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The Gabbers  JMC"JMC is fascinated by the politics of romance reading and writing, and by the genre’s position in the publishing and media worlds." read more...
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Dear Mr. Publisher, Let Me Introduce Myself
« Sick of the Same ol’ Story | Home | 02/21/2010 Grab Bag Winner »  Dear John Sargent, CEO of Macmillan: After reading your letter of January 30, 2010, it strikes me that perhaps you have never met one of my kind. What with Amazon described as your “valuable customer,” and your letter addressed only to authors and agents, perhaps my species has suffered from a kind of invisibility in your world of corporate publishing. So let me introduce myself: my name is Robin, and I am a reader. We readers are a diverse bunch, so I can only represent myself here, but I’m quite certain I am not unique. As a reader for more than 30-some years and a book buyer for more than 20, I cannot begin to count the number of books purchased or the accumulated money spent over those years. From textbooks and novels in paperback, trade, and hardcover, to non-fiction in fields as diverse as cultural studies and biology, to all sorts of academic volumes, my bookshelves are stacked several layers deep with books ranging from The Professional Chef to Beloved, from Philosophy in a Time of Terror: Dialogues with Jurgen Habermas and Jacques Derrida, to The Phantom Tollbooth, and from Roaring Camp: The Social World of the California Gold Rush, to a veritable slew of Harlequin category Romances. On my Sony reader, my iPhone, and my laptop, I’m simultaneously reading The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, Wolf Hall, and Mr. Unforgettable (a Harlequin SuperRomance). I’ve currently got Harvey Silverglate’s new book, Three Felonies A Day: How the Feds Target the Innocent, and The Dream of Perpetual Motion on my wish list. So why do I infer that perhaps you don’t know me and my fellow readers? Because of your recent battle with Amazon, your company’s resistance to having its books available digitally in public libraries, and the fact that you don’t even mention the word “reader” in your letter referenced above. And yet, while you seem to be content to ignore my people, I have been forced to learn more and more about your kind (publishers) and Amazon’s kind (retailers), as my ability to simply buy books in whatever form I want and for a price that seems competitively fair to me has been usurped by so many things over which I have no control. Like this whole “agency model,” that is apparently not an agency model at all, and retail price management, not to mention this whole “windowing” thing with digital and paper releases. Ironically, the more paraphernalia I have acquired to enable ever more diverse and numerous book purchases – dedicated digital reader, multi-function devices, multiple software downloads to read various DRM formats – the more difficult it has been for me to buy and read as many books as I would like. And seriously, I don’t think it’s supposed to work that way. It struck me at the time I was acquiring these things that the whole idea behind expanding options of format was to naturally facilitate more buying and more reading. Who else would pay several hundred dollars for a device but someone who was willing to spend hundreds, even thousands of dollars for the books those devices are made to accommodate? I can buy at home, on the run, on vacation, on a whim, in my pajamas, in between coffee and breakfast – whenever and wherever the desire strikes. And for someone like me, someone who loves, values, and needs books in my life, that desire is pretty much at a constant hum against the rough edges of my consciousness. And yet I am thwarted at every turn, it seems. Some of the books I want aren’t available in digital. Others are available in formats one or more of my devices don’t read. DRM encryption makes it impossible for me to do what I can easily do with a print book – move it to another location – without technically breaking the law. And except under very limited circumstances, digital retailer terms of service prevent me from sharing, while giving them away or selling them (as I can under the First Sale Doctrine with print books) is perceived as downright verboten. And now you’re telling me that I am going to be paying the same for digital books as for their print counterparts? Well, all I can say to that, putting aside the legality of RPM and the questions about what really constitutes an agency model, is that you are making it even more difficult for me to buy books, especially Macmillan books. I see all these compelling words and phrases in your letter to authors and agents: rational, stability, healthy competition, fairly compensated, long-term viability, a vibrant future for books. But I can’t help but wonder how books can have a “vibrant future,” when so much of what you and your corporate publishing kin have been doing lately seems to be discouraging me and other digitally inclined readers from buying your books. It seems to me that perhaps you worry about the way readers will eventually value, or rather de-value, the book as digital sales continue to rise. You dislike the $9.99 digital book price and seem to have the perception that library patrons will pirate your books if you provide digital copies to public libraries. But what you don’t know is that the $9.99 price is one of the most important engines driving my increased fiction buying. Because I generally purchase fiction to read on my digital devices, preferring in print books I need to take copious notes in or that have wonderful illustrations, or other types of value that translate into tangible form. And I will continue to pay a price for those books that seems commensurate with both my additional rights and the other value-adding elements (high quality paper, for example, or coffee table artwork). But I will not buy more new fiction in print, and I will only buy it in digital if the price is less than what a print book, with its additional production costs and fewer reader rights, costs retail. And because digital publishing is advancing, I have competitive opportunities to purchase digital fiction books from publishers other than the big six. And there are also the hundreds of books I still have TBR on my bookshelves or digital devices, as well as innumerable used copies for sale. I could certainly hold out for several years without buying any new fiction in any form from the big six. No one has the power to turn me off books altogether, because they are too much a part of who I am and what I appreciate. But if you keep trying to tell me that what reads clearly to me as a battle over the value of form (hardcover over digital) is really a battle over the value of content, not only will I not believe you, and not trust you, but I will not value you as a publisher And your books will pay that price, which, I can guarantee, is substantially more than $9.99. All Best, Robin L.. This entry was posted by Robin on Thursday, February 18th, 2010 at 6:00 am. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site. 26 Responses to “Dear Mr. Publisher, Let Me Introduce Myself”Leave a Comment |
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February 18th, 2010 at 8:40 am
Very well written, Robin.
I like the book in my hand so no digital/kindle for me. But who knows could change my mind.
And all modes should be available for all readers. What about Large Print books – there should be more of them; they should be available for every title – I realize you are not excluding them for sale, but hey Mr/Ms/Mrs Publisher – get more of them out there for the reader who needs them. Luckily at this point I am not one of them but there are a lot of readers out there who do.
I apologize if they are available for every title and I do not know about it – but from my travels I do not see them hardly at all.
February 18th, 2010 at 1:33 pm
@Pat L.:
Absolutely, and I’m sorry I did not mention these. Especially since you pay more for them in print (more pages, I assume), but on most digital devices/software applications you can adjust the font of a text, which can makes digital even more diversely appealing (and if TTS were enabled, even more so).
I certainly don’t expect that every reader will eventually go digital (I doubt I’d ever go totally digital), but it amazes me that while digitally-inclined readers are poised to buy more books more often, we seem to be penalized rather than encouraged for it.
February 18th, 2010 at 1:48 pm
I forgot you could prob make the digital print larger. Good point. Again all kinds of reading material should be made available to everyone’s likes and not some more costly than others if possible.
February 18th, 2010 at 1:55 pm
Hear, hear. And while the big six and Amazon essentially try to force me to choose Betamax or VHS, I can discover a publisher like Ellora’s Cave, who can let me read how (on what) I want.
February 18th, 2010 at 2:48 pm
@Ann Marie: Drollerie Press is great, too, and they are multi-genre. They even pubbed actor Michael Boatman’s first novel. Great cover art, too. http://drolleriepress.com/books/
February 18th, 2010 at 3:29 pm
Well done Robin, you have eloquently and concisely said everything I as a reader wanted to say myself
February 18th, 2010 at 3:51 pm
You go, girl! Robin, you are right on target with your column. As readers, we get shuffled off to the side when the publishers argue about sales.
February 18th, 2010 at 4:28 pm
I could spend a lifetime at Smashwords, buying reasonably priced eBooks over multiple formats, all DRM-Free. Some classics, some new releases, and tons and tons of unknown gems – free to sample before buying. An e-Reader’s dream.
February 18th, 2010 at 4:30 pm
@Ilona and @GSM: thank you! It honestly baffles me that more publishers don’t want to sell directly to readers, as well as to retailers. Although the fact that they don’t consider us their customers has helped me understand so clearly why I never feel like corporate publishing is in sync with the diversity of reader interests.
February 18th, 2010 at 4:36 pm
@Kristine: I remember when Project Gutenberg was a brave experiment! Now there’s Baen and Smashwords and Scribd and Kindle and oh so many different venues for so many different writing and publishing models. The possibilities for innovation seem so ripe, and I think readers have so much to gain from continued expansion and diversification.
February 18th, 2010 at 6:36 pm
I’m never one to be the first to get new technology. I want the different devices to battle it out, push each other to one up the other, and to bring the prices down before I even consider buying. I’ll stick to paper books and the occasional ebook for my laptop.
February 18th, 2010 at 8:30 pm
Being on a fixed income I have not purchased an e-reader yet. I figure as soon as I save up the money to buy one, they will come along with a new and better one and mine would then be obsolete. Beta, VHS, DVD, Blueray, these all started the same way and I’ve had them all but Blueray and I can’t afford to buy a machine or the special DVD’s that go on them. That’s why I’m jumpy about the e-readers. Also the price of the digital books seem higher in a lot of cases than a print book which I much prefer in the first place. So for now I’m sticking with print books and hoping for the best.
February 18th, 2010 at 8:31 pm
[...] Dear Mr. Publisher, Let Me Introduce MyselfA reader response to John Sargent of Macmillan. [...]
February 18th, 2010 at 9:35 pm
Very well done. I liek the letter a lot.
February 19th, 2010 at 12:14 am
I think we all should have the choice of how we read our books. Very well written post.
February 19th, 2010 at 12:25 am
@Sue A.: My understanding from reading various tech blogs and such is that $99 is seen as the real tipping point for widespread digital device adoption. Would that be about your price point, do you think?
I know a number of people now who read digital books only on their existing computers or multi-function phones. In fact, even though I have a Sony Reader, I read most things on my iPhone these days, because it’s more convenient, especially at night in bed (backlight).
@Linda Henderson: I wonder, frankly, what needs to be sorted out first: the digital texts themselves or the technology on which to read them. Linking both are problems with incompatible formats and proprietary software and hardware. But prices seem to me even more of a problem, b/c people buy so many books as opposed to # of reading devices. I know many who are waiting, just like you are, to see how things shake out.
@Debra G.: Thank you!
Lynn R.: Yes, I totally agree that choice is key. And right now, for those of us who read at least some of our books in digital format, choices seem both extensive and extremely limited. It’s a strange paradox but often unsatisfying outside the actual content of the books themselves.
February 19th, 2010 at 12:26 am
nicely written I agree with ever thing you said.
February 19th, 2010 at 3:57 pm
@peggy: Thank you!
February 19th, 2010 at 5:23 pm
I loved your article. I too agree with it. Everyone should have a choice…..
February 19th, 2010 at 7:38 pm
I live in the outside of Philadelphia where we have been pounded with snow and a lot of businesses have suffered because people have not been going out. You would think that a company would be thrilled with the idea that they can sell their product anytime/anywhere and work hard to make that part of their business attractive and inviting to consumers.
February 20th, 2010 at 3:23 pm
Very very well written blog. Like other ladies said, everyone should have a choice and not be resitricted.
Enjoy your weekend.
February 20th, 2010 at 3:25 pm
Very very well written blog. Like other ladies said, everyone should have a choice and not be restricted.
Enjoy your weekend.
February 20th, 2010 at 5:49 pm
I’m a book reader. I’m not ready to go digital yet.
February 21st, 2010 at 11:30 am
Sooooo not interested in digital. Part of the fun of reading is the smel and feel of the book. A Kindle is just too sterile.
February 21st, 2010 at 3:20 pm
At this point I love the book in hand. I love the smell of a bookstore and that is the smell of the books, not of an electronic device. But everyone should be able to have a choice.
February 22nd, 2010 at 7:59 am
[...] open letter to publishers from the point of view of a frustrated reader over at Readers Gab had me ruefully nodding my head: Ironically, the more paraphernalia I have acquired to enable ever [...]