Book retailers are having a very hard time these days also. Even ones with very low cost, like Half Price Books, are in big trouble. Two Half Price locations near me have just closed along with one Barnes and Noble. The chain retailers are in just as much trouble as the newspaper and publishers in general.
You can down load a fiction book for $5-6.00 or buy a hard copy for $25.00. And who here doubts they make more profit on the down load? A Kindle DX can hold 3,500 books. The real problem is that book retailers are being bypassed in this type of book sale. So if you have 20-30% of your sales lost to the e-book trade then even the retailers are in real trouble and I have seen forecast that predict 50% of future sales will be by e-book format in 5-7years.
The business models just do not work right now and must be changed for anyone to make money in the print business. That or we need a better e-book product that will allow us to read and view books in electronic format that we have traditionally done in a paper format.
Information exchange, and that is what publishing is all about, is not going to stop. It is just going to be very different. In the early 1900's there were many double makers and now there are just a very few so publishing is going to be under a rapid change and most likely consolidation. The problem for us it that with the PC climate who will publish books about guns. A very non PC subject for too many people.
EDM, I have enjoyed your books and hope that the changes to come in publishing allow you and others to continue your works. Too much has already been lost due to time. The first person to figure out how to go to e-books and e-publishing and make the system work will make a ton of money. What does a down load cost? A few thousandths of a penny. Get a big enough "e"library and there is real money to be made. Someone is going to make it work.
