5 ms·

Simon & Schuster to delay eReleases four months from Hardcover publication

16 points by AndrewWarner 17y ago

jameskilton 17y ago
"We believe some people will be disappointed. But with new [electronic] readers coming and sales booming, we need to do this now, before the installed base of e-book reading devices gets to a size where doing it would be impossible." Wow, that says it all about as succinctly as anyone can. I can't tell if this is cluelessness or desperation.
blahedo 17y ago
Mostly, it just means that people will go out and download the pirated copy off the internet. Smooth move.
- AndrewWarner 17y ago
  I don't think there's a pirate book community out there yet. Is there?
  - kqr2 17y ago
    Just check the torrents... Also, people will often do translations of popular books (c.f Harry Potter) before the publisher gets around to it.
  - jakarta 17y ago
    For business books, there is definitely a pirate community. I've noticed it specifically with anything related to investing.
  - tdoggette 17y ago
    www.anonib.com/BOOKCHAN/
- patio11 17y ago
  Some of us are not spoiled children. If I want to buy your book, and you don't want to sell me your book, that's fine -- I'll buy someone else's book. I've chewed through about 40 novels on my Kindle already, but its not like I'm in imminent danger of running out if I can't buy yours. (The only people I see this working out for are "event" book such as, e.g., the Harry Potters of the world.)
  - blahedo 17y ago
    Well, I don't even have an ebook reader. I'm sure there are many scrupulous people out there who won't pirate the books, but that doesn't mean they're going to buy the hardcover either. This isn't "I'm cheap/poor, I'll wait for the paperback", this is "I physically can't display a hardcover on my Kindle, so I'll get something else."
teilo 17y ago
Yet another company with contempt for their customer base. "WE will tell you what you want."
preview 17y ago
Is this really that much different from releasing the hard cover well before the paperback version?
jsz0 17y ago
What a strangely convoluted business model they have discovered. Wouldn't it make a lot more sense to sell the digital copy at a higher price initially? I doubt many owners of e-book readers are interested in paper hardcovers anymore. Isn't that sort of the point? They'll most likely just read something else instead and maybe in 4 months they'll remember and buy the S&S book they were interested in. This is an incredibly hostile move to S&S's new, or lesser known, authors who depend on the first big wave of publicity and reviews to sell books. The well known S&S authors will fare better but will probably still experience some fallout. The bigger losers are S&S's best customers. The ones who buy lots of books, stay up on new releases, and do tons of free marketing by recommending books to friends & family.
cstross 17y ago
To a publishing executive, this makes sense because ... The traditional pattern of book-selling is a reverse auction. First you sell the limited edition short print run signed gilt-trimmed hardcover. (Optional.) $35 Then you sell the regular hardcover. (Optional.) $25, discount to $16. Then you sell the trade paperback. (Optional.) $16, discount to $10. Then you sell the mass-market paperback. (Optional only if you're a small press.) $8, discount to $5. If it's a mega-bestseller, then you sell the cheap MMPB edition, discount down to $3 in quantities of 100K and up. Each of these steps occurs in sequence, typically 6 or 12 months apart. Some or all may be ommitted -- most books only go through 2, sometimes 3 of these stages -- but the general pattern is that the price comes down as the early adopters are soaked up by the expensive editions. It's an established business model and it worked in the traditional book business because books effectively come with built-in DRM; who in their right mind borrows a hardcover and photocopies it? If you read HN I'm going to take it as read (heh) that you understand why this model is fundamentally broken when you try to apply it to soft goods, as Hachette's execs seem to be bent on trying. (Full disclosure: I am published by a Hachette subsidiary in the UK, and I'm contractually required to not saw off the branch I'm sitting on.)
- patio11 17y ago
  This is a particularly acute problem for booksellers because, against everyone's expectations, their core audiences are taking to the Kindle in droves. This leads to the ultimate nightmare for the market segmenter -- they're cannibalizing their best customers. It would be like if an enterprise software company convinced their Fortune 500 clients to all sign up for their self-service $9 a month SAAS plan.
  - cstross 17y ago
    Yes. Most American households buy around 1 book a year. Roughly 50% of books are sold to just 2-3% of the market. There's a power law at work (with, admittedly, a cut-off at the high end). I know quite a few folks who typically buy and read 50-150 novels a year. To make a runaway best-seller, you need to reach out to the 1-book-a-year folks, but to stay in business you've got to keep the 50-books-a-year people happy, because those are your core market. Regularly reading fiction for entertainment is, these days, a niche market.
AndrewWarner 17y ago
What's frustrating about this is that, in a world where people are increasingly less willing to pay for media, S&S found customers who 1) still want to read books, and 2) are willing to pay for those books. And now that they found that prized audience what they're doing is telling them "Go away! Come back when we're ready for you."

16 points by AndrewWarner 17y ago

"We believe some people will be disappointed. But with new [electronic] readers coming and sales booming, we need to do this now, before the installed base of e-book reading devices gets to a size where doing it would be impossible." Wow, that says it all about as succinctly as anyone can. I can't tell if this is cluelessness or desperation.

blahedo 17y ago

Mostly, it just means that people will go out and download the pirated copy off the internet. Smooth move.

AndrewWarner 17y ago
I don't think there's a pirate book community out there yet. Is there?
- kqr2 17y ago
  Just check the torrents... Also, people will often do translations of popular books (c.f Harry Potter) before the publisher gets around to it.
- jakarta 17y ago
  For business books, there is definitely a pirate community. I've noticed it specifically with anything related to investing.
- tdoggette 17y ago
  www.anonib.com/BOOKCHAN/
patio11 17y ago
Some of us are not spoiled children. If I want to buy your book, and you don't want to sell me your book, that's fine -- I'll buy someone else's book. I've chewed through about 40 novels on my Kindle already, but its not like I'm in imminent danger of running out if I can't buy yours. (The only people I see this working out for are "event" book such as, e.g., the Harry Potters of the world.)
- blahedo 17y ago
  Well, I don't even have an ebook reader. I'm sure there are many scrupulous people out there who won't pirate the books, but that doesn't mean they're going to buy the hardcover either. This isn't "I'm cheap/poor, I'll wait for the paperback", this is "I physically can't display a hardcover on my Kindle, so I'll get something else."

teilo 17y ago

Yet another company with contempt for their customer base. "WE will tell you what you want."

preview 17y ago

Is this really that much different from releasing the hard cover well before the paperback version?

jsz0 17y ago

What a strangely convoluted business model they have discovered. Wouldn't it make a lot more sense to sell the digital copy at a higher price initially? I doubt many owners of e-book readers are interested in paper hardcovers anymore. Isn't that sort of the point? They'll most likely just read something else instead and maybe in 4 months they'll remember and buy the S&S book they were interested in. This is an incredibly hostile move to S&S's new, or lesser known, authors who depend on the first big wave of publicity and reviews to sell books. The well known S&S authors will fare better but will probably still experience some fallout. The bigger losers are S&S's best customers. The ones who buy lots of books, stay up on new releases, and do tons of free marketing by recommending books to friends & family.

cstross 17y ago

To a publishing executive, this makes sense because ... The traditional pattern of book-selling is a reverse auction. First you sell the limited edition short print run signed gilt-trimmed hardcover. (Optional.) $35 Then you sell the regular hardcover. (Optional.) $25, discount to $16. Then you sell the trade paperback. (Optional.) $16, discount to $10. Then you sell the mass-market paperback. (Optional only if you're a small press.) $8, discount to $5. If it's a mega-bestseller, then you sell the cheap MMPB edition, discount down to $3 in quantities of 100K and up. Each of these steps occurs in sequence, typically 6 or 12 months apart. Some or all may be ommitted -- most books only go through 2, sometimes 3 of these stages -- but the general pattern is that the price comes down as the early adopters are soaked up by the expensive editions. It's an established business model and it worked in the traditional book business because books effectively come with built-in DRM; who in their right mind borrows a hardcover and photocopies it? If you read HN I'm going to take it as read (heh) that you understand why this model is fundamentally broken when you try to apply it to soft goods, as Hachette's execs seem to be bent on trying. (Full disclosure: I am published by a Hachette subsidiary in the UK, and I'm contractually required to not saw off the branch I'm sitting on.)

patio11 17y ago
This is a particularly acute problem for booksellers because, against everyone's expectations, their core audiences are taking to the Kindle in droves. This leads to the ultimate nightmare for the market segmenter -- they're cannibalizing their best customers. It would be like if an enterprise software company convinced their Fortune 500 clients to all sign up for their self-service $9 a month SAAS plan.
- cstross 17y ago
  Yes. Most American households buy around 1 book a year. Roughly 50% of books are sold to just 2-3% of the market. There's a power law at work (with, admittedly, a cut-off at the high end). I know quite a few folks who typically buy and read 50-150 novels a year. To make a runaway best-seller, you need to reach out to the 1-book-a-year folks, but to stay in business you've got to keep the 50-books-a-year people happy, because those are your core market. Regularly reading fiction for entertainment is, these days, a niche market.

AndrewWarner 17y ago

What's frustrating about this is that, in a world where people are increasingly less willing to pay for media, S&S found customers who 1) still want to read books, and 2) are willing to pay for those books. And now that they found that prized audience what they're doing is telling them "Go away! Come back when we're ready for you."