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I know I should stay clear of Amazonfail, but I just want to say that a publisher which can't make a profit selling $9 etexts (or $5, or $2) deserves to go bankrupt. If amortized editing and design costs are really the lion's share of a physical book, the system is deeply, deeply broken.
(Even applying design costs to the etext version is largely ridiculous. How much design work does an etext need? I'd prefer it as a raw text file anyway, but a LaTeX-generated PDF would also be just fine as well. The only reason for fancy design in the first place is to catch people's attention in a store. Etext selection and browsing is nothing like that, so why bother with it in the first place? Tradition? Snob factor? Anything that can't be seen in the scaled down image of the book cover in an Amazon listing is a complete waste of money.)
I remain unconvinced of the long-term viability of selling data as a business model. But if you want to find a way for authors to make money, don't make it even harder by trying to defend these dinosaurs at the same time.
(Even applying design costs to the etext version is largely ridiculous. How much design work does an etext need? I'd prefer it as a raw text file anyway, but a LaTeX-generated PDF would also be just fine as well. The only reason for fancy design in the first place is to catch people's attention in a store. Etext selection and browsing is nothing like that, so why bother with it in the first place? Tradition? Snob factor? Anything that can't be seen in the scaled down image of the book cover in an Amazon listing is a complete waste of money.)
I remain unconvinced of the long-term viability of selling data as a business model. But if you want to find a way for authors to make money, don't make it even harder by trying to defend these dinosaurs at the same time.
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Obviously. But the threshold between possible and impossible is being pushed back. 20 years ago, you'd get laughed at for saying that a major operating system could be created by hobbyists. 10 years ago, you'd get laughed at for saying the world's most detailed and expansive encyclopedia could be created by hobbyists. 5 years ago, the same with a global atlas (http://www.openstreetmap.org). What changed? Technology. Communication tools. I have no idea how far it will go, but neither does anyone.
It does seem obvious to me that, as these tools get better and more commonplace, so will piracy. At the same time, more people are going to be wanting to do creative things, because the tools of production and distribution are getting cheaper at the same time. The obvious conclusion is that it will become harder and harder to make a living doing creative things. At some point it could become basically impossible, like aiming to be a rock star or an astronaut. Theoretically possible, but a completely unrealistic goal all the same.
We're facing a real Midas Plague, here, a post-scarcity world. (When it comes to data, anyway. Luckily our lives are increasingly data-driven!) What does "professional" mean when you're producing something with a marginal cost of zero, doing something for the social recognition instead of a cash payment? I really need to make a full post about this point, I think it's pretty critical. Emphasizing being a professional as the ultimate symbol of success could get very toxic if being professional simply isn't possible.