Withold my ebook? No no no!

As reported at Dear Author from articles in the Charlotte Observer and the Wall Street Journal, Simon and Schuster CEO Carolyn Reidy, Brian Murray, chief executive of News Corp.‘s HarperCollins Publishers, and Lagardere SCA’s Hachette Book Group all announced that they plan to delay digital book releases until months after the hardcover releases in 2010.

All you people who have digital readers (I’m raising my hand, too, here), it’s your/our fault. Reidy is quoted as saying:

Simon & Schuster CEO Carolyn Reidy said Wednesday that the rise of e-books has led to a “cannibalizing” of new hardcover purchases.

“We believe that a large portion of the people who have bought e-readers are from the most devoted reading population,” Reidy said. “And if they like the e-readers they are naturally going to convert because the e-books are so significantly less expensive.”

I don’t know how much more complex a bad solution they could come up with here, but sticking it to the customer in order to protect sales of a dwindling product is the most ludicrous thing I’ve heard in a long ass time. It’s boneheaded and short sighted and insulting. Basically we’re being told that our dollars are not acceptable as sales currency because we bought the wrong format.

I think the only proper way to answer a solution this insanely complex in its lunacy is… rhyme. Let me make this as simple as possible in this hypothetical response to the publisher’s insistence in pushing the hardcover on a digital book customer.

 


Do you like this hardcover book?
You should buy it! Look look look!

I do not like a hardback book
I will not read it, not that book.
I want to read it, yes, I do,
but not that hardback, no, thank you.


Will you buy it here, or there?
You can buy it anywhere!
This hardback book is just for you.
The only kind we offer you.

I will not buy it, here or there.
I will not buy it anywhere.
I do not want a hardback book.
I want to buy a digital book.

Would you buy it in a store?
If you buy one, will you buy more?
You can buy it here, or there.
You can buy it anywhere!

We only have this hardback book.
There are no others, if you look.
This hardback paper is for you,
and if you buy one, you can buy two!

I will not buy it in a store.
I will not buy one, two, or more.
I will not buy it here, or there.
I will not buy it anywhere.

I will not buy a single one.
Our transaction might be done.
I do not want your hardback book.
I want to read my digi-book.

We do not sell digital books.
We only sell the hardback books.
If you want e, you have to wait.
Until the hardback sales abate.
This digital is just a fad,
and in our viewpoint, very bad.
The only books are ones like these:
Buy in hardback, won’t you please?

I will not buy them, don’t you know?
This is why your profits blow!
I want to read your books, right now!
I want to read them anyhow!

I want to put them on a Kindle,
or Nook or Sony, and not be swindled.
I will not buy a hardback book,
not now, not later, you backwards crook.

Your clueless thinking blows my mind.
E-sales are climbing! Are you blind?!
See this finger, nice and high?
You can kiss my sale goodbye.

I’ll go online and find my book,
scanned page by page by pirate crook,
and you have lost all sales from me,
both now and in the future. See,
I do not want your hardback book.
I want to read my digital book.

Categorized:

Ranty McRant

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