eBooks are the future of stamp catalogs and other philatelic literature
Though I’m much in love with my printed set of stamp catalogs, I have no doubts that sooner or later eBooks will triumph over printed matter. Right now one of my largest annoyances is the fact that though eBooks seem to be this seasons hottest gift ideas, there is nothing but few oddball philatelic publications available. Nothing from Amos (publisher of Scott), nothing from Schwanberger (publisher of Michel), and nothing from SG (publisher of Stanley Gibbons). Why?
Most stamp catalogs are gigantic volumes that are hard to handle... For example this Scott catalog weights about 2,5kg's, is about 4cm's thick, and measures like a sheet of A4. It's simply enormous.
- eBooks are usually much cheaper than printed matter (not to mention postage related savings)
- The price of reader devices have come down a lot too (close to level of medium quality mobile phones and as such)
- And above all, the usability / technology of eBooks seems to have gone gone up in huge steps.
I can honestly see no valid reasons major stamp related book/catalog publishers refuse to say “Auf Wiedersehen, Herr Gutenberg”.
I understand that one of the main worries for publishers may be loosing profit margins. Whereas printed set of catalogs can easily cost up to 1,000€/$, no reason minded consumer would pay the same for eBook (or other digital services, like paid subscription websites).
Any opinions from You readers? If there was an say Scott/SG/Michel-catalogs available as eBooks for decent price (say 10-20€/$), how many of you would buy such? At least I would…
I agree completely. I own a pdf version of the Scott Classics Catalogue which I consult far more often on my iPad than the hardcopy. (I particularly like being able to zoom in on images or complex listings of sets.) I would love to be able to purchase electronic copies of catalogs that I can’t justify the price or space of the printed versions for only occasional use.
@Bob… I do agree that PDF-files of stamp catalogs do make a good interim solution (and I do have/use lots of them; especially when on the road). But I honestly would have hoped publishers to issue something for eBooks this season. But obviously they don’t want my money, LOL.
Additionally, my humblest compliments to Jacques-Marie for translating this article to French. Merci beaucoup
Alas!…SG have their catalogue online, but it cost you(subscription) over £50.00 per year…comparing with the bulky five books, it’s really an advantage, and the price exceed well £ 200,00…LOL!!!
What I used to do…is to buy the books from the public libraries once they got the new editions, for a mere £5.00 the lot…again, LOL!
@Fred… I’ve been a subscriber of Michel and SG online catalogs for few years… I’ve recently come to conclusion to give up on both of them. Though they hold enormous potential, I’m honestly speaking quite annoyed with the slow pace of progress and constant issues they have. Sadly they are light years away from the quality and level of detail the print counterparts have… For the same money I pay for annual online access, I can easily get myself a printed catalog or two while waiting for things to mature.
The libraries “take away” shelves are superb source for old catalogs IMHO too
Your right, its the economics Keijo!!
I fear as collectors and therefore the main consumers of stamp publications, including catalogues, we are not enough of a “market” or incentive for the publishers to move to new media, after all we will continue to “consume” their product, however they publish it; and to a degree whatever they want to charge for it. I am also a purchaser from my library when their new editions arrive and of a new Swiss (my favourite collection sphere) catalogue about every 4-5 years.
Hi Keijo.
I see following problems with migration from hard copy to full “e-book”.
1. Money. Definitely hard copy can give more money to the publisher. (but – only if the quality of e-version of catalogs will stay on current low quality). If publishers migrates all data from hard-copy to e-version without loosing in quantity/quality and provide to the end-users good scheme of purchasing and subscription for the catalogues – then publishers can make more money on e-versions of catalogues than on hard-copies.
2. Some “conservative” mind of collectioners. A lot of us do not like new stuffs and want to buy new 2.5 kg books instead of downloading e-version
3. I’m from Russia and even if I see some progress in numbers of e-readers that the people here have, but simple Pocket PC is about 300-400$ USD here. And if the salary for most people is about 1000$ then it’s a problem to by such stuff.
My vision:
Ideally the Publisher should provide NOT e-version of a catalogue, but a services which includes:
1. Good stamps’ quantity
2. Good quality of information and pictures (HDR)
3. Good price (lower than hard-copy)
4. Frequent updates
5. other features, e.g.:
5.1. RSS from some philately news sites
5.2. Subscription to stamp-related articles.
5.3. Search/filtering in content
5.4. Integration with e-bay and other bla-bla-bla
If so – then I will by such service.
Maridena,
I agree that publishing catalogs as service (or SaS/Software as Service) could be a solid alternative for eBooks. But the current online catalogues are simply NOT “ready”. IMHO they fail somewhat miserably with item 2 (”Good quality of information and HDR-pictures”); and for what I’ve heard, I would definitely not expect nothing but slow progress in upcoming years too… Thus I’m placing my hope on eBooks. In the end, converting existing print publications to eBooks should be somewhat easy job (technically speaking; as all the assets are already in required digital formats). All that is required is some “good will” from publishers to do so.
I think the main reason for which many catalogue editors dont release more electronic versions of their products is that these are much more easier to copy ilegally than printed ones.
Hi Pablo,
IMHO this is one of those gray areas, where book publishers have got only bad options available.
Yes, eBook-formats are always under fire. Despite of some advanced (and sometimes not-so-advanced) DRM (Digital Rights Managements)-solutions, there will always be people who try to pass-by the system, and create illegal copies. It’s just a fact of life in current 24/7/365 tech-lifestyle.
But, a printed book is no better IMHO… Essentially any modern photocopier can be used to reproduce any printed book as PDF (just cut away the spine/binding from the book, insert the loose pages to autofeeder, and select output as PDF-option. Then just wait some time as the machine scans everything automatically.
PS. Nice to hear from You again… It’s been long since last time…
Keijo, once again you have started an excellent conversation.
My addition: I want a catalog in “e book” format.
Thanks
Dell from California
I came upon this site Dec 2011 and would like to inform your interested readers that a stamp catalogue does exist in full color as an eBook. If your readers went to http://www.lulu.com and did a search for Walsh or go to
http://www.lulu.com/spotlight/jmwalsh you will see the first all color stamp ebook stamp catalogues. Two are done. Sent as info as the readers seem to be asking for that. Thanks, John from Newfoundland, Canada.
Good conversation! I read recently that Scott had converted their catalogue to a database format. I would hope that the next step would be to publish an app based on that data. Not necessarily an ebook but an app.
I think this would solve many problems. It is much tougher to copy (pirate) an app. They could charge a subscription fee and provide updates for the fee. If the app allowed the user to mark up the catalogue entry it could double as an inventory program too.
The cost of printing and distribution of paper is a waste. The value to collectors is the new prices, new issues, consistent numbering, identification details and “search ability”. So charge for those things and distribute as simply as possible.
Right now I don’t pay or a catalogue (library only). But I’d pay $100 per year for a good app if it was for worldwide issues. That’s a new revenue source for the catalogue publisher.
AFAIK, that’s what’s Amos is trying to do… Few weeks back Chad Snee (editor in Chief at Amos) tweeted that they’ve started doing final inhouse testing for the upcoming Scott catalog app.
Hi Keijo-san
Auf Wiedersehen, Herr Gutenberg would make a great heading for this post. Very funny!
@William (hadashi)…
I would not bury Mr. Gutenberg yet… The problem with iEverything is that once you run out of electricity (and network), the readers / devices become what they truly are: pieces of dead plastic. We had an ~12 hour power outage yesterday ( and some parts of Finland have been without electricity several days now) due to winter storm, and I can say that most of that time I spent reading traditional (printed) books in candlelight.
Keijo …what a nice thing! candlelights …so romantic… !LOL!
Hi,
I was reading the latest Linn’s Stamp News and there was an article about the 2013 Scotts Catalogue. In it, the editor of the Scott Catalogue wrote that:
“The coming year will bring some exciting new developments for Scott, including the launching of digital versions of the catalogs that will be available via the Apple iPad and iPhone.”
Interesting times. I hope the app is affordable, as I’d be willing to try Version 1.
@Mark… I agree, that this year will be very interesting… What worries me a bit is the fact that with AppStore apps 30% of sales revenue goes to Apple and rest to owner (in this case Amos). So likely it won’t be as affordable as many collectors wish (especially as I doubt Amos doesn’t want to price digital version too attractively).
@Keijo I fear you are right. So long as Amos obsesses over losing revenue from existing customers, they’ll miss out on the bigger opportunity — getting new recurring revenue from brand new customers, like me.
I’ve only ever purchased used catalogues from our local library. I’ve never sent a dollar to Amos Press. But I’m willing to give Amos $100 per year for a digital version of their product (where the cost to “print” a new copy is nearly $0.)
My bet is there are more collectors like me than traditional print catalogue buyers (that buy their paper catalogues every year) that would make the switch to digital.
And as you mentioned earlier, Amos has an opportunity to win over customers of Michel or Gibbons if they can create a truly useful digital app.
I’m excited to watch this unfold.
Mark
@Mark… Not so long ago I read that Schwaneberger (=publisher of Michel) prints over 400,000 copies of catalogs each and every year; I would suspect the print numbers for Amos, SG and Yvert to be in the same ballpark. What I don’t know (but sure would like to know) is how many collectors use or would consider using digital products. I have a hunch that it’s pretty small bunch of “geeks” and other tech enthusiasts. So I do understand why catalog publishers move slowly with this. They definitely don’t want to break the ’sweet bubble’ they are living in.
Having read many of the comments and myself with a computer background of many years. I recently worked on a project regarding cataloges and moving them over to ebook/epub format.
IMO the current epub format does not lend itself to traditional catalogues with many graphics. Graphics chew up a lot of space and the epub standard was written with text books in mind. (i.e. flowing text) The current pdf standard still seems to work best on the new e-readers since they all support it without DRM. But Adobe also has a pdf DRM product. (works with most e-readers but Amazon Kindle)
The idea of a database and an app sounds interesting but as many of you have pointed out maybe cost prohibitive. DVD’s are passe, I have an old set of scott that I don’t use that much anymore and found the old cataloge from the library just as good.
So I think you may have to wait a long time to see a cataloge in epub format because of the size issue. Just to give you an example one of our pdf files are about 40MB the same in epub was over 120MB, due to the graphics and the way epub handles them.
Andrew
400,000!!! Wow! I had no idea. I would’ve guessed 20,000 tops.
I see more and more collectors online, regardless of age. But you are likely correct — it’s one thing to comment on a blog but using an app is another thing entirely.
@Andrew:
Hmm… Storage are data transfer are pretty cheap these days, so I doubt if that could (or should)be so much of an issue.
@Mark:
Well, Michel does issue much more catalogs than Scott. I think there are roughly 70 different catalogs if all the specialized ones are included. So it would make only 5,000+ copies per catalog if spread even. But likely bestsellers (like regular Deutchland-catalog) sell far more whereas specialized volumes (like Zeppelin-catalog) sell in far less quantities.
Keijo,
You are correct in that storage and bandwidth are not expensive today, so an app with a database is the most likely candidate I could foresee, however the real cost to you and me will be the publisher charges.
As for the epub standard it does not lend itself to graphics, so seeing that on your e-reader is not currently available from vendors like Apple who at maximum will send an ebook of 20Mb or less. You would have to divide a catalog into small epubs for it to work. You have the same result with mobi as well.
Cheers
Andrew
The basic problem is that stamp collectors like ourselves tend to be an older lot. You don’t see the kids (anyone younger than myself @51) collecting stamps. They are the electronic-gadget age. I enjoy the feel of a printed book in my hands. Another problem I’ve found is that I can’t make notes on an electronic version. The new Scotts I have is notorious for missing things (like the “see #xxx for the German Historical Sites, Spanish Carlos heads and ad infinitum). I make pencil notes to refresh my memory. If any of the catalog companies could make an integrated application, with inventory and catalog together to let me know if I have that stamp, well that would be another matter. P.S. I made an order from PostLynx, let you know how it turns out.
As a 24 year old collector, there is nothing more frustrating than having to pay out vast amounts of money for catalogues which quickly go out of date.
Thankfully eBay and the like have solved that problem quite a bit, but I would love Stanley Gibbons to produce a decent quality database and app to keep track of it. Maybe they should leave it for on PC’s rather than tablets, as many older people have computers but not likely an iPad!
It would also be much easier for collectors of thematics to keep up to date with new issues if the database contained within it a list of subjects… they haven’t released any thematic catalogues in many years and don’t seem to have plans to – it is frustrating as a thematic collector.
Is it possible to download a pay catalog that is in spreadsheet form to facilitate inventorying, or one that can be copied and pasted into a worksheet? it would make inventorying much easier because one could simply tic a column entry to indicate one has the stamp and use the count function to tally the total, etc.
@Rick… Sadly anything as such does not exist legally. Technically speaking it would be a very efficient alternative, and simple to produce. However, all the catalogue publishers “refuse” to produce anything as such in order to protect their digital assets/properties. Sigh.
Some online catalogues / tools (by Michel and Stanley Gibbons) have limited export features (CSV for Excel) for have/want lists.
Interesting that they continue to resist this. To my naive thinking, it seems technologically and practically possible to find a way to protect their property, and they could charge a significant premium above the current catalog price for a “combo package”. The spreadsheet would have a security feature like computer software. Oh, well.
Well, Michel has just launched their eBooks at http://www.briefmarken.de/ebooks
Sadly the prices are quite far from being compelling: 99€ for the two-part Michel Deutchland Special catalog, or 65€ if bought as single editions. True, it’s slightly cheaper than buying the print catalog, but still WAY TOO MUCH for eBook IMHO. And to add salt to wounds, Michel has decided to provide these using 5 year subscription that limits to online-viewing only (no download possibility). So after 5 years you loose access to books unless you pay again… They’ve made pretty much everything possible to milk every penny from the poor collectors
Anyway, below is a summary what each major catalog publisher is now providing (and at what price):
Michel
eBooks:
- 5 year subscription; about 65€ per title
- works on all devices (including PC) that supports (free) Flash Player plugin. However, Flash is not available on iPad and iPhone.
- Content always downloaded online (no local storage/download); requires constant online connection.
Online catalog:
- Subscription based, 18€/month
- Works on any web browser with Internet connection
Scott
eBooks:
- one time fee, about 30$ per title
- works on iDevices only.
- content downloaded to user device on first time; works offline
Online catalog:
- n/a
Stanley Gibbons
eBooks:
- one time fee, about £35 per title
- works on iDevices only.
- content downloaded to user device on first time; ; works offline
Online catalog:
- Subscription based, £25 per year.
- Works on any web browser with Internet connection
Yvert:
eBooks:
- n/a
Online catalog:
- Subscription based, 99€ per year.
- Works on any web browser with Internet connection
I think that the utilization of digital formats in the stamps catalogues is the future. Certainly my bid for contributing solutions to the collectors has been clear and it is possible to see in my web page:
[LINK REMOVED AS IT VIOLATES COPYRIGHTS]
In spite of the fact that I am sure that always there will be persons who try to spoil the system and to create illegal copies. It is a fact that in current technology it is necessary to possess it and to expect from the user for positive action in order that this type of pages has a future and let all the collectors to have benefits.
@mendiguren68…
I agree with you that digital formats are the future. Michel, SG, Scott and other catalog publishers are rolling out digital versions of their catalogs the same pace they push out the printed ones. And I fear that some day in (not so distant) future, we’ll see the end of printed catalogs.
As far as piracy goes, I think it is to some degree an industry created issue The higher the price of product, the higher the temptation to get an illegal copy will become.