I know e-books are a cheaper product – both to produce and consume – and I’m certain that writers do too.
I have several messages saved permanently on my cellphone’s voicemail. Every month or so I trudge through the parade, when I’m required to re-save them. There’s a message from my wife and business cohort, Eliza, telling me that our daughter, Rio, has successfully managed to stand on her own. Another one, chronicling Rio’s first steps. Several from Rio, as some words inch out, Eliza gently prodding her along in the background.
And then there’s a stew of Two Dollar Radio-related messages. There’s one from independent publicist Lauren Cerand, saying that she saw Erotomania: A Romance, a novel by Francis Levy, in the window at City Lights. I also have saved messages from nearly every one of the authors we’ve published at Two Dollar Radio over the last two years informing me that their author-copies have arrived. They sound satisfied, and what they have to say always makes me smile.
I remember talking with Larry Shainberg, whose book Crust we published last October. I was asking Larry about Samuel Beckett, whom he was fortunate enough to meet on a handful of occasions and befriend (Larry also wrote a Pushcart-winning monograph on Beckett for The Paris Review). Larry told me that he went to see Beckett in Europe, and the pair was returning to the hotel where Beckett was staying when the desk clerk provided him with his mail, which contained the author-copies of one of his books. I don’t recall that Larry mentioned which book of Beckett’s it was, but I remember him saying that it didn’t matter whether it was your first book or your fiftieth, there’s still that feeling of intense satisfaction and joy that arrives with finally holding your book in your hands.
As a publisher, I derive a great deal of satisfaction myself when the finished book arrives. Recently, when copies of Rudolph Wurlitzer’s second and third novels, Flats and Quake, which we’re re-issuing in a back-to-back edition, came from the printer I immediately broke out my camera and took pictures. Certainly, some of the glee could be attributed to the fact that the book looked as we intended: we were nervous about the flipped/upside-down pages.
I’ve learned that publishing is a drawn-out process that above all demands patience. There is that initial burst of enthusiasm after reading a remarkable submission, then the re-kindled energy over presenting the title to the reps at sales conference, but the real flood of excitement comes upon holding the finished product in my hands. That’s when it’s real, the transition complete, when I find its spot on the bookshelf in my office: it is now a book.
As a publisher we’ve dragged our heels in embracing e-books (or even acknowledging their presence). Through our distributor, Consortium, we’re able to partake in their parent company’s program, that allows publishers to make their books available electronically rather painlessly, albeit with a modest fee. But it took us at least eight months to sign the contract, and we’re still, now, months later, resolving any further contract entanglements with authors.
Part of my reluctance is my inability to resolve in my mind the bitter truth of what we’ll be stamping our brand upon. As a publisher, I know e-books are a cheaper product – both to produce and consume (providing you can foot the tab for the e-reader) – and I’m certain that writers do too. What makes anyone believe that readers won’t arrive at this realization as well? Once the honeymoon with their sleek new gadget ends, they’ll start to demand more for their money. As a commenter to Nick Harakaway’s blog post on e-books points out: “I wouldn’t pay more than $10 for an eBook, because at more than that, I want more than I’m getting. I want a dust jacket, I want something physical. There’s an inherent belief (and I agree) e should never cost as much as its old world equivalent. You really do get less.”
Gimmicks such as Simon and Schuster’s snigger-trigger “Vook” are just the tip of the iceberg. Soon, because of the lack of page-count constraints, e-books will come complete with deleted chapters, a writer’s and editor’s cut, and alternate endings. The result will resemble more a videogame fantasia than a traditional “book.” And I don’t want to read that.
As Emily Pullen, of Skylight Books in Los Angeles, so aptly points out in a blog post: “Creating digital literature and harnessing the medium’s unique capabilities requires a specialized knowledge of programming languages. As such, it is software engineers and computer programmers (the techies) who are best suited to use this new literary medium, not the traditional Writer.”
Most likely, it will be several years and rungs on the evolutionary ladder of the Vook before even its initial potential can be imagined. In the meantime, at Two Dollar Radio we’ll casually make our books available electronically. At our size, the potential fifty dollars a month from e-book sales can make a difference. But I don’t expect many messages from authors calling to share their enthusiasm at their e-books arriving. And I won’t blame them.
30 responses
Could not agree more. The content of a book is more than its content: it is the tactile cover, the spine, the weight and feel of the paper, the font, even the way the words carry over from one page to the next. I think this is more than nostalgia for a fading medium, but even if it is, so be it. Nostalgia as the avant-garde. The experience of a good book can’t be separated from the physicality of the book itself. I remember some old science fiction movie where “in the future” no one ate food anymore, they just took a bunch of pills. Who needed the fusiness, the waste, the inefficiency of actually sitting down to eat? Food is just nutrition, went the argument. Books are just words, goes the argument. But the book’s medium is a narrative, too. The content of a book is more than the content of a book.
It’s not up to you or what you like/want/makes you feels good. It’s about the readers.
Publishing’s long-bred snobbery is what’s gotten the industry into this hole. Books have not evolved, while everything else we do/consume has. Do you like your Tivo? Your iPhone? Your satellite radio? Your online video? We all do, but they only happened because companies saw market opportunity in offering consumers a new way.
We’ve gotta embrace innovation to survive, and put customers first. Distributing the same technology/package publishing always puts out will not be enough.
For people my age (soon to be 41), I suspect reading books on a screen will always seem odd to some extent, even though I read stuff using Stanza on my phone all the time, and that’s because our earliest memories, reinforced over the decades, include the sense of holding a book and having that sensual relationship with it. Our kids and grandkids (should we have them) will have a different sensation with e-books, and will probably grouse about their kids not having the experience they did when the next generation has books downloaded straight into their heads or whatever the next technology is.
I don’t buy that the book’s medium is necessarily a part of the narrative. Twelfth Night reads the same whether I’m reading it in the Penguin edition, the monster Riverside Collected Shakespeare, or on my phone. Now sometimes the medium matters if the way you found it is important to you–if it was a gift, or if you stumbled across it in a dusty bookstore, etc.–and one could argue that you won’t get the same sort of excitement about getting an email with a book attached the way you do when a close friend presses a volume into your hand (though I suspect that will change with the generations as well), but the book itself hasn’t changed. Only the way you first experienced it did.
I’m not sure if it’s ironic or appropriate that you begin damning ebooks by praising voicemail. Though I guess when voicemail became popular about 20 years ago people couldn’t complain about it on blogs.
Hi Matt:
Watching movies on small screens is an utter disaster. I’ll admit it, all the things you mention (Tivo, etc.) I either despise or use (i.e. online video) as an expedient pathway to something larger. When you say that “it’s not up to you or what you like /want/ makes you feel good”—well, but it is! I’m a “reader” just as much as “the readers” you mention. The entire media industry is geared to creating “needs and wants” that are then fulfilled through “innovative technologies.” I don’t know if, as you say, the publishing industry has a long-bred snobbery and that books have not evolved. But if you’re right, then I’m glad. It feels good to be on the losing side.
There’s a difference between people who enjoy reading AND books themselves and those who simply enjoy reading. In most cases people who enjoy one will enjoy the other but not neccessarily and not always in an equally comparable way. And then you have a more extreme version of the book obsessed who simply enjoy collecting books but not actually reading them. My point is that for people for whom reading is about more than the words their brains are processing, e-books are evil incarnate! So, of course there are those that like to read that are embracing the e-books. Good for them! My guess is that those people do not appreciate the physical book to quite the extent that others do! Just because we are offered new technologies does not mean that we have to embrace them. That notion is ridiculous and what I usually define as “Suckerism”! If they tell us we need it and that it is terribly practical item and everyone else has one then I must need one too! Right?
As Brian Spears has pointed out in past comments on this subject, e-books will have their place in society, most appropriately for students and acedemics. My fear, and I can only assume the fear of many others who love books, is that as e-books emerge they will eventually take over the market because they are cheaper to create in every way, shape and form and that’s usually always what wins out when it comes to what consumers are offered or fooled into thinking they need. Either that or books will continue to be offered, albeit on a much smaller scale, and we will be charged much higher prices for them! Not a fair trade at all!! What is likely to happen with books is what is/has happened with music. To think it won’t is delusional. What has happened to the music industry has not bothered me because I do not have a physical attachement to cds, records, tapes, album art, etc. but I’m sure that it matters to a lot of other people who do. And because of that it is a valid issue! Just as the future of the printed word is also valid!
This is a very interesting topic and one that has much more depth than meets the eye. I believe a big portion of this has to do with the lengthy amount of time that books have been a part of society. I hope that in this instance books are not simply brushed aside for the latest in shiny, high-tech gadgetry! What will be lost is hard to put into words (as my rambling tyraid attests to)! For the vast majority of people, an e-book is not really all that more convenient that an average sized novel is! They will only truly be practical for a small portion of society! Slipping an e-book into your bag in the morning on your way to the subway is not going to cause a downswing in scoliosis type ailments! Let’s not fool ourselves!
Matt, e-books make up a very small percentage of book sales. As I said, a publisher our size could hope to make maybe $50/month on e-sales. Compared with how many hard copies we sell, that’s very, very insignificant. Why people (large publishers) are hot on the wagon is because it’s an emerging technology, and one of the only places where sales are increasing. (But, obviously, that’s only because it’s an emerging technology and there is no sales history. So of course sales will increase.)
The media has painted the publishing industry at large to be in a hole, but that certainly doesn’t apply to every book publisher. At Two Dollar Radio we aren’t in the hole.
Our goal as a publisher is to reach 5,000 readers with each book. We think that’s a healthy, responsible number to try to meet. And I believe there will always be 5,000 people reading a tangible book.
@Eric I’m thrilled to hear you’re not in the hole, and there is certainly no one-size-fits-all business plan. I do firmly believe that the traditional book feels nice, smells nice, feels good in the hand, etc – but is also really inconvenient, easy to lose, a waste of energy resources (production, shipping, etc). Ereaders are moving from first adopters to everybody – stats say they’re going to triple sales for Christmas. It’s a train worth getting on – ultimately, the risk is NOT getting on the train.
But did you see the Nook that came out today? http://www.barnesandnoble.com/nook/features/techspecs/
Beautiful. I want one. I love my local bookstore, but this is better. There are a lot of options for my time – and I want the option that enhances my life & is super easy – and I like a good shiny object as much as the next guy. Whatever I want when I want it, and it looks sexy. Who wouldn’t want that?
The Nook: “great news for book cover designers… your craft will be preserved in the space of a postage stamp”
http://blog.bookcoverarchive.com/2009/10/1416/
One fact that gets lost through all this excitement about ebooks is that producing an ebook is not significantly cheaper than producing a paper book. No, printing is not cheap, but it’s a fraction of the cost of acquiring a manuscript, editing it, laying it out and marketing and advertising it. All these things still need to happen when you make an ebook. It’s shocking to me that their value and cost is so thoroughly discounted by people in the publishing business.
One thing I worry about is people don’t realize how fragile electronic data is. Digital formats are NOT archival media. If we don’t keep printing and preserving written culture a lot of it can be lost very quickly.
It’s shocking to me that their value and cost is so thoroughly discounted by people in the publishing business.
The publishing business needs to get better about explaining the costs to the public, quite frankly, because that’s who doesn’t understand why a data version should still cost ten bucks. You’re the first person I’ve heard make any sort of argument–and it’s the beginnings of a convincing one, I might add–for why an e-book should cost more than a buck a copy.
You’re the first person I’ve heard make any sort of argument–and it’s the beginnings of a convincing one, I might add–for why an e-book should cost more than a buck a copy.
Because printing costs are actually a fairly minimal part of the process. The costs include editing, formatting, shipping, and returns if you’re selling to bookstore. E-publishing cuts out shipping and returns for the most part, but the book still needs to be edited, typeset, spellchecked, and the author (I hope) will still need to be paid.
… the author (I hope) will still need to be paid.
This is quite a parenthetical, one which points to one of the great mysteries of the future of publishing (not to mention the music industry, film, etc.). Do we still believe that artists have the right to be paid for their creative production? If so, then everyone needs to take a deep breath before getting so excited about new technologies that enable publishers (and booksellers) to squeeze writers out of the equation. This isn’t new to e-books, by the way – the trend toward paperback originals already entails perfectly awful economics for writers; e-books will just accelerate the process.
And if we don’t believe artists should be paid, then where do we expect art to come from? Corporations? The independently wealthy?
“Free” may be cool, it may be a “radical price,” as Chris Anderson says – but the more our culture allows us to demand things for free, and at our absolute convenience, the more it devalues those things themselves, and the people who make them. You want e-books packed with commercials for Viagra and Chevy trucks? You want novels sponsored by Google? Keep demanding free.
Andrew, the parenthetical was merely me indicating my own self-interest! It is an interesting question, though– will ebooks be ‘shared’ like music files? Musicians make more money from live performances than they do from music sales, but there’s no equivalent venue for authors.
“Soon, because of the lack of page-count constraints, e-books will come complete with deleted chapters, a writer’s and editor’s cut, and alternate endings. The result will resemble more a videogame fantasia than a traditional “book.†And I don’t want to read that.â€
This is not such a new thing. I have “restored,†“annotated,†and “unabridged,†versions of Plath, Carver, and Vonnegut on my bookshelf already, not to mention illustrated copies of Tolkien and King. To me, they only seem to deepen the reading experience. Why shouldn’t an e-book come with some appended material and high-res digital artwork?
If iTunes had been invented before Napster, no one would even imagine free music. But industry resists (inevitable) change, and the people who suffer most are the artists. If publishers are smart, they will figure out a way to take advantage of electronic media before their customers do.
Andrew—I think the following comment of yours might be slightly hyperbolic: “And if we don’t believe artists should be paid, then where do we expect art to come from? Corporations? The independently wealthy? “Free†may be cool, it may be a “radical price,†as Chris Anderson says – but the more our culture allows us to demand things for free, and at our absolute convenience, the more it devalues those things themselves, and the people who make them. You want e-books packed with commercials for Viagra and Chevy trucks? You want novels sponsored by Google? Keep demanding free.”
I’m a writer. A fringe writer, granted, and even a quick glance at my work will show you its lack of viability as a commodity. I give my writing away for free. No commercials. No Google sponsorship. No nauseating jacket-cover blurbs. No paper, if you don’t want paper. Print it out if you wish. I’ve created a body of work while employed at a variety of day jobs and living paycheck to paycheck throughout my life. Does this devalue my work in your eyes? Does it devalue me? I don’t feel devalued (somewhat ignored, yes, of course, but not devalued). Artistic devotion has many faces, and worthwhile art can be created out of a wide array of financial and social and political (and personal) circumstances. Not getting paid for one’s art should almost never be an excuse to stop making one’s art. Life can be hard (obviously) and is a privilege (not so obviously). Making art can likewise be difficult and is likewise a privilege (no matter how rough it can be on the ego).
You make a good point, Tim. Art will always get made by dedicated, talented people, no matter what their circumstances or compensation.
Still, I can’t help but wonder why we don’t demand free health insurance, and ask the doctors to hold down a day job to support their “medical habit.” Or free food, and tell the farmers to grow their crops in the middle of the night, after coming home from their office temp jobs. Maybe we should make housing free, and cross our fingers that developers and construction workers keep building out of deep love for their craft.
Art is an essential part of a meaningful life. Perhaps it’s not so surprising that many non-artists refuse to see it that way – but when artists validate and enable that refusal, it is we who devalue ourselves.
We only devalue ourselves in a monetary way (not high on my priority list). If our mutual goal is to foster better and more enriching art (whatever that might mean to each of us), it isn’t clear that the “professional” will produce more of it than the “amateur” (no matter what the amateur is forced to do to make a living). The professional will almost assuredly have to make some commercial compromises (these can be both bad and good, I know, in terms of pleasing consumers). The amateur might have to withstand some version of anonymity and might always be at risk of implosion. There’s room for both methods (as has long been the case). The professional will continue to find ways of getting paid (even if it means becoming more of a small-time entrepreneur—though I doubt even David Foster Wallace could have fed and sheltered himself by selling t-shirts and buttons at readings).
It’s hard to raise aesthetic/economic objections to the looming era of the e-Book without sounding like a Luddite or a reactionary or a crank or ahopeless romantic or all four. Not to get all grad-school Marxist, but once we buy into the assumption that the e-Book is the “natural” evolution of the book, we make a mistake. There is no “natural.” (Thank you Gang of Four.) The creators of Kindle, the Nook (!?!), etc. are technicians, functionaries of corporations whose goal is profit. So be it. This is true of the “paper” book industry too, of course. The shift away from paper books is not a natural, inevitable progression to something better. It is, as was the paper book, a reflection of a larger economic logic.
I think I disagree with our esteemed and brilliant books editor Andrew Altschul here. To write is a gift. I write pretty much full time and I feel like I’m retired, sitting in a coffee shop half the day scribbling in a notebook. I’m 37 and dirt poor. After writing 7 books I still have to live with two young hipster roommates who play their music too loud and don’t do their dishes. Still, I feel so lucky when I remember: I don’t have a job!
I don’t think a writer is owed anything more than a small room and healthcare. We are not doctors, or farmers. We’re wrong to think society owes us something, because if we’re honest with ourselves most artists will come to the conclusion that we don’t make art to make the world a better place, or to feed people, or to heal people. We make art for ourselves. The rest is gravy.
Stephen–
However much you’re making off your art, it’s not 0$.
And is someone giving you free health care? Can you put me in touch with them?
Zak, it’s true it’s not 0$. Whenever anyone makes money from art most of it should go to the artist.
Also, I think art grants are great, etc. But I disagree with people who think artists should have enough money to, for example, have children. To expect more than the most basic living for doing what we most want to do seems greedy, and I resent the entitlement that writers think they are owed so much. It’s demeaning to what we do. And it doesn’t make sense. The idea that a literary writer who sells a thousand books should make as much as a doctor is absurd to me. Still, knowing that, I’d rather be a literary writer.
I’m only speaking of creative writers here. People who write for work, white papers, journalists, etc. should be paid as much as any other laborer.
And Andrew, the reason artists are entitled to health care is because everyone is entitled to health care.
Right. Everyone is entitled to health care, but since artists are not considered productive members of society, we generally don’t get it. I know those hipsters you live with. They are 26 years old and write the dialogue for cell-phone video games. They, too, love what they do, and they get paid six figures for it. You, and I, work at least as hard as they do – my point is not about entitlement, but exactly the point you make above: Someone makes money off of what you and I do – but “most of it” certainly does not go to you and me. And as the publishing industry rushes to go digital, you can bet that we’ll get less and less.
Art is different from medicine, yes. But it does make the world a better place. And when artists romanticize their own struggle and poverty they just play into the hands of an industry that wants to get our labor for nothing.
I will totally accept less money once all the rock stars and actors do.
The thing is, rock stars and actors have, you know, fans. More than a couple hundred or couple thousand, and they’re willing to pay for the rock stars’/actors’ products.
Great point to Stephen about his >0$ though. I think it points out that Stephen (hi Stephen!) is operating in a commercial system too, just a different one.
Stephen @24:
“I disagree with people who think artists should have enough money to, for example, have children. To expect more than the most basic living for doing what we most want to do seems greedy, and I resent the entitlement that writers think they are owed so much.”
Isn’t this just taking your personal idea of what’s “basic” and what’s a luxury and imposing it on everyone? Not literally imposing it — I totally get and admire your basic stance that if you want money get a higher paying job, and if you want art make art — but acting like it’s an objective standard for what people should aspire to. (Living in the San Francisco instead of Podunk is “basic,” but wanting children (marriage? no roommates? a car? a bicycle? a nice pizza?) is “greedy.”)
Damian:
I didn’t say I wanted the same amount of money as them, I said I will accept less if they accept less.
Living in San Francisco isn’t basic. Living in San Francisco, like being an artist, also requires sacrifice. Smaller apartments and multiple roommates, for example. Good for anybody who can afford to have children and be a literary writer, that’s a neat trick to pull off. Just don’t tell me you’re entitled to it, because you’re not.
I find it interesting that posters here think that authors will suffer from e-publishing. Quite the opposite, I think: publishers will suffer. A manuscript doesn’t need to be formatted and laid out to become an e-book, and, from the looks of most contemporary paperbacks, publishers have already given up proofreading. It’s quite easy now to self-publish an e-book, and I dare say that self-publishing will become the wave of the future, with publishers becoming as relevant as the “music industry.”
How will authors be paid? I don’t know. I don’t even know if they will be paid. Oddly enough, I suspect that we’ll end up with more being “published” than before. Will the quality be better, or worse? Probably about the same; publishers seem to have taste in inverse proportion to their size.
How will we find what books are good? Probably the same way we find them now: from reviews, from friends, from recommendations on web sites.
The future won’t be worse, but it will certainly be different.
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