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O’Reilly Media has stopped retailing books directly on its ecommerce store

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Re: O’Reilly Media has stopped retailing books directly on its ecommerce store

#41

Post by throwaway7645 »

hdra wrote: post #6
ddrum001 wrote: post #2

Having purchased many books thru O'Reilly, and now using Safari Online - I'm a huge fan of this move. Feels to me like going from iTunes to Spotify, or Netflix DVDs to Streaming.

I'm not. I purchased many books from O'Reilly as well, but the number is more like 4-5 books a year. Even with just 4-5 books a year I still usually end up with a book left unread or unfinished every time. Spotify/Netflix makes perfect sense for a subscription model because of the way we consume musics/videos. The same can't be said for technical books. Not for $399 a year anyway. With that price point, seems like th…

Bingo...i was thinking the same thing.

Re: O’Reilly Media has stopped retailing books directly on its ecommerce store

#42

Post by runevault »

kqr2 wrote: post #28

Does anyone know how this will affect previous ebooks purchased via O'Reilly? Will you still be able to login and access the digital books or do you need to download all of them before a certain date?

They say you will still be able to access stuff you already bought for life. You certainly already can access them as I logged into my account to check.

Re: O’Reilly Media has stopped retailing books directly on its ecommerce store

#43

Post by williamstein »

manaskarekar wrote: post #3

This really sucks. It was my favorite place to buy books. It seemed like the one place that had the model closest to being right. - They used to have an ongoing discount of 45% and more on special holidays. - They were DRM free in multiple formats and they gave you discounts on ebooks if you had purchased the print books. - They had regular updates to ebooks posted in one single list that you could keep up with. I wi…

I completely agree. I buy a handful of books every year directly from O’Reilly, due to the reasons listed above. I don’t buy $399/year, and even if I did last year, I definitely couldn’t predict that with certainty next year, so I’m definitely not going to subscribe. Bummer.

Re: O’Reilly Media has stopped retailing books directly on its ecommerce store

#44

Post by ianai »

Lendal wrote: post #24

I'm a Safari online subscriber myself, but I think this decision is a huge mistake. I also own books that I purchased from O'Reilly and I still use those books. Just because I don't continue to re-purchase them doesn't mean I don't use them or will never purchase another. I use them on a daily basis. I also use Safari on a daily basis. Why can't they see that there is a need for both models? I rent things, and I own…

I just don't understand the business choice. It's not like this will push people onto the safari books program. If anything, I worry that this portends the end for them.

Re: O’Reilly Media has stopped retailing books directly on its ecommerce store

#45

Post by TheAceOfHearts »

ilamont wrote: post #17

One other thing worth mentioning: Publishers (and authors) were notified of the change today . It's akin to an app store suddenly announcing a major shift in the business model and payouts to app developers, effective immediately. For my company, the single-title sales are often greater than Safari subscription income, and I am not sure sending visitors to Amazon is going to make up for the lost sales on O'Reilly. I…

I actually really like Safari books online, the all-you-can-eat subscription style matches my usage perfectly. My experience has been that most technical books aren't worth reading cover to cover, but many make for great references. When researching certain technical topics, I just open dozens of books and skip straight to the relevant sections.

Re: O’Reilly Media has stopped retailing books directly on its ecommerce store

#46

Post by ianai »

michaelmrose wrote: post #11

In case it might help anyone many libraries pay for a subscription to safari books. For example the Seattle library system provides free access to safari books to all card holders. Seattle library cards are available not only to anyone in who works, lives or owns property in seattle/king county but also those who have a card in one of several surrounding county library systems. Further non-resident cards may be had f…

Can you essentially only read the books from the library website?

Re: O’Reilly Media has stopped retailing books directly on its ecommerce store

#47

Post by ianai »

throwaway7645 wrote: post #41
hdra wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not. I purchased many books from O'Reilly as well, but the number is more like 4-5 books a year. Even with just 4-5 books a year I still usually end up with a book left unread or unfinished every time. Spotify/Netflix makes perfect sense for a subscription model because of the way we consume musics/videos. The same can't be said for technical books. Not for $399 a year anyway. With that price point, seems like th…

Bingo...i was thinking the same thing.

Either employers or they're hoping people will just "suck it up". For this to really work, they need to drop the price to Netflix/Spotify levels of 10/month.

Re: O’Reilly Media has stopped retailing books directly on its ecommerce store

#49

Post by [deleted] »

douche wrote: post #33
myth_drannon wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Manning gives that you for free

That and their daily half-off sales have resulted in me spending far too much money on their books... At least they generally have good editing and a pretty high quality bar, better than I've seen with Packt or Apress.

[deleted]

Re: O’Reilly Media has stopped retailing books directly on its ecommerce store

#50

Post by clumsysmurf »

kin wrote: post #20
detaro wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Amazon selling PDFs? Brick and mortar selling PDFs?

Amazon sells Kindle versions so there's DRM. But, Google Play store offers PDF and ePub versions of O'Reilly books.

There are significant problems with both options.

For Amazon, when you buy an eBook, you are essentially given a license to use it. Amazon can revoke that - we've all heard of people moving to another country to see their entire library disappear, only (hopefully) remedied after enough hell was raised on some website.

As for Play Books, lets imagine you are a Android developer working on the next great thing, and you are an ethical person. Still, you can make a mistake. Suspension of an app is considered a strike against the good standing of your developer account: “Additional suspensions of any nature may result in the termination of your developer account, and investigation and possible termination of related Google accounts.”

You would lose everything, eMail, books, etc. So while I don't expect these problems, knowing there is a small possibility, with almost no chance of remedy by a human on the other end, dissuades me from investing lots of money in that ecosystem.

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