soft copy vs. hard copy no more.

[smokey]

here's an idea, i haven't yet seen discussed (but forgive me if it has, and i failed to notice it), though it has more to do with service rather than hardware or functionality.

i'm a frequent reader, so ebook readers are very appealing to me. but i also do like my small collection of books. this is my dilemma.

but what if a deal was worked out where by after purchasing an ebook, having read it and having liked it, one could get the hard copy at a highly discounted rate? a move like this would definitely push me off the fence to the "purchasing an ebook reader" side. it seems like a logical move that could only be good for the industry and, as of right now, i fail to see any drawbacks to it. the implementation seems highly possible and, off hand, i don't foresee any possibilities of exploiting such a service.

i must admit, i am new to all this, i haven't done any research, and i do not own an ebook reader, so this suggestion is pretty much fresh out the half-bakery.

be gentle.

[NatCh]

It's an interesting idea, smokey, but I don't see that anything new needs to be done to allow it: just hit your local used book store and pick up a copy, or wait for it to hit the bargain shelf at B&N or Borders.

You'd have the benefits of having it early, but you can likely get the hardback for paperback price or less that way.

[Azayzel]

Interesting concept, but I prefer the "buy the HB or PB and get the digital version for free" concept better. I only mention this because it has already been instituted by Syngress Press with several of their computer series. They could forgo the hard copy and require you to to simply input a special code to download your digital copy.

Of course your method could cut costs if they only have to physically print books when ordered and not bother with back-stock.

[JSWolf]

There was a hardcover start trek book in one of their series where if you bought the first edition, you got a CD with it that had the previous 15 books in PDF format included on CD.

That was nice especially if the early books may have been out of print by then.

[smokey]

thanks for your input, Azayzel!

Originally Posted by Azayzel

Of course your method could cut costs if they only have to physically print books when ordered and not bother with back-stock.

i wanted to make this point as well, but i failed to mention it in my first post. i'd like to think of the "soft copy before hard copy" method as sort of a try before you buy kinda deal.

now i was assuming that production costs for ebooks are super duper extremely low seeing as how it is just data. so once the paper version of a book is translated to digital format (through whatever process they use to go about doing this), production of the book is pretty much just a matter of duplicating that data times the number of volumes in demand.

now a question i intended to bring up was, would it be that big of a hit to the book company to offer a discount of up to 40 percent (percentage would vary from title to title offering the highest savings possible while still maintaining a fair return for the company) off on the paper version for every digital version that is sold? keep in mind that not everyone who purchases the digital version will always opt to purchase a hard copy. doing so could increase the demand for digital ebooks, and by association, the demand for ebook readers. the more interest gained in ebooks, the further and faster the technology would progress.

at least these were my thoughts, until i read this:

Originally Posted by NatCh

...just hit your local used book store and pick up a copy, or wait for it to hit the bargain shelf at B&N or Borders.

you know, now that i think about it, this makes a lot more sense.

thanks for reading and responding, everyone! feel free to weigh in, but now i'm pretty much convinced that NatCh's solution is the much more obvious, sensible and easier way to go.