E-books too cheap?

I found myself writing a response to another blog that posed the question 'are e-books too cheap?'  As usual my reply ended up being longer than their article and so I’m posting it here instead.  But the simple answer would be 'yes, yes they are.'

There is of course a lot of ranting about this subject matter in my world - indeed done so myself here in the past - something, actually, that I can scare myself with, ranting, in terms of just how well I can do that.  But that kind of honesty isn't received very well in general in a largely passive aggressive society; does nothing for my online presence, so I refrain from it for the most part these days.  With that in mind, I won't go on too much.

There's varying reasons as to why books are so under-priced but it never fails to astound me that the level of work that goes into creating a (well written) book is so undervalued - and not least of which by the author themselves. 

What other profession where such high level of skill is demanded can be paid for by the consumer with only pennies?  It's offensive to me that people think nothing of paying $5.00 or higher for a cup of coffee that's been generically percolated in minutes - oftentimes more than once a day - and yet balk at paying $2.99 for a book that's been months, or even years, in the making, a product that can provide days or weeks of pure reading pleasure that can induce a better high than caffeine, or even accompany that if you're like me and totally addicted to the stuff - but something definitely wrong with that picture - the book thing, not the coffee; nothing wrong with that at all.

Even if you have written an amazing book that should sell at a comparatively decent price, unless you have the art of marketing down, and even then, you probably won't sell any more even if you do completely under-price - that's one mistake authors make all too often, I feel.  Make it free, in general, for whatever reason (and there may be some validity to doing this for promotional purposes) and many won't value it at all - in fact whole forums dedicated to listing freebies on a daily basis are filled with people 'over-frothing' their e-readers for the sake of it - are they really going to even look at a book priced at the outrageous sum of 99c when they have so many freebies readily available in the hopes that they'll find the odd gem?   Frankly, I'm amazed that books are even allowed to be free on an on-going basis by the distributors.  What else in this life is?... well... outside of all that insightful enlightenment you hear about.  And if some people are so unimaginative that they can't manage to find any of that for themselves... well then... they should have to pay for gleaning it from others who work extremely hard at depositing their insights and inventiveness in the form of stories.  Just sayin'.

Unfortunately one reason is because of the slush pile available publicly; authors feel pressured into lowering their prices, trying, and usually failing, to get noticed.  Why should the reader have to pay for your work when they can get something else for nothing, or next to it?  Yes, outrageous to have to pay for the months of very real slogging that a true writer undertakes to bring you a story.  Indeed, I hope the comic books are separated from the encyclopaedias sooner rather than later - perhaps when untrained writers come to realize that it might be easy enough to publish a book, but not so easy to create a product that's actually worth the time they spend doing that, that they're simply bogging the rest of us down, those of us who are serious about it; striving to be the best writers we can be, not just for our benefit, but the reader's too.  Surely to God that's worth the pennies lying around in your car's coffee cup holder?

Did I say I wasn't going to go on too much...?  Ah well.

Words are (truly) Cheap

So true!

Why is it that everything, and I mean, everything in life, is so bloody expensive, mass-produced or not - well... that is, all, except e-books?

But back to this picture here; it absolutely blows my mind that people will pay this, even upwards of $5.00, for (oftentimes, a weak) coffee – and oftentimes more than just once a day too – something that took only seconds to make by anyone at all, and that can be dismissed almost as instantly as simply being a poor experience if it's distasteful, but an experience, no doubt, they'll repeat over and over again, yet, most don’t want to pay more than $2.99, for what can often be the result of years of slogging, to read a lovingly compiled book; many expecting to pay just 99c – which, if it also happens to be weak, they’ll feel completely hard done by and suspicious of every other book that dares to ask for such an outrageous price.  There’s something wrong with this picture, literally; people obviously willing to feed their stomach willy-nilly, but not the mind; insult to their intelligence or not, a book has more value, surely, than what will end up at the bottom of a toilet bowl when all's said and done? Even if some books are better deposited there too.  But don't the two normally go together; body and mind?

Why then, do we put up with being so undervalued as authors?  The answer to that is of course obvious, all authors know that; the indie world of publishing making it easy for anyone at all to publish a book. This results in millions of people all trying to undercut each other in the hopes that their cheapie will sell millions.  But only the lucky few achieve that kind of success, usually with supreme marketing skill - or the funds to pay someone to do it for them - providing of course they've produced a well-written book.  Marketing, a harder task even than actually writing a book, in my own considerable effort (which after six months of following advice and sacrificing much of my valuable writing time, to that end, religiously putting the work in, but no matter how I much I do, no matter how many places I advertise, I don't see a difference in sales, and am at the point of seriously considering going back to contacting agents (they shouldn't be as busy, these days, should they?)

Don't get me wrong; undoubtedly it's a wonderful opportunity for authors to publish books that mainstream publishers perhaps won't even glance at, but there has to be some kind of distinction other than price, to discern between those who've actually taken the time to study the art and put their life and soul into writing books.  They need to break free from the tsunami of mediocrity and amateurishness that can barely splash around a few words; people with no understanding of the formulaic aspects of writing because they haven't bothered to take it seriously at all.  Yes, the slush pile, as far as I can tell, anyway, is now on the reader's computer in these modern times, via Amazon and Smashwords and other distributors, and no longer just the traditional publishers' desk - which, for all we've ever said about them, we might now have a better understanding of.  But still... books are no different from anything else that's widely available; and so, I ask again, why is it, in an expensive world of everything else, that e-books, and the talent that's put into many of them, are ALL EXPECTED to be so underpriced?

Just like the thousands of coffee shops we have to choose from, and anything else for that matter, there's good and there's bad, cheap and expensive, Dollar stores and Harrods, and everything in-between.  Why then, when many people see a book priced at more than $2.99, do they balk at it?  Why, even, when they see it being offered for free, which I personally completely don't agree with outside of promotional giveaways, and which did absolutely nothing for me in Amazon's KDP programme, do they value it even less than that?  It just doesn't make sense.  It doesn't seem fair.  But then, the world never has been.

This kind of low pricing is completely outrageous; any hard working author's work should be rewarded; they have a great skill, and, if they're like me, give up many aspects of normal life to bring the world stories for the love of it - and by author, I mean, any who've actually taken the time to at least try and hone their craft, whether still early on in their writing journey or not, and not one who simply thinks they can sit and type out a story because everyone at the BBQ say they're hilarious when recounting what happened last Saturday night.

And so, I’m happy to start seeing that certain organizations are beginning to try and come up with ways to separate the English from the (double) Dutch.  But perhaps an entrance exam, or something, like the one I had to pass to be employed as a freelance writer, or maybe we should have to prove something of our credentials at least - I don't know; I'm not the one with the answer, just a lowly writer, working for a pittance.  But one needs to be arrived at, soon, for true talent deserves to emerge from under the tidal wave that is the sea of indie publishing.  Hopefully, these companies are doing this with a view towards upping the prices of well-written books, too, and that people will start to bear in mind the old cliché, 'that you gets what you pays for'.  With everyone and their dog crying for pay rises these days, I think its high time, authors had a commensurate level of compensation as well - writing simply for the love of it, or not; if it's professional, published and available to the public, then it deserves more than the paltry amounts we seem to have accepted that they go for in our otherwise over-priced with everything else world.  Four or five books that can be kept for an eternity = the price of one designer coffee, gone in minutes?  Hmmm....

Also, on the whole coffee analogy thing, it seems appropriate to mention that it's unfortunate that the most popular chains are where most people tend to flock to, of course this happens because everyone else goes there, the human race inclined to be automaton, mainstream an inevitability.  But hasn't individual, true, talent, supposed to have been liberated in the indie publishing world?  Were we not supposed to be sitting in independent coffee shops stirring Grande cups of libretto at our leisure by now, chewing on our grubby laptops while staring into the universe and sharing the ideas that came from the strange abyss of imagination we've always travelled because that's what the people said they wanted?

Why then, in a so-called indie world of publishing, should we have to, increasingly, feel the need to appeal to a mentality that has no problem shelling out a fortune for a cup of froth simply because it's the flavour of the month?  Why do many writers jump on the copycat bandwagon that will inevitably drown the rest of us in the way that wizards and vampires (and undoubtedly to come, fifty ways to drink a coffee) have done?  Indie or not, someone, somewhere, is still telling the world what they're going to like next... and that's a shame.  Fashions and trends are one thing; but everything, everyone, pretty much, is the same all over the world.  And the ironic thing... people actually do this for the money?  Wake up and smell the sea-salt, that boat sailed; you're supposed to be an inventor; YOU create the next big thing.

As Alanis once said, I hate the world today.  And by the world, I do of course mean many aspects of the Internet and it's anti-social media - which I pretend to slot into with only a slightly better shape than I ever did in the real one as an oft misunderstood artist type.  And sadly, for all I hated about the real world too, it seems to have stopped percolating different varieties of coffee altogether, blending them all now in a huge gigantic melting pot that has cheapened, but not in my book, the true art of what being a barista might once have been.

Drama Queen

Poets are fairies… kind of

spreading their mystical word

All with long hair… probably

and glasses… sensitive rhymester nerds

Yeah, can be seen in coffee shops… usually

staring blankly out the window

herbal tea in coffee mugs… maybe

stirring everything but inspired libretto

Most of them smoke weed… obviously

I mean come on; poems are serious shit man

Stoking up words of paranoia... typically

and calling it enlightened inspiration

Ye-ah... they’re all fucking weirdoes, poets

floating around with chewed pens and grubby laptops

smiling melancholy at nature and stars… fucking souls

Get a real job... ya freaked out crazy crackpots

- S P Mount -