Authors have been getting screwed on ebook royalties, and it's likely to get much worse. Publishers fear they are going to get screwed by Amazon once it has a choke hold.
Finally, they are both pushing back. A flurry of activity in the last week:
The Authors Guild released a statement fighting Random House specifically on rights to older ebooks, but also on the royalty rate for all of us. It wrote:
It should also start offering a fair royalty for those rights. Authors and publishers have traditionally split the proceeds from book sales. Most sublicenses, for example, provide for a 50/50 split of proceeds, and the standard trade book royalty of 15% of the hardcover retail price, back in the days that industry standard was established, represented about 50% of the net proceeds of the sale of the book. We're confident that the current practice of paying 25% of net on e-books will not, in the long run, prevail. Savvy agents are well aware of this. The only reason e-book royalty rates are so low right now is that so little attention has been paid to them: sales were simply too low to scrap over. That's beginning to change.
It's very tough to fight the publishers one deal at a time, but we may get some traction from owners of older books (not covered by the 25% deal) getting higher rates. Several high profile authors and estates have announced plans to do just that in the last two weeks. The latest, Steven Covey. His “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People,” is still selling about 200,000 copies a year (based on Bookscan numbers, grossing up for the 30% they miss). That's better than most bestsellers on their initial big run.
NY Times summary of some of it all here.
Meanwhile, the publishers are finally pushing back with Amazon. Many are now delaying ebook release of their big and medium books by four months (or so).
Good for them. They don't like that cheap eboos at $10 are canibalizing the sales of hardcovers priced at $27, and often selling as low as around $16.
Writers need the publishers to fight and win, because ultimately, authors can't get paid a decent wage without money coming in to the publishers. If they get squeezed, we all do.
Though the delayed release makes some sense--comparable to movies coming out four months later on DVD--I doubt that is the long-term solution. Eventually, publishers will want to capitalize on all readers simultaneously. The problem is Amazon (followed by the others) undercutting the value of their product by selling it so cheaply. No industry can survive something like that. Authors probably can't survive it.
What I think the publishers are doing is playing for leverage. They need some--since they can't control the retail price. Amazon is selling every one of those $10 ebooks at a big loss. They can control handing over the ebooks, and that's what they are doing. Hopefully an equitable solution can be worked out.
I am all for relatively cheap books, and for instant access to ebooks. And in the long run, the much cheaper production/distribution should allow for everyone to benefit: authors, publishers, online retailers and readers. But not if the whole system gets skewed so badly that any one of those parties gets screwed. We are all in this together, and need a solution that works for everyone.
Finally, they are both pushing back. A flurry of activity in the last week:
The Authors Guild released a statement fighting Random House specifically on rights to older ebooks, but also on the royalty rate for all of us. It wrote:
It should also start offering a fair royalty for those rights. Authors and publishers have traditionally split the proceeds from book sales. Most sublicenses, for example, provide for a 50/50 split of proceeds, and the standard trade book royalty of 15% of the hardcover retail price, back in the days that industry standard was established, represented about 50% of the net proceeds of the sale of the book. We're confident that the current practice of paying 25% of net on e-books will not, in the long run, prevail. Savvy agents are well aware of this. The only reason e-book royalty rates are so low right now is that so little attention has been paid to them: sales were simply too low to scrap over. That's beginning to change.
It's very tough to fight the publishers one deal at a time, but we may get some traction from owners of older books (not covered by the 25% deal) getting higher rates. Several high profile authors and estates have announced plans to do just that in the last two weeks. The latest, Steven Covey. His “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People,” is still selling about 200,000 copies a year (based on Bookscan numbers, grossing up for the 30% they miss). That's better than most bestsellers on their initial big run.
NY Times summary of some of it all here.
Meanwhile, the publishers are finally pushing back with Amazon. Many are now delaying ebook release of their big and medium books by four months (or so).
Good for them. They don't like that cheap eboos at $10 are canibalizing the sales of hardcovers priced at $27, and often selling as low as around $16.
Writers need the publishers to fight and win, because ultimately, authors can't get paid a decent wage without money coming in to the publishers. If they get squeezed, we all do.
Though the delayed release makes some sense--comparable to movies coming out four months later on DVD--I doubt that is the long-term solution. Eventually, publishers will want to capitalize on all readers simultaneously. The problem is Amazon (followed by the others) undercutting the value of their product by selling it so cheaply. No industry can survive something like that. Authors probably can't survive it.
What I think the publishers are doing is playing for leverage. They need some--since they can't control the retail price. Amazon is selling every one of those $10 ebooks at a big loss. They can control handing over the ebooks, and that's what they are doing. Hopefully an equitable solution can be worked out.
I am all for relatively cheap books, and for instant access to ebooks. And in the long run, the much cheaper production/distribution should allow for everyone to benefit: authors, publishers, online retailers and readers. But not if the whole system gets skewed so badly that any one of those parties gets screwed. We are all in this together, and need a solution that works for everyone.
