6 ms·

Agreed--not just typography but in many cases the entire ebook experience is just terrible. Some works are very clearly just OCR'd from the print version, with

by acabal 15y ago

Agreed--not just typography but in many cases the entire ebook experience is just terrible. Some works are very clearly just OCR'd from the print version, with no proofreading done (you can tell if you're reading one if you spot an obviously out-of-place word that would still pass a spellcheck). Others may be mostly presentable, but retain their print ephemera--for example, hyphenation in the middle of a paragraph, because there was a line break in the print version at that point. It's not always the publisher's fault--I've developed a few ebooks for different platforms, and ebook readers today are where Mozilla and IE were around the IE5 browser wars. Developing a book that looks good across all platforms is difficult, if not impossible in some cases. It wouldn't suck so much if we weren't paying almost the same price as a print book. Why would I pay ~$13 for a brand-new, often terrible-quality ebook (and a DRM'd one at that), when I could buy two print books for the same price, and get Amazon to ship them free to my door?

slipperyp 15y ago
For the convenience of being able to carry it on your phone, make highlights and notes that you can search in the future, for the ability (if you're interested in it) of finding information about passages others who've read the same book found most interesting, for the ability to "loan" the book to a relative or friend in a distant state without having to send the book through the mail. I'm not trying to say you're wrong or that I even disagree, I'm just trying to point out that people should have different expectations with ebooks and physical books (like I mentioned in my other post which was downvoted). ebooks are awesome in some ways physical books are not (and they're lousy in some ways that they really oughtn't be). The point I most strongly agree on is where you say this is in its infancy (like the browsers wars). The first ebook I read was on a Windows PocketPC in about 2000 and it sucked. The whole technology has gotten dramatically better and I expect it will continue to, but it's not more than about 10 years old, really, and only really started gathering steam within about the past 5 years. And I'm not saying "therefore we should all have low expectations" but I, personally, am willing to look at all the things that have been done well and focus more on those than focusing on typography or whether editing is immediately correct.
- deleted 15y ago
  [deleted]
bmuon 15y ago
It's still worth it when you're outside the US and want to get certain books that aren't published in your country or aren't imported in their original language. Then you save some money on shipping and a lot of time (the cheapest shipping takes almost a month to certain parts of the world). But yeah, ~$13 for an ebook is outrageous.
w1ntermute 15y ago
> Some works are very clearly just OCR'd from the print version Why are books even OCRed to create ebooks? Do they not have the original digital copy of them to work from?
- pak 15y ago
  If they are subcontracting the ebook dev process to a third party, perhaps not. And also, the whole editing to typesetting process is probably a hellish mix of Word and InDesign files, which leaves no "pristine copy" to pick the structured text out of. (Imagine: edits late in the process are made to the typeset InDesign files, after the structure has been lost.) You need structured text for creating an ebook because the ebook software does its own typesetting. So to pick up all the late edits, the only choice might be to OCR the final book and re-apply the structure. Yep, it's sad.
  - w1ntermute 15y ago
    > If they are subcontracting the ebook dev process to a third party, perhaps not. So they're not willing to provide the original source files, or what? > edits late in the process are made to the typeset InDesign files, after the structure has been lost. Wow, they do this so haphazardly that they don't even bother to go back to the original Word file and add the same edits? Is InDesign used for all books? I don't see why you would need it for something without any figures/graphs/tables. You could just use Word, and things would work out fine.
    - dfc 15y ago
      With all due respect you are out of touch if you think MS word has anything to do with typesetting / laying out a printed page.
      - w1ntermute 15y ago
        With all due respect I have extensively used Word, InDesign, & LaTeX and, contrary to your belief, typesetting can be (and is often) achieved in Word quite effectively.
MatthewPhillips 15y ago
> Why would I pay ~$13 for a brand-new, often terrible-quality ebook (and a DRM'd one at that), when I could buy two print books for the same price, and get Amazon to ship them free to my door? Two printed paperback books, with their horrible sand-paper pages, pixelated fonts, and crease-forming covers... surely you can live with an out-of-place hyphen if you can live with a paperback.
- ToastOpt 15y ago
  The paperback managed to put the hyphen in the right place. At least it's making an effort. When was the last time you saw paperback had an out of place hyphen just because that's where the hardcover placed it?
- andrewflnr 15y ago
  Yes, two crappy books instead of just one, for the same price.
sandGorgon 15y ago
I think its because the workflow is broken - what is the tool that you use to typeset to get beautiful ebooks in EPUB, MOBI and AZW ? I dont know - and neither does reddit/selfpublish . How does an author go from writing to generating books without encountering specialized (and expensive) typesetters? The first piece of advice that self-published Kindle authors will give you is to have a beautiful cover - how do you design one and integrate it into your ebook generation workflow to get one nice little package ? Can I say that the publishers are fleecing us, when probably they are having to pay extra to make sure their ebooks look good on Kindle, Nook, Sony, etc. ? The toolchain doesnt exist - and it is time for disruption.
kellishaver 15y ago
> Why would I pay ~$13 for a brand-new, often terrible-quality ebook (and a DRM'd one at that), when I could buy two print books for the same price, and get Amazon to ship them free to my door? I buy ebooks because they're easier to see... The lousy formatting makes them less enjoyable to read in some cases, but seeing is a prerequisite to reading. I need the inverted screen and the ability to enlarge the text and view the book on a back-lit display. I've also noticed that my daughter, age 9, has an easier time reading ebooks with the text size bumped up than she does printed books. In her case, it's not about eyesight, but the fact that larger text and fewer words on the page makes it easier for her to focus - she retains what she's read better. There may be a slight tendency toward dyslexia or something there. It's not sever enough to get a diagnosis, but there is some sort of little "glitch" there that both we and her teachers have noticed it. Instant delivery is another nice feature. If I decide at 10pm that I want to start a new novel, I can have it in my possession by 10:02. So ebooks offer many advantages in the realm of accessibility, and there are certainly many more books available in ebook format than there are large print editions, but the poor typography and high price are certainly annoying.

by acabal 15y ago

slipperyp 15y ago

For the convenience of being able to carry it on your phone, make highlights and notes that you can search in the future, for the ability (if you're interested in it) of finding information about passages others who've read the same book found most interesting, for the ability to "loan" the book to a relative or friend in a distant state without having to send the book through the mail. I'm not trying to say you're wrong or that I even disagree, I'm just trying to point out that people should have different expectations with ebooks and physical books (like I mentioned in my other post which was downvoted). ebooks are awesome in some ways physical books are not (and they're lousy in some ways that they really oughtn't be). The point I most strongly agree on is where you say this is in its infancy (like the browsers wars). The first ebook I read was on a Windows PocketPC in about 2000 and it sucked. The whole technology has gotten dramatically better and I expect it will continue to, but it's not more than about 10 years old, really, and only really started gathering steam within about the past 5 years. And I'm not saying "therefore we should all have low expectations" but I, personally, am willing to look at all the things that have been done well and focus more on those than focusing on typography or whether editing is immediately correct.

deleted 15y ago
[deleted]

bmuon 15y ago

It's still worth it when you're outside the US and want to get certain books that aren't published in your country or aren't imported in their original language. Then you save some money on shipping and a lot of time (the cheapest shipping takes almost a month to certain parts of the world). But yeah, ~$13 for an ebook is outrageous.

w1ntermute 15y ago

> Some works are very clearly just OCR'd from the print version Why are books even OCRed to create ebooks? Do they not have the original digital copy of them to work from?

pak 15y ago
If they are subcontracting the ebook dev process to a third party, perhaps not. And also, the whole editing to typesetting process is probably a hellish mix of Word and InDesign files, which leaves no "pristine copy" to pick the structured text out of. (Imagine: edits late in the process are made to the typeset InDesign files, after the structure has been lost.) You need structured text for creating an ebook because the ebook software does its own typesetting. So to pick up all the late edits, the only choice might be to OCR the final book and re-apply the structure. Yep, it's sad.
- w1ntermute 15y ago
  > If they are subcontracting the ebook dev process to a third party, perhaps not. So they're not willing to provide the original source files, or what? > edits late in the process are made to the typeset InDesign files, after the structure has been lost. Wow, they do this so haphazardly that they don't even bother to go back to the original Word file and add the same edits? Is InDesign used for all books? I don't see why you would need it for something without any figures/graphs/tables. You could just use Word, and things would work out fine.
  - dfc 15y ago
    With all due respect you are out of touch if you think MS word has anything to do with typesetting / laying out a printed page.
    - w1ntermute 15y ago
      With all due respect I have extensively used Word, InDesign, & LaTeX and, contrary to your belief, typesetting can be (and is often) achieved in Word quite effectively.

MatthewPhillips 15y ago

> Why would I pay ~$13 for a brand-new, often terrible-quality ebook (and a DRM'd one at that), when I could buy two print books for the same price, and get Amazon to ship them free to my door? Two printed paperback books, with their horrible sand-paper pages, pixelated fonts, and crease-forming covers... surely you can live with an out-of-place hyphen if you can live with a paperback.

ToastOpt 15y ago
The paperback managed to put the hyphen in the right place. At least it's making an effort. When was the last time you saw paperback had an out of place hyphen just because that's where the hardcover placed it?
andrewflnr 15y ago
Yes, two crappy books instead of just one, for the same price.

sandGorgon 15y ago

I think its because the workflow is broken - what is the tool that you use to typeset to get beautiful ebooks in EPUB, MOBI and AZW ? I dont know - and neither does reddit/selfpublish . How does an author go from writing to generating books without encountering specialized (and expensive) typesetters? The first piece of advice that self-published Kindle authors will give you is to have a beautiful cover - how do you design one and integrate it into your ebook generation workflow to get one nice little package ? Can I say that the publishers are fleecing us, when probably they are having to pay extra to make sure their ebooks look good on Kindle, Nook, Sony, etc. ? The toolchain doesnt exist - and it is time for disruption.

kellishaver 15y ago

> Why would I pay ~$13 for a brand-new, often terrible-quality ebook (and a DRM'd one at that), when I could buy two print books for the same price, and get Amazon to ship them free to my door? I buy ebooks because they're easier to see... The lousy formatting makes them less enjoyable to read in some cases, but seeing is a prerequisite to reading. I need the inverted screen and the ability to enlarge the text and view the book on a back-lit display. I've also noticed that my daughter, age 9, has an easier time reading ebooks with the text size bumped up than she does printed books. In her case, it's not about eyesight, but the fact that larger text and fewer words on the page makes it easier for her to focus - she retains what she's read better. There may be a slight tendency toward dyslexia or something there. It's not sever enough to get a diagnosis, but there is some sort of little "glitch" there that both we and her teachers have noticed it. Instant delivery is another nice feature. If I decide at 10pm that I want to start a new novel, I can have it in my possession by 10:02. So ebooks offer many advantages in the realm of accessibility, and there are certainly many more books available in ebook format than there are large print editions, but the poor typography and high price are certainly annoying.