obviously end up with Harry Potter or Twilight levels of success but I thought that for someone getting a few books published they would be doing alright. Am I living in fantasy land? I haven't followed any of the links that anyone has posted but does anyone here know enough about it to give us a general idea about what being an author is really like?


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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Thu Apr 12, 2012 18:25 
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I guess it depends how popular your work is... I imagine it ranges from "making a living" to "solid gold house".


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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Thu Apr 12, 2012 18:27 
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Yeah I just wondered how much of a living it is but I suppose it is hugely variable. I can't imagine it is a quick process writing a book so there must be a period of a couple of years at least for most authors where they don't have one as a new release.


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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Thu Apr 12, 2012 18:35 
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As I understand it, it usually works like this:

    *Bellend does a degree in English Literature, doesn't know what to do, occasionally plays games, becomes a games journalist.
    *Games journalist has dreams of becoming an author, doesn't really give a shit about games or serving his readers.
    *Writes a shite novel in his spare time whilst somehow managing to make a living freelancing for Future Publishing magazines and Eurogamer despite the fact that nobody gives a shit about his opinion because he doesn't give a shit about games or serving his readers.
    *He finishes his shite novel and some publisher guy likes it. They publish it and it sells next to fuck all.
    *Games journalist stops being a games journalist and pitches his next book idea to another publisher on the basis that he has already had a book published. Publisher accepts, offers him an advance equal to about a year's wage.
    *Ex-games journalist writes the book. It's shit, just like his last one. Doesn't sell much.
    *Ex-games journalist goes to yet another publisher: "I've had two books published, give me an advance."
    *All the while, ex-games journalist is supplementing his paltry income by still writing freelance in the gaming press, despite the fact the he gives even less of a shit about games and serving his readers than he did before. Because of this, aspiring youngsters who actually give a shit can't get their feet in the door of the industry.
    *Ex-games journalist labels himself an "author", despite the fact that most of his income comes from very poor freelance games journalism.
    *etc


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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Thu Apr 12, 2012 18:40 
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"making a living" to "solid gold house".


There's a whole strata of hack shit writers guild cack below that.

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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Thu Apr 12, 2012 18:42 
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Oh, totally! I was working on the assumption that the writer was at least getting published regularly and stuff - and that writing is all they do, rather than a hobby for extra cash or whatever. I'm sure there are any number of aspiring authors on the dole, for example.


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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Thu Apr 12, 2012 18:43 
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And dead. Was it Stieg Larsson's books that only sold after he'd joined the choir invisible?

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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Thu Apr 12, 2012 18:51 
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Gilly wrote:
Yeah I just wondered how much of a living it is but I suppose it is hugely variable. I can't imagine it is a quick process writing a book so there must be a period of a couple of years at least for most authors where they don't have one as a new release.


The vast majority of authors will earn less than a City office monkey. In fact, most authors have a 'real' job as well

:(

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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Thu Apr 12, 2012 19:00 
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Gilly wrote:
Yeah I just wondered how much of a living it is but I suppose it is hugely variable. I can't imagine it is a quick process writing a book so there must be a period of a couple of years at least for most authors where they don't have one as a new release.



The average wage of an author is somewhere along the lines of £8k pa.

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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Thu Apr 12, 2012 19:04 
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My sister has had three novels published through a small independent publisher. By the time you added up all the time she spent on them, I think she earned less than minimum wage ( although writing is a far more flexible job than cleaning or stacking shelves ).

I'd be interested to know how much of J K Rowling's megabucks are from book sales and how much are from the rights for movies and games.


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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Thu Apr 12, 2012 19:05 
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Gilly wrote:
Yeah I just wondered how much of a living it is but I suppose it is hugely variable. I can't imagine it is a quick process writing a book so there must be a period of a couple of years at least for most authors where they don't have one as a new release.


The average author's income is £8k pa. My friend, J, spent about 3 years writing his novel and it's due to come out in 2013, although he has do do more rewrites of it. My other friend, CC, I'm not so sure about. My further friend, J2, has just finished the third edition of his Biochemistry text book, which seems to be coming along well to have a third edition.

From what I've picked up from MrsA, academic books seem to pay better but getting a lawyer to sit down and actually finish something can be a struggle. teachers seem to be more productive. I can't comment on how much she has paid them, though.

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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Thu Apr 12, 2012 20:33 
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NervousPete wrote:
Paperback books rock. Penguin books all the more. I'm just in love with the entire concept and design of a papery book, so yeah, no Kindle for me.


:this:

Completely agree mate. Each to his or her own of course, but for me the Kindle adds unnecessary complexity, fragility and expense into what was otherwise a perfectly satisfactory equation. Of course, I am a total Luddite at heart, but I really enjoy the "feel" of a book; turning the crisp pages and so on - I really feel like I'm "doing something". I just don't get that from staring at a screen; indeed, I frequently have to print drawings and reports rather than read a pdf direct off-monitor or whatever. Plus, even the humblest, trashiest paperbacks of my youth - that I still retain and cherish as I could never throw a book away - evoke memories of those periods of my life when I read them. Again, I'm not going to get that from loading up one file or other on some device and besides, I spend enough of my bloody time peering at computer screens, often through little choice.

No, I'm sure a Kindle is a very worthy little device, but it's certainly not for me. Besides, knowing me I'd end up inadvertently chucking it into the swimming pool or whatever when next on holiday - that's when I do 95% of my reading for leisure anyway.

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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Thu Apr 12, 2012 20:42 
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Sorted :P


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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Thu Apr 12, 2012 21:01 
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Captain Caveman wrote:
I just don't get that from staring at a screen; indeed, I frequently have to print drawings and reports rather than read a pdf direct off-monitor or whatever.


It's worth remembering, however, that the "virtual ink" screen of the kindle is completely different to reading from a pixel-based monitor.


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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Thu Apr 12, 2012 21:03 
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Zen-Chan wrote:
Captain Caveman wrote:
I just don't get that from staring at a screen; indeed, I frequently have to print drawings and reports rather than read a pdf direct off-monitor or whatever.


It's worth remembering, however, that the "virtual ink" screen of the kindle is completely different to reading from a pixel-based monitor.


Indeed! If you get an opportunity to take a look at a Kindle or equivalent, Cavey, I think you'll be pleasantly surprised by the screen.

However, I understand the rest of your argument. Mrs WTB feels very much the same and still reads paper books. She bought me the Kindle, but doesn't want one for herself.


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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Thu Apr 12, 2012 21:04 
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Paper can GTFF - I've even started reading magazines on the iPad now.

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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Thu Apr 12, 2012 22:39 
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I now get annoyed if I have a paper book of something instead of on the Kindle. I love it.

Not least because otherwise I'd need a massive barn to house all my books, or would have to throw them away. I was a massive Kindle-phobe until I got one.

:D

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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Thu Apr 12, 2012 22:42 
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The Kindle is utterly brilliant. It isn't a replacement for books, neither is it a competitor to an iPad. It sits in a (very successful) niche of its own.

TBH, I wish a lot of older sci-fi was on it, then I could get rid of some of the books I have. (Incredibly, stuff like 2010 isn't on it, or the full Foundation series.)

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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Fri Apr 13, 2012 8:54 
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Gilly wrote:
I always assumed that authors made decent money. I mean I know that they don't all obviously end up with Harry Potter or Twilight levels of success but I thought that for someone getting a few books published they would be doing alright. Am I living in fantasy land? I haven't followed any of the links that anyone has posted but does anyone here know enough about it to give us a general idea about what being an author is really like?


"Ed Reardon's Week" on Radio 4 is probably not that far from the truth :)


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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Fri Apr 13, 2012 9:02 
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myp wrote:
Paper can GTFF

Do you wipe your arse on it too?

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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Fri Apr 13, 2012 9:12 
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kalmar wrote:
Gilly wrote:
I always assumed that authors made decent money. I mean I know that they don't all obviously end up with Harry Potter or Twilight levels of success but I thought that for someone getting a few books published they would be doing alright. Am I living in fantasy land? I haven't followed any of the links that anyone has posted but does anyone here know enough about it to give us a general idea about what being an author is really like?


"Ed Reardon's Week" on Radio 4 is probably not that far from the truth :)



That's one of my favorite programs.

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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Fri Apr 13, 2012 10:11 
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Zardoz wrote:
myp wrote:
Paper can GTFF

Do you wipe your arse on it too?

Bidet, obv.

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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Fri Apr 13, 2012 10:23 
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myp wrote:
Zardoz wrote:
myp wrote:
Paper can GTFF

Do you wipe your arse on it too?

Ange has to shower the cack off my legs.

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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Fri Apr 13, 2012 12:43 
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I wonder how much my signed copy of "Stanley Bagshaw and the 22-ton Whale" is worth?


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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Fri Apr 13, 2012 13:03 
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GazChap wrote:
I wonder how much my signed copy of "Stanley Bagshaw and the 22-ton Whale" is worth?

1p.

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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Fri Apr 13, 2012 13:03 
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+8.99 postage.

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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Fri Apr 13, 2012 13:20 
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Mr Russell wrote:
+8.99 postage.


Except ebay will limit the amount you can charge for postage to £2.50 so when you actually sell it you make a loss of £6.50 and the ebay / paypal fee's and the buyer will claim it arrived damaged and want a refund so paypal will freeze your account and you'll have to pay the extra cash to have them buy a special camera and flamethrower to destroy the book and place the video of its destruction on Youtube.


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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Fri Apr 20, 2012 17:00 
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Quite a good read (via Skeptobot's twitter)

http://gigaom.com/2012/04/18/note-to-pu ... ign=gigaom

Quote:
Note to publishers: Your addiction to DRM is killing you
By Mathew Ingram Apr. 18, 2012, 1:57pm PT 25 Comments

inShare112

The Department of Justice’s lawsuit against two major book publishers — for allegedly colluding with Apple to keep the price of e-books artificially high — continues to make its way through the courts, and it has set off a frenzy of finger-pointing about who to blame for the destruction of the book industry at the hands of Amazon’s evil monopoly. I have argued that there’s a little bit of evil on both sides of this issue. But one thing seems fairly certain: If the publishers dislike the power Amazon has over them, they need to recognize they shoulder much of the blame, since they helped to forge the DRM chains that have kept them shackled to the company’s platform. Why not break those chains and try to set their content free instead?

The publishers have tried to argue they were forced to cut a deal with Apple to institute an “agency pricing” model for e-books — which allows them to set the ultimate price for their titles instead of giving that power to the end retailer, the way they did with Amazon until Apple came along — because otherwise Amazon would push prices down to unreasonable levels and take even more control over the industry. But who gave Amazon a lot of that control in the first place? The Big Six publishers themselves, by requiring DRM. As author Charlie Stross argued in a recent post:

By foolishly insisting on DRM, and then selling to Amazon on a wholesale basis, the publishers handed Amazon a monopoly on their customers.

Amazon no doubt wanted to lock up all of that e-book content with digital-rights-management protections just as badly as the publishers did, since that helped tie customers to its Kindle platform and the Amazon ecosystem. But the Big Six enthusiastically embraced the idea, because they believed piracy was a major risk with digital content and the only way to prevent it was to wrap it in Amazon’s proprietary file format. Further, those DRM controls also allowed publishers to set all kinds of restrictions on what e-book owners could do with their books, including how many times (or even if) they could lend them.

Has DRM prevented piracy? That seems unlikely, since it is relatively easy to get around those locks and copy a book if you really want to. What is pretty clear, however, is that those rights-management locks have cemented Amazon’s control over the publishers’ content. In other words, it has given the online retailer a stick with which to beat them, as Stross described it recently. And it has also made it more difficult for some independent e-book sellers, because publishers won’t let them sell their books without DRM.
Those DRM chains are hobbling the industry, not pirates

When it comes to readers and book buyers, meanwhile, DRM has been nothing but a source of pain and frustration, just as it has been in every other content market, including digital music. Books from the Big Six can’t be loaned or borrowed, or they can only be loaned or borrowed a certain number of times. And they can only be used on one platform, with all kinds of restrictions. What these chains and locks do, more than anything else, is to make the simple act of buying and reading a digital book horrendously complicated. Does that make more people want to buy and read e-books? It’s hard to see how. In a very real sense, those locks are hobbling the industry.

I think Christopher Mims of MIT’s Technology Review is right when he says the only option for publishers is to embrace the disruption that digital provides and do their best to disrupt themselves — and Amazon — rather than setting up artificial barriers:

It’s abundantly clear that publishers that survive in an Amazon world will be those who disrupt Amazon itself. If Amazon’s aim is to “cut out the middleman” then the next logical step is for publishers to cut out the middleman that is Amazon.

Some publishers refuse to bow to the god of DRM: O’Reilly Media, for example, sells all of its titles without any digital restrictions whatsoever. Tim O’Reilly has said he isn’t concerned about digital piracy, because most of the people who take his books without paying probably never would have bought a copy anyway. So it’s not as though he has lost a sale, and someone who reads them for free might later decide to pay (musician Neil Young has said that “piracy is the new radio”). And J.K. Rowling sells e-book versions of her massively successful Harry Potter series without DRM, although digital locks are added when a copy is downloaded to a Kindle.

Some, including Financial Times writer John Gapper, are skeptical that giving up DRM would make much of a difference for traditional publishers, since Amazon would presumably just continue to push down prices of e-books regardless, putting pressure on their profit margins and inexorably gaining more market share. And abolishing DRM certainly wouldn’t be some kind of magic wand that would return the book-selling business to the glory days of old. But at least it would give publishers a chance to be more flexible and adaptable, instead of trying to prop up their failing business model with price-fixing.


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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Sun Jan 18, 2015 15:52 
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I am geting rid of a lot of books, as I don'y have space. Where is the nest place to sell them, zifit are offering 8p a book...

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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Sun Jan 18, 2015 15:59 
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Unless you have some rare stuff, it's almost certainly not going to be worth your while to sell them - you might as well just take them to a charity shop.

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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Sun Jan 18, 2015 16:00 
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Master of dodgy spelling....

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Grim... wrote:
Unless you have some rare stuff, it's almost certainly not going to be worth your while to sell them - you might as well just take them to a charity shop.



I will box them up and get rid cheers.

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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Sun Jan 18, 2015 16:21 
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Zapper is a quick way to scan them for pricing estimates though.

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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Sun Jan 18, 2015 19:25 
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Yeah, make sure you're not dropping a first edition Dickens or anything :)

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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Sun Jan 18, 2015 20:10 
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Excellent Member

Joined: 30th Mar, 2008
Posts: 3542
I'm still not sure about this. Every time i finish reading a book on my tablet i yearn for some paper. I have lots of attachment to the physical object, so i doubt that i ever make the transition fully.


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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Sun Jan 18, 2015 21:35 
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Decapodian

Joined: 15th Oct, 2010
Posts: 5134
There's a few authors I'll keep buying real books from (or getting them as a gift, which is where ebooks really fall short) but I just couldn't dedicate the space to keep everything I've ever read. I've got another box full on the loft to go off to a charity shop when I get chance. It's a bit depressing but I know I'll almost certainly never read any of them, and if I do change my mind then that's what the kindle is for.


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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Sun Jan 18, 2015 22:11 
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Bad Girl

Joined: 20th Apr, 2008
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RuySan wrote:
I'm still not sure about this. Every time i finish reading a book on my tablet i yearn for some paper.


Toilet paper, cause you've been reading 50 Shades of Grey? AMIRITE!?


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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Sun Jan 18, 2015 22:15 
SupaMod
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Est. 1978

Joined: 27th Mar, 2008
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I got a dead tree for Christmas.

Every time I pick it up I'm sad it's not my Kindle.

It doesn't help that it's not very good (it's the new Alien book).

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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Mon Jan 19, 2015 4:15 

Joined: 15th Nov, 2008
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..........................................

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Bye.


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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Mon Jan 19, 2015 10:30 
SupaMod
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Est. 1978

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Cobracure wrote:
What I dont understand is apparently Vinyl is making a comeback - you cant even remote controlled fast forward that.

Sure you can. Even back when Vinyl was first popular, there were players that could fast forward, skip to the next track, etc.

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Grim... wrote:
I wish Craster had left some girls for the rest of us.


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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Mon Jan 19, 2015 10:36 
SupaMod
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"Praisebot"

Joined: 30th Mar, 2008
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With a remote control? Really? I didn't know this.


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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Mon Jan 19, 2015 10:45 
SupaMod
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I only know because my mates dad had one from the seventies (I guess) when we were growing up. The remote was like a brick!

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Grim... wrote:
I wish Craster had left some girls for the rest of us.


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 Post subject: Re: When did books become completely worthless?
PostPosted: Mon Jan 19, 2015 12:51 
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ugvm'er at heart...

Joined: 4th Mar, 2010
Posts: 22256
Was the remote on a cable? Our first VCR was like that.


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