"Pay as you read" Indiegogo fundraiser

Interesting. I'm not sure what to think of it. Their graphics / video look professionally done, so that's something at least.

I don't really see the point though. I guess the idea is partially to prevent buyer's remorse? You don't have to keep paying for the next bit if you didn't like the last one, and so on. But there's a free excerpt, apparently, and to be honest I can usually tell pretty quickly if I'm going to like something or not (at that point I either close it or buy all of it).

I don't like the idea. Period.

If I buy a book, I've already tested that I can and will finish it. So there's no use in that.

Almost all of the books I buy are either on sale or used. So what then? No sales? And if there are sales, or the price lowers/raises while I'm reading, what then?

How is this going to be distributed? Do I need to keep paying for each segment of the book before I read it? That I need to keep uploading each piece onto my e-reader. Or will it just be automatically uploaded?

What's going to regulate this?

And what people are going to take full advantage to this? People who read half the book and drop it? What's the point of even starting a book if you're not going to finish it.


I just seems like a completely tedious idea that'll cause more frustration in the end.

It'll be a good idea for the opposite: If you don't finish a book, you get a refund for what you didn't read. But, even that has it's problems.

I'm with Will on this.

People are using Indiegogo to raise funds to self publish their books. I am so against these types of fundraising endeavors. If you read down their page, it just looks like another vanity press in the making. I dunno.

I can read the free samples provided by Barnes & Noble's nook section or just stand around the damned bookstore and read the first chapter. No money invested until I buy the book.

Didn't Stephen King try something like this?

Yeah, it was a while back:
http://www.pcworld.com/article/35723/article.html

So this is micro transactions for books now.

I don't like the idea of it. I don't like the idea of micro transactions in video games, either, so there's that. However, point being there are free samples of books you can read on Barnes and Noble and Amazon to determine if you're interested or not. No transactions for certain words, either. Plus 10k isn't a whole lot (I know it's an example, but still).

benbradley said:

Didn't Stephen King try something like this?

Yeah, it was a while back:
http://www.pcworld.com/article/35723/article.html

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You can still download the six published parts of The Plant from King's website. -Also, this is a very good example of the "new and revolutionary" e-book models people talk about not being either new or revolutionary.

I hope the relative books are finished and folk are not paying for a never-ending soap opera.

I don't think it's a bad idea—but I'm a chronic unfinisher. I start books and then they get bad or boring or simply uninteresting halfway through and I drop it and grumble because I bought crap. An Amazon preview isn't good for determining if the author can actually plot a novel.

I do this with video games, too.

I don't see how this takes away from people who want to purchase the entire book upfront. It simply helps people like me, who will not bother to finish books if they lose our interest move onto something else without feeling as if we've wasted our money. I just hate paying $10 for a book that has an awesome preview and an awesome summary only to find out that the middle and end sucks—and having that confirmed by other readers. If I could only buy the beginning of those books, I'd be happy.

I see it as a kind of tech option implemented through Amazon, though. I'd assume they'd work out the kinks. I see it kind of like purchasing a single episode or song off of iTunes instead of the entire season or the entire album. Just buy what you like. I know it's not a comparison that works for everyone, but that's how it lines up for me. I'd expect the story to be completely finished, though.

Or, conversely, some stories have awful beginnings that I'd rather avoid, but for some reason, I trudged through—it's mostly library books that I've done this. If I could just skip buying that beginning, I wouldn't mind that either.

But at one point, my currently reading shelf got to around 30+ at which point I was reading many different things at one time, so that tells you my attention span is rather short.

If I'm going to pay any money for a book, it's one I intend to finish. Why should I pay for 2-3 chapters and then decide it's not worth finishing? That's money out the window (and that I can't spend on a book I will finish).

It just sounds like a spin on the Victorian periodicals that Dickens et al used to write for.

As someone who often starts reading a book, and abandons after about 50 pages if I'm not enjoying it, this would probably encourage me to buy more than I do. I would be more likely to risk - say 70p on 10,000 words, than £7 - on the whole thing, if it was a new writer. Publishers aren't the only ones growing more risk adverse.

I already detest serials. I don't need that format for my novels, too.

And how do we know that the writer won't just keep spinning the story out to keep us paying?

All the disadvantages of a free download site, and you get to pay for it, too!

Much would depend on what the price is. I would see this as only working if it is very cheap, because this method undermines the illusion of ownership (which is part of the value of an ebook).

mirandashell said:

And how do we know that the writer won't just keep spinning the story out to keep us paying?

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Well, if the writer keeps spinning it out and the readers stay interested enough to keep paying, I'd say sounds like the author would be one hell of a latter day Scheherazade.

Hmmm.... I'm not so sure. For instance, if I'm reading a crime novel, I want to know who the murderer is. In this system, I may get invested in it but 3/4 of the way through I realise the author is stringing me along. I will get really really pissed off and never do it again. So there is a reader lost. And I bet I won't be the only one. No-one likes to be suckered.

There are a few books that were so bad I couldn't finish them but luckily they were borrowed from libraries so all that was wasted was my time and energy and not actual money. The books that I purchase tend to be ones I've researched.The only exception was Mark Kurlansky's Salt. As a person who has read whole books about olive oil, orange juice, vanilla, chocolate, wine, etc, I THOUGHT I knew what I was getting into but his book turned out to be so tedious I gave up after weeks of picking it up and putting it down.

I guess this 'pay as you read' program might have saved me a few dollars but... Meh. I really don't make a habit of buying crappy books so...

thebloodfiend said:

I don't think it's a bad idea—but I'm a chronic unfinisher. I start books and then they get bad or boring or simply uninteresting halfway through and I drop it and grumble because I bought crap. An Amazon preview isn't good for determining if the author can actually plot a novel.

I do this with video games, too.

I don't see how this takes away from people who want to purchase the entire book upfront. It simply helps people like me, who will not bother to finish books if they lose our interest move onto something else without feeling as if we've wasted our money. I just hate paying $10 for a book that has an awesome preview and an awesome summary only to find out that the middle and end sucks—and having that confirmed by other readers. If I could only buy the beginning of those books, I'd be happy.

I see it as a kind of tech option implemented through Amazon, though. I'd assume they'd work out the kinks. I see it kind of like purchasing a single episode or song off of iTunes instead of the entire season or the entire album. Just buy what you like. I know it's not a comparison that works for everyone, but that's how it lines up for me. I'd expect the story to be completely finished, though.

Or, conversely, some stories have awful beginnings that I'd rather avoid, but for some reason, I trudged through—it's mostly library books that I've done this. If I could just skip buying that beginning, I wouldn't mind that either.

But at one point, my currently reading shelf got to around 30+ at which point I was reading many different things at one time, so that tells you my attention span is rather short.

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gothicangel said:

It just sounds like a spin on the Victorian periodicals that Dickens et al used to write for.

As someone who often starts reading a book, and abandons after about 50 pages if I'm not enjoying it, this would probably encourage me to buy more than I do. I would be more likely to risk - say 70p on 10,000 words, than £7 - on the whole thing, if it was a new writer. Publishers aren't the only ones growing more risk adverse.

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Yeah. I can see this being a half-decent idea for people who are gunshy about buying books they're afraid they'll only leave half-finished. I doubt I'd actually use this service, but I know I've read plenty of books that were good up until about the 40% - 60% mark and then the drop-off hit (it's one reason why I'm reluctant to try unfamiliar authors without a really strong recommendation), so being able to only pay for the parts I read would be great, in theory at least. In practice... dunno.

It's not a new idea. Publisher Weekly wrote about a site called Total Boox that launched this month, there's another called elecbook.com, and ValoBox launched last October. Other people have expressed their doubts about this model. Only time will tell I suppose.

Looking at Total Boox, they claimed you wouldn't pay more using pay as you read than if you purchased the book on another site in its entirety. It’s not always the case, however. I Am God by G Faletti is $10.72, Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter by Seth Grahame-Smith is $10.72, and Theory U by C. Otto Scharmer is $31.95 On Amazon the Kindle versions are $8.39, $5.99, and $16.47, respectively. iBooks’ prices are $10.99, $5.99, and $16.99.

In contrast, As You Read appears to "focus on indie writers" -- which I think by their definition means self published -- though I question the experience of those involved*. They call the site a publisher in one tweet then a distributor in another. The website and video look nice, but a look at their campaign so far makes me doubt their marketing and social media skills and, consequently, their ability to promote their authors and their site. Neither seems to have much of an online presence, and at least one admitted they are new to blogging and mostly clueless as to how Twitter works. As for quality control, who and how will they be determining what is ”quality literature”? Neither has any editing experience that I saw nor could I find anything about bringing on additional staff.



* Turns out I know one of the team members. I had a negative experience with him regarding a demand for full copyright after both parties signed a contract as co-creators/owners. It really is a small internet world.

If it's a book by Stephen King, or Dean Koontz, or another famous writer I really love, I'd do it. Otherwise, not a chance in hell.

mirandashell said:

And how do we know that the writer won't just keep spinning the story out to keep us paying?

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Don't plenty of authors do that with series already anyway?

thebloodfiend said:

I don't think it's a bad idea—but I'm a chronic unfinisher. I start books and then they get bad or boring or simply uninteresting halfway through and I drop it and grumble because I bought crap. An Amazon preview isn't good for determining if the author can actually plot a novel.

Click to expand...

I'm bad at finishing books, too, but I think this model might actually make me less likely to finish stuff. As it is, there have been several books that I started reading, lost interest in, and then read and finished a while later. But if I had to keep paying to read more, I don't think I'd bother. Even if the cost worked out the same in the long run, I think I'd just see it as an easy excuse not to take up the book again.

That said, I don't think it's necessarily a bad idea if there is a market for it. If some people like it, that's reason enough to give it a try. It just wouldn't be for me as a rule.

Though, I could see myself possibly doing this if I was curious about an ebook and the sample wasn't enough to get a decent idea of what the book was like.