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From: Paul S Person <psperson@old.netcom.invalid>
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.written
Subject: Re: =?ISO-8859-1?Q?=93SFBC_shutting_down?=
 =?ISO-8859-1?Q?=94?=
Date: Sun, 05 Jan 2025 08:51:08 -0800
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On Sat, 4 Jan 2025 16:41:07 -0600, Lynn McGuire
<lynnmcguire5@gmail.com> wrote:

>On 1/4/2025 10:40 AM, Paul S Person wrote:
>> On Fri, 3 Jan 2025 18:39:31 -0600, Lynn McGuire
>> <lynnmcguire5@gmail.com> wrote:
>>=20
>>> On 1/3/2025 4:57 PM, Ahasuerus wrote:
>>>> On 1/3/2025 5:19 PM, Garrett Wollman wrote:
>>>>> In article <vl9mo7$3fsk$1@dont-email.me>,
>>>>> Lynn McGuire=A0 <lynnmcguire5@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>> I am surprised SFBC lasted this long.=A0 I have not ordered a book=
 from it
>>>>>> since the early 1970s.=A0 I think that =93Dune=94 was the last =
book I bought
>>>>>> from it.
>>>>>
>>>>> I wrote a blog post more than a decade ago about how the book-club
>>>>> business model no longer made any sense, and I am quite surprised =
that
>>>>> it took the private-equity investors so long to come to the same
>>>>> conclusion.
>>>>
>>>> Certain business models can take a long time to be phased out. For
>>>> example, telegram services are still not quite dead (see this list =
of
>>>> companies -- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
>>>> Worldwide_use_of_telegrams_by_country). AT&T shut down its 411 =
service
>>>> just 2 years ago -- see https://www.bloomberg.com/news/
>>>> articles/2022-11-08/at-t-to-end-411-directory-saying-farewell-to-
>>>> telephone-operator-era
>>>>
>>>> I wonder how paper books will fare over the next 50 years.
>>>
>>> I would say that over half of dead tree books that I buy from Big =
River
>>> are POD (print on demand).  I suspect that MMPB is going away and =
will
>>> be replaced with POD trade paperbacks for the novelty of them.
>>>
>>> The real question is, is POD going away ?  The POD machines are
>>> reputedly high maintenance and not totally automated, yet.  From what=
 I
>>> can tell, Big River has over a dozen POD machines across the USA =
which
>>> cost well over a million USA Dollars each.
>>=20
>> The local drug store had one for a few months, but it apparently took
>> up more space than it was worth. IIRC and understood the signage
>> correctly, you could write your own book, format it properly, and
>> print it out. As well as, no doubt, a catalog of books written by
>> others.
>>=20
>> That drug store is going away, which is a great loss. According to the
>> employee who advised me of this, it is because they lost their lease.
>> But they didn't have much stock (the parent company is just emerging
>> from bankruptcy so stock requires cash) and so can't have been doing
>> much business. Well, except the Pharmacy, I suppose.
>
>The Amazon POD machines are the size of the drugstore.  Supposedly they=20
>print, collate, print the cover, apply the glue to the collation, glue=20
>the cover to the collation, cut the book to the appropriate size using a=
=20
>guillotine.
>
>The book covers are made on separate machines feeding to the process.=20
>The collations are B&W, the covers are high definition four color.

This one wasn't that big, but it still occupied a lot of floor space.

And, in case I wasn't clear, it also provided covers, which it
printed. I think, if you did your own book, you could provide the
cover art.
--=20
"Here lies the Tuscan poet Aretino,
Who evil spoke of everyone but God,
Giving as his excuse, 'I never knew him.'"