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The Kindle Swindle?

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61–62 of 62 posts

Re: The Kindle Swindle?

#61
post #35

Old guard always wants to protect a dying business because the people in charge have to wipe out their existing knowledge and experience of their business to go into a new business. When he/she goes into the new business, he/she would have no advantages vs a competitor that already exists in the field (i.e. a print executive going into tech). Most companies (due to the promotion structure) cannot make this jump some…

Why not in paper form? There's something lost from paper to e-ink, and everybody who uses a Kindle will realize that. If e-books become big and cheap, that means book sales are going to benefit, to some degree.

I personally read a lot and I think the electronic medium will add an additional layer of value: annotation, collaboration, access to a large amount of knowledge without having to lug around paper. Print's slowly dying because it's not linked to rest of the content in the world.

I don't think content creators are dead by any means, but I do think there have to be devices and mediums that enable more than the create and publish model.

When Amazon designed Kindle, they tried to make sure the user experience was as close to a book as possible. When I go on a plane, I would prefer not lugging around 4 books in my suitcase vs just using a Kindle. There is something about the print medium that's very pleasing, but I think e-ink and e-books will co-exist like theater and t.v. Although many can say that the T.V. will cannabilze all theater going activity, there is something unique about the experience that the solo activity cannot capture.

Re: The Kindle Swindle?

#62
post #23

You work for six months or a year building up your product, for no pay. A startup founder - or an unpublished author. What most tech types don't realize is how much risk there is already in the writers profession. These are not fat-cat music executives. They don't have anything like as much chance of becoming rich as a founder of a startup. Heck, most don't even make a living, and have to keep the day job; even once…

How about "I don't care?". Really. I bought the book and I am free to do with it as I please. That's where you rights as an author stop and mine as a reader begin. Will we have fewer authors? Likely. But I don't care. For all I know there are too many books being written already.

To put it another way, should we also charge each parent who reads a book to his child? It would make current authors more prosperous, but then it will also attract more people to writing and those new people will be just as miserable as the current crop is today. There will always be some miserable writers, no matter where the goal posts are set.

Can't make a living writing? Don't write. Go do something people would want.

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