Hi all, long time no update. I’ve finished the 2nd Odd Thomas book (due this Halloween), and have several projects in the works, but right now I’d like to show you all a website my friends and I have been working on for the past few years. Heck, from all the hype about ebooks and the iPad these past few months, I might even presume to call it a new business-model for book publishing.
The site is called Bento Comics, and there’s a write-up here on Robot6, with a encouraging comment by well-known superhero writer Kurt Busiek (wow). “Bento” is the Japanese word for a mix-and-match lunchbox, and that’s exactly what our site does. Read on.
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What is BentoComics.com?
BentoComics.com is a Print-On-Demand site. What “print-on-demand” means is that YOU, the buyer, gets to choose a book you want online, print one (or more) copies at a book printing company, then have the books mailed to you.
Instead of having to go to the bookstore to buy your books (or at online bookstores like Amazon.com), you can get both printing and mailing done online. So in summary:
- Read comics on the site for free
- Collect these comics into your own personalised book,
- Print a single (or more) copy of your book, and have it
- Delivered to your doorstep
BentoComics.com piggybacks off Lulu.com, a printing company that specialises in self-publishing. The technology to print a single book at a low cost already exists, and Lulu.com takes it up a notch by printing your one (or two or whatever) copies, and mailing it directly to you.
How much does it cost? Is it expensive?
It’s actually quite cheap. It’s approximately USD$13 for a 170-page book, personalised by you, plus an additional US$4 for shipping (USD$8 for international). Both Lulu and Bento Comics make a profit off this pricing model. Lulu accepts both Paypal and credit cards as payment.
Here’s a table of costs:
- a 32 page book will cost $7.78
- a 64 page book will cost $9.06
- a 100 page book will cost $10.50
- a 150 page book will cost $12.50
- a 200 page book will cost $14.50
- a 300 page book will cost $18.50
- a 400 page book will cost $22.50
- a 500 page book will cost $26.50
- a 600 page book will cost $30.50
- a 740 page book will cost $36.10
Once you register at BentoComics.com and Lulu.com, you can start compiling and ordering your books. Once you place an order, it’ll take 3-5 days to print, and then it’ll be delivered to you. I live in Sydney, Australia and it took 1 week for me to order and receive the book – not saying this short delivery time is guaranteed, but that’s my experience.
Are there e-books available?
Yes, I made e-books for all my stories. Right now I only have 1 story, called Ten Years Ago Today on BentoComics.com, but I have a total of 8 other stories chosen from queeniechan.com that I want to make available for print/download, and I’ll be putting up a story every weekend for the next 2 months. You can download the e-book for that here – it’s a link on the right-hand side of the page, where I say “e-book available in .epub”. Feedback welcome.
The e-book is DRM-free, and in ePub format, which means it’s readable on all PCs and e-readers EXCEPT the Kindle. I want to charge USD$0.99 for the e-book (like iTunes), but right now the system isn’t yet in place, so you can download it for free.
If you have only a PC or Mac, and no e-reader of any kind, you can still read e-books on your PC. Here’s 2 programs you can download: The Adobe Acrobat eReader, and the Barnes and Noble eReader. They’re both not that great at reading JPEG files, but they will do for the time being.
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Why Print-On-Demand books? Isn’t e-books the Way of the Future?
E-books will undoubtedly be huge, but to think that they’ll completely replace paper books is as wrong as the idea of the “paperless office” circa 1997. Books, as media, are different to music and movies.
The idea of a “book” has been around for as long as writing has, whether it’s papyrus scrolls, clay tablets or animal skins. Conversely, what we understand to be “music” and “movies” refer specifically to storage mediums – technological devices that can store and retrieve experiences for playback. This is a strictly 20th Century invention. Unlike books, music and movies have always been intangible experiences. So when people go on about the “feel” and “texture” of a book, and “curling up with a book in bed”, they’re talking about something REAL, and for some people, something irreplaceable.
But then Bento Comics isn’t about whether e-books or paper books are better.
It’s About Giving Readers a CHOICE
There’s no reason why e-books and paper books can’t co-exist together. I can think of many books on my bookshelf that I love, and can’t live without the paper version of (I’d like the e-book version too). Conversely, I can think of many books on the same shelf that I merely like, and given the choice would have just bought the cheaper e-book version. Certainly, whether I want an e-book version, or a paper book version of something (or both) – should be up to ME to decide?
So, what Bento Comics is about, is content as both service and product, as opposed to the old idea, of just content as product. Content refers to what the consumer is buying – a Beatles song, a crime thriller novel, a vampire movie. Pre-Internet, it was about packaging the content in a particular way (which the consumer DOESN’T get to choose), and then sending the 12-track CD, 700-page thriller with a red, black and blue cover, and a 2-DVD-pack-with-extras to the appropriate distribution channels. I see that as “content as product”.
Content as service, as you may imagine, is about not just about the delivery channel (I buy my books at Kinokuniya, sometimes Amazon.com), but about the FORM the product comes in. Maybe I’ll buy THIS book as a normal paper book, and buy this other book in e-book format. Maybe today I’ll buy a book online and get it mailed to me, while tomorrow I get some other book when I go by Kinokuniya. Providing the customer with all these formats and choices, is in itself, a SERVICE (At least that’s how I see it).
If you want to find out more, I suggest going to the About Page, or better yet, making an account at Bento Comics and testing the system out yourself. We’ve tested it and it works as it’s supposed to, and we’re all interested in feedback.