March 04, 2004

Well, If You Have to Ask, Search Alibris

A number of authors, including JK Rowling, Philip Pullman and Vikram Seth, are leading a coalition against the removal of retail prices from books. Philip Pullman notes that "books are not eggs," midlist authors would suffer, and royalties would be more creatively calculated.

There's actually a simpler way to look at the issue: Does anybody really want to go into a bookstore and be surrounded by books with terrible price tags besmirching their exterior? The affixing paste may ruin the cover. Or the pricetag might become so prominent as to destroy a carefully designed cover. Worse still, the name of a book or an author might be blotted out due to some rushed, underpaid bookstore clerk threatened with a flogging.

Posted by DrMabuse at March 4, 2004 02:45 PM
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