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back to article Publishers' club lauds UK e-book sales surge

Brits are buying more e-books than ever before. Sales of digital tomes in 2011 leapt 366 per cent over 2010's total, the Publishers Association said today. Not that paper is in any danger of being displaced in the near future. The total value of e-book sales as in the UK came in at a mere six per cent of that of physical books …

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  1. Andalou

    Really?

    A decrease in cover price. A DECREASE in cover price? Of physcial paperbacks? My ar$$.

    And even if, statistically, that is true... perhaps if publishers bothered to accommodate adequate gutters so you could read without destroying the spine. Perhaps if they did not print an inflated cover price that presupposed a multi-buy discount...

    I hate the destruction of the nasty commie net book cartel. Pardon me for preferring the days of only having to make a binary choice between a £1.95 mass market Grafton or a £2.95 King Penguin and today's wonderful freedom of getting an X-Factor's wannabee biography from Asda for £3 and a literary novel where the £13 softcover is more expensive than the remaindered hardback. Thank you, free market. Fuck.

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    1. Chris Parsons
      Reply Icon

      Re: Really?

      Could not agree more - unfortunately, it reflects the society we live in.

      I buy books mostly second-hand now, some great bargains to be had. Oxfam is a good source.

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  2. Martin
    Headmaster

    digital tomes?

    A couple of pedantic points

    A tome is a big heavy book. The major advantage of e-books is that a whole library, never mind an individual book, is not big and heavy.

    And if VAT at 20% is removed from an e-book, that reduces the price by approximately 17%..

    But yes - I don't quite see why an e-book should attract VAT when a paper book does not....

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