????每當(dāng)我撰文論述電子書(shū)業(yè)務(wù)時(shí)——尤其是在美國(guó)司法部（the Justice Department）對(duì)蘋(píng)果公司（Apple）及五家圖書(shū)出版商提出反壟斷訴訟的背景情況下，總會(huì)有人留言稱(chēng)，電子書(shū)定價(jià)過(guò)高，因?yàn)殇N(xiāo)售電子書(shū)的出版商其實(shí)并不用承擔(dān)紙質(zhì)圖書(shū)印刷和發(fā)行通常所需要支付的任何費(fèi)用。

????當(dāng)然，電子書(shū)不會(huì)憑空從石頭縫里蹦出來(lái)，但我從來(lái)沒(méi)有看到過(guò)哪篇文章合理地闡述過(guò)出版一本電子書(shū)的實(shí)際成本。因此，我很高興地在最新一期的《紐約客》雜志（the New Yorker）上發(fā)現(xiàn)，肯?奧萊塔寫(xiě)了一篇精辟的文章——《紙質(zhì)追蹤》（Paper Trail），對(duì)電子書(shū)業(yè)務(wù)進(jìn)行了闡述。其中有一段是這樣寫(xiě)的：

????“電子書(shū)的生產(chǎn)成本比紙質(zhì)書(shū)便宜，每本電子書(shū)在生產(chǎn)成本上大約可以便宜20％，因?yàn)殡娮訒?shū)不需要紙張、印刷、運(yùn)輸、倉(cāng)儲(chǔ)等成本，而且也消除了未售出書(shū)冊(cè)的退還成本——這是一項(xiàng)重要的開(kāi)支，因?yàn)橛?0％至50％的書(shū)最終會(huì)退給出版商。但電子書(shū)同時(shí)也會(huì)產(chǎn)生一些額外的費(fèi)用：維護(hù)電腦服務(wù)器、監(jiān)控盜版、對(duì)舊書(shū)進(jìn)行數(shù)字化處理等。此外，出版商還得付錢(qián)給作家和編輯，以及支付租金及管理費(fèi)用，更不用說(shuō)精裝版圖書(shū)的印刷、分銷(xiāo)和倉(cāng)儲(chǔ)費(fèi)用，而精裝書(shū)仍然在出版商的銷(xiāo)售中占據(jù)絕大部分的份額。”

????電子書(shū)相比紙質(zhì)書(shū)在成本上節(jié)省的20％似乎并不是很大一筆錢(qián)，尤其是考慮到亞馬遜（Amazon）一直在以14.99美元到4.99美元的價(jià)格銷(xiāo)售電子版圖書(shū)，有時(shí)甚至免費(fèi)提供，而這些圖書(shū)的精裝版售價(jià)卻高達(dá)30美元。

????考慮到大多數(shù)圖書(shū)的成本超過(guò)了出版商的銷(xiāo)售收入，這種計(jì)算就變得更加復(fù)雜了。亞馬遜的杰夫?貝索斯認(rèn)為，目前傳統(tǒng)出版模式的浪費(fèi)令人窩火，而他的圖書(shū)出版模式對(duì)于讀者（降低了圖書(shū)價(jià)格）及希望成為作家的人（消除了作者和讀者之間的“把關(guān)人”）都更加高效、更加出色。

????正如奧萊塔指出……

????然而，傳統(tǒng)出版模式對(duì)作家而言具有一些優(yōu)勢(shì)，尤其是在出版商發(fā)揮類(lèi)似風(fēng)險(xiǎn)投資公司的作用時(shí)更是如此。作家向某出版商成功推銷(xiāo)出版一本書(shū)的建議時(shí)，他會(huì)收到一筆預(yù)付版稅，它有助于作家負(fù)擔(dān)相應(yīng)的調(diào)查研究及寫(xiě)作的費(fèi)用。這些預(yù)付版稅大多從來(lái)沒(méi)有收回過(guò)。相當(dāng)于暢銷(xiāo)書(shū)養(yǎng)著非暢銷(xiāo)書(shū)。光景好的年份里，出版商仍能夠獲得微薄的利潤(rùn)，從而可以讓更多的作家通過(guò)獲得出版商提供的預(yù)付版稅來(lái)冒險(xiǎn)啟動(dòng)新的寫(xiě)作項(xiàng)目，也就是說(shuō)，這種模式養(yǎng)活了一大批職業(yè)作家。如果是在一個(gè)更高效的環(huán)境里，出版商只會(huì)付錢(qián)給那些能寫(xiě)出暢銷(xiāo)書(shū)的作家，而很少會(huì)付錢(qián)給那些寫(xiě)不出暢銷(xiāo)書(shū)的作家，這對(duì)于嚴(yán)肅的讀者和作家而言都是一個(gè)令人憂慮的情形。據(jù)Taleist網(wǎng)站最近進(jìn)行的一項(xiàng)調(diào)查顯示，在所有自費(fèi)出版的作家當(dāng)中，有半數(shù)作家每年從寫(xiě)作中賺取的收入還不到500美元。楊表示，如果出版商沒(méi)有錢(qián)向作家支付預(yù)付版稅的話，“我們擁有的優(yōu)質(zhì)圖書(shū)數(shù)量會(huì)更少。它對(duì)作家的影響堪稱(chēng)巨大。”

????作為曾在印刷及電子出版業(yè)工作過(guò)的人，我認(rèn)為奧萊塔的這篇文章對(duì)電子書(shū)戰(zhàn)爭(zhēng)雙方提供了一個(gè)非常公平的描述。訂閱了《紐約客》雜志的讀者可以點(diǎn)擊此處獲得這篇文章的PDF版本。

????翻譯：iDo98

????Whenever I write about the e-book business -- especially in the context of the Justice Department's antitrust suit against Apple (AAPL) and five book publishers -- someone in the comment stream invariably suggests that e-books are vastly overpriced because the publishers who sell them incur none of the usual costs of printing and distribution.

????E-books don't write or edit themselves, of course, but I've never seen a good accounting of what it actually costs to publish one. So I was gratified to find, high up in "Paper Trail," Ken Auletta's smart piece about the e-book business in the current issue of the New Yorker, this paragraph:

????"E-books are cheaper to produce, by about twenty per cent per book, because they do away with the cost of paper, printing, shipping, and warehousing. They also eliminate returns of unsold books—a significant expense, since thirty to fifty per cent of books are returned. But they create additional costs: maintaining computer servers, monitoring piracy, digitizing old books. And publishers have to pay authors and editors, as well as rent and administrative overhead, not to mention the costs of printing, distributing, and warehousing bound books, which continue to account for the large majority of their sales.

????Twenty percent doesn't seem like much of a savings, especially considering that Amazon (AMZN) has been selling electronic versions of books that cost $30 in hardback for anywhere from $14.99 to $4.99 to $0.00

????The accounting gets even more complicated when you consider that most books cost publishers more than they earn. Amazon's Jeff Bezos argues that traditional publishing is infuriatingly wasteful, and that his model is far more efficient and better for both readers (by lowering prices) and would-be authors (by eliminating the "gatekeepers" that prevent them from reaching readers).

????As Auletta points out ...

????The traditional model has advantages for authors, though, particularly in publishers' function as venture-capital firms. When an author sells a book proposal to a publisher, he receives an advance against royalties, which helps underwrite research and writing. Most of these advances are never earned back. But books that sell well support the ones that don't. In a good year, this earns the publishers a modest profit, and it allows more authors to take risks in starting new projects—which is to say, it supports a class of professional writers. In a more efficient world, publishers would pay authors who write best-selling books and rarely pay those who don't, an alarming prospect for most serious readers and writers. According to a recent survey by the Web site Taleist, half of all self-published authors make less than five hundred dollars a year from their writing. If publishers don't have the money to pay advances, Young says, "we're going to have fewer books of quality. The impact on authors could be huge."

????As someone who has worked in print and electronic publishing, I thought Auletta's piece offered a pretty even-handed account of both sides of the e-book wars. If you have a subscription to theNew Yorker, it's available as a pdf here.