The publishing industry doesn’t seem to understand that they need a new business model. Digital books are the future. Independent publishing via on-line sites will be the model.
Even big on-line publishers such as Amazon don’t get it. They are charging prices for digital books comparable to paper editions. What are their costs to sell you a digital copy? Yes, there are the royalties to the publisher and author as well as a profit for themselves. But there’s no physical transfer. when you buy a copy, they still have everything they started with. There’s no empty spot on the shelf that must be filled.
The savings in time, and resources should be passed to the buyer, not fall victim to the greed of Amazon and other on-line bookstores.
The reason there are so many pirate copies of everything is that consumers are tired of blatant rip-offs and they’re “Mad as hell and aren’t going to take it any more.”
