Why do publishers still issue hardbacks? (2018) | Hacker News Reader

Why do publishers still issue hardbacks? (2018)

theguardian.com

66 pointssamclemens86 comments

"The hardback is a mark of quality"

I disagree. A major mark of quality (other than the writing) is the paper it's printed on, and the publishers often pick the poor, yellowing, easy-tearing newsprint paper, almost newsprint quality.

Then they stick a hardback cover on it and sell it for £££.

Come on publishers, if I pay decent dosh for a book, hardback or soft, don't skimp on this.

-Assuming you're in the UK, I'd like to draw your attention to the Folio Society - granted, their selection is very limited, but their titles are a joy to behold - proper, heavy paper, sewn spines, commissioned illustrations...

They do international shipping too (or used to). I was a member for a number of years and resided outside of the UK.

They still ship to the US at least, I've ordered from them recently.

-Oh, they most definitely do, it was poorly worded on my part - my thought was that their selection of titles is rather UK-centric, though I do believe it has broadened in later years.

(I live in Norway, but have been a Folio Society regular for a decade and change, now - books published in Norwegian are rather expensive, so the premium (in the international market) price of Folio Society books is still quite comparable to that of a Norwegian hardcover release - but the comparison ends there.)

Consider my attention drawn - thanks! (also @Nerada too)

Other good stuff:

- Many university presses, especially if you've heard of the university.

- Library of America for works by American authors in English. They're dense (bible-type paper, usually 2+ novels per volume) but more readable than a lot of editions that go for density (think all those unreadable, useless single-volume Shakespeares out there for comparison). Very well made. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade is the French equivalent of this, in purpose and in form, if you read French.

- Limited Editions Club and Heritage Press, which reprinted LEC books in somewhat lower quality (and usually somewhat smaller, too). HP can be hit-or-miss—watch out for any with (faux) leather on the binding. All the cloth-bound stuff is great. Often have great illustrations and such included. Big, heavy, Serious Business editions for your Serious Business books. Their epics feel epic.

- Modern Library and Everyman are pretty OK. I especially like Everyman's little poets series, for nice single smallish volumes dedicated to individual poets that are a little easier to actually pick up and read through than some of the huge, more comprehensive collections out there. You've gotta watch translations from both ML and Everyman, though, as often they use older (public domain) translations for non-English works that are probably not what you'd choose, given your choice of any translation. Other times they're good, more recent ones. Just have to watch out.

- Norton Critical Editions are paperback but usually have excellent annotations and commentary. If you want something like the experience of reading a book in a course at a university and don't want extra books of commentary, lean toward these.

- Penguin Classics are paperback, but are often the only way to get a half-decent copy of all kinds of religious and mythological works—Eastern and Western—outside a handful of the most famous ones, without resorting to very expensive, very limited run academic press editions.

- Dover's like Penguin Classics but for older math and science books.

I've bought a shitload of books over the years and my advice to anyone starting out is to buy whatever you'll read. Something you don't mind abusing or writing in. Trade paperbacks are the sweet spot on this, for me, usually. Save the nice copies for books you love and for which you really want the ambiance of a nice edition. Worry more about annotations, introductions, appendices, and which translation you're dealing with than how the book looks, in most cases. For your easier genre fic or light business-related reading you're unlikely to re-read, just use an e-reader, or buy disposably-cheap used mass market paperbacks. If you love something you read there enough you want it on your shelf for re-reads and reference, you can always grab a paper copy later. That goes for other books, too—buy the LEC or LOA or some weird niche press ultra-nice goatskin-bound edition only after you already know you love a book.

If you're gonna buy paper genre fic before reading it, try to reserve most of that shelf space for short story collections (great to be able to grab off the shelf and just start reading, much nicer than in ebook format).

[EDIT] Loeb, if you read Latin or Greek or sometimes they're just the best edition of more obscure ancient works even if you don't read the original (they're all facing-page translations). Green Lion Press for very nicely-bound math books.

[EDI2] Don't, don't "collect" hardbacks of very popular books unless you re-read them all the time. You can go grab a bunch of Terry Goodkind or Stephen King hardbacks at thrift shops any day you want, for next to nothing. Don't waste space with them unless you read them all. The. Time. That's true to a lesser degree for most books—few are rare enough you can't just go find it some time later, at a reasonable price, if you pass on it today. Most aren't quite as ubiquitous and cheap as Stephen King novels, though :-)

I'd put a good word in for the NYRB series.

Also, the Library of America was modeled on the French Pléiade. I don't know where in the US you can count on finding these, but they are well printed.

This link will cost me dearly ...

I just checked a few examples, and the hardcover and paperback editions have consistently different weights and thickness that cannot be explained by just the cover.

To use a friend's book as an example:

Normal People (https://www.amazon.com/Normal-People-Novel-Sally-Rooney/dp/1...)

Paperback: 304 pages, 0.6 inches, 8.3 ounces

Hardcover: 288 pages, 1.0 inches, 14.7 ounces

The hardcover has fewer pages but is 70% thicker and 80% heavier. The other dimensions differ only slighty (5.7 x 8.6 vs 5.2 x 8)

I checked two other recent releases and this seemed somewhat consistent. And even if the weight difference is mostly the cover, I would tend to think the cost of material to correlate linearly with weight (as your accusation also implies). So you are getting about twice the weight for about twice the price[0]?

Printing costs are obviously only a fraction of the price. I wouldn't even be surprised if books were one of those goods where gross margins actually increase even when the price difference is lower than the increase in weight (the canonical examples are perfume and software).

Personally, I don't care too much about paper thickness. The far more relevant quality issue used to be acid, with paper degrading within a decade. Today's paper is good for a few hundred years, so it wins any competition with those hand-sewn, thick, artisanal "quality products" of previous eras.

[0] Incidentally, the hardcover I looked up above sells for $9.95 while the paperback is $17.00 (both new). Go figure!

I have different experience: it seems a trend that the books I'm interested in (note: not fiction) are first made for hardback, then just scaled down for paperback, resulting in pages that are too annoying to read. After a few paperbacks that I've hated, now if I see that the paperback has smaller dimensions but the same number of pages I am going to order hardback.

You're friends with Sally Rooney? Pretty cool. (Unless you just meant that this is a book your friend owns.)

> Then they stick a hardback cover on it and sell it for £££.

Traditional hardbacks (and collector-quality ones, even now) are made from pages sewn together in signatures, and will last for many, many readings. When the binding does get worn out, a new one can easily be put on.

However, the typical "hardback" you see in a bookstore today is basically just a paperback with thicker cardboard for the covers. The pages are held together (and the "binding" is held on) with a thin layer of glue, just like a paperback, rather than being properly sewn.

You're lucky if you get one reading out of one of those pieces of crap before it starts to fall apart in your hands.

They are simply not worth the money. Go with ebooks, or, if you absolutely must have paper, paperbacks. Otherwise you're getting ripped off.

It's painful to see so many examples of hallmarks of quality or even just signals of niche culture hollowed out and used as a facade on inferior products.

Sometimes it really does feel like late stage capitalism (especially MBAs) is gradually ruining much of the fruit it made plentiful. This pursuit of pennies sucks the soul out of anything it touches. There's value in lasting quality, and as I've gotten older I've learned to appreciate goods that reflect a respect for the art of the trades that produced them, like solid tools, or over-engineered appliances from decades past, where a little extra material is the difference between just out of warranty failure and indefinite use.

But I suppose the real problem that the average person doesn't notice and/or care.

Well, you might want to be careful what you wish for. "High-quality paper" is heavy.

In Korea, somehow every publisher decided books should use maximum quality paper, which is brightly white, looks supreme, and also so heavy that you could use them for upper body exercise.

E.g., this is how ASOIAF boxed set looks like in Korea: http://www.yes24.com/Product/Goods/11816241

(It doesn't help that they print each page with an inch margin, 150% line spacing, and fonts large enough for 70-year-olds without glasses. Sometimes I wonder if they're selling books by weight.)

That looks fine? Similar to a lot of paperbacks I see in the States.

I take exception to needing 11 books to contain a 5 book series, unless the Korean language is not very dense.

My English edition is five paperbacks, but these paperbacks run at about a thousand pages each. A 1000-page paperback is a major hassle to read (how do you comfortably hold it?) or carry around, and they seem to get damaged pretty quickly (the spine is a mess by the time you’ve finished reading). I’d prefer a larger number of thinner volumes.

That's the problem: somehow nobody sells a larger number of thinner volumes. You just get a larger number of books, each somehow being heavier than the original English volume.

Hangul was intentionally created to be the simplest script in the world to learn.

It's also reasonably dense, up to 3 letters can be packed in one square, compared to one and a half in latin.

I cannot stand brightly white paper - i had some books with it as a child and it was basically impossible to read in sun - contrast was blinding... it didn't help that some of those books had glossy paper.

The yellow-ish/brownish paper seems to be the least straining for eyes in my opinion.

This. I would gladly play a bit more for acid-free paperbacks that don’t turn yellow and brittle.

I am concerned what my current book collection will look like in 10-20 years, and for this reason have been considering hardbacks over paperbacks (which isn’t always better quality but there is some positive correlation there).

I collect a fair number of both American and UK edition of various books. The paper and glue quality of virtually all UK books, even limited/special editions, is just appalling. Even the worst American airport paperbacks are superior to nearly anything I've acquired from the UK.

I have been told this is "just the way things are done over there."

I hardly ever buy hardback books, but I think the paperback books are cheaper in the UK.

I had a long trip changing planes in Los Angeles followed by Heathrow, and I bought the second part of a trilogy in LAX, and the third part in LHR. The American edition is better quality, but was 50% more expensive than the UK/European edition.

A quick look on amazon.com vs amazon.co.uk gives the same impression, at least comparing the actual price (not the RRP).

In France the standard became de "livre de poche" edition, the "pocket-book". Fits well on shelves, kind of uniform format, softcover, so it is easier to read/transport, good paper quality.

I have grown with this being the standard and to me when I see US hardcover books at $50+ I don't understand it: it is bulky, hard to read in a cramped place like a subway (or toilets!) No two books are the same size or color and it is printed with so much spacing that it looks like kids books or the kind of dissertation formatting I used to do when the teacher asked for 20 pages and I only had 5 pages of material.

+1 for small book formats. As some who reads in the metro each morning, not having to carry around a hardback is nice.

I've never seen a non-textbook that was only available in hardcover. Has the lack of a lighter alternative ever been a problem for you?

I think it's that books, particularly hard backs, are in a pseudo-artwork/collectible category. There are times I've liked a paperback so much I bought the hard back and never opened it, just to have the "pretty" version on the shelf.

Yes, that's a weird thing. Some books seem to be vanity items. But even in that respect, I find the US format weird: all books are dissimilar and are harder to fit in typical furniture.

I do prefer the look of this: http://a52.idata.over-blog.com/2/25/73/36/Photos/Bibliothequ...

to the look of this:

https://www.archimag.com/sites/archimag.com/files/styles/art...

That's comparing books by a single publisher in what looks like a very specific series, with paperbacks from different publishers.

The former - the one you prefer - looks institutional to me, like something a hospital or childcare home would buy in bulk, at a discount, to provide reading material for the unfortunate inmates.

The latter has a lot more distinctiveness, and is chaotic since the book designs individually try to grab attention, so that they sell themselves in a bookshop. I don't particularly love the result, it's an artifact of how books have been sold over the past century, but it's preferable to the former by some distance. It's far easier to spot a book whose cover you know in the second style.

Penguin used to do that decades ago in the English speaking world -- their paperbacks were all the same with nothing more than the name of the author and the title on an orange background(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penguin_Books#/media/File:Imag...). But they've moved away from that except for intentionally "retro" editions.

> I think it's that books, particularly hard backs, are in a pseudo-artwork/collectible category.

On either the “artwork” or “collectible” front, the “pseudo” is an unnecessary modifier.

> softcover, so it is easier to read/transport

All books get damaged when being carried on a regular basis. Pocket books especially so, because pockets can be a fairly hostile environment for stiff card and a wad of paper. Say what you like about convenience, but the larger formats do lend themselves to being treated better. For convenience these days we have ereaders though.

I personally find hardbacks easier to read on the move, because you’re not battling with the cover as much or having to hold it awkwardly folded in half or something. But they are cumbersome and awkward to carry.

Thing is, you are supposed to carry a book the time it takes to read it. It just has to survive something like 2 or 3 weeks in transports.

The kind of books that only take you three weeks to read on public transport are usually garbage anyway.

Seriously, it is market segmentation. The hard cover comes out first at a massively inflated price to capture that segment of the market that is willing to pay a premium for "early" access. A while later, the softcover version is released for everyone else. Most people wait and buy the pocket book. The pocket book really is standard in North America as well.

I think it also comes from the Lang law, that prevents competition from different editions of the same book. In France, book are taxed at a much lower sales tax than other items but in exchange, there must be a single price for a given book (usually printed on the cover)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lang_Law

So a publisher has to choose the format they are going to sell and the single price for it. It made most publisher favor the most popular soft-cover pocket-book format.

Reference books, that need to be more durable, textbooks, photography books, comics, usually prefer hardcovers.

(Disclaimer: I have no specific opinion on this law, I think it lowered the price of books in France and reached its goal in making literature more accessible but I have no idea about its detrimental effects on the industry. I have never seen anyone violently oppose it)

Hardcover books are a pleasure to read, especially if they are smyth-sewn. You can identify a smyth-sewn book by placing it on a table and opening it in the middle. If the pages stay flat on top of each other, it is. The pages of a case-bound hardcover will separate from each other and stick out, and a softcover book will just close and fall over.

And that is exactly why hardcover books are a pleasure to read: it takes little effort to hold them open. A smyth-sewn hardcover you can pretty much put on a table and leave it alone while reading it. When reading softcovers, my fingers often get tired before my eyes do.

I bought a hardcover Le Guin anthology recently after balking a bit at the price. But then I was amazed to find it stayed open when I put it on a table and very happy to have paid the premium! Now, thanks to you, I know there is a name for this technology.

I always thought this was just price discrimination, extracting more surplus from readers by bifurcating them into two groups. Hardbacks are released first. Everyone who really wants it now needs to shell out more, even if they don't really care about the physical properties. Then the paperback is released to attract the more reluctant readers.

Same here. Very similar to a typical patronage model you see for digital media where there are some perks like early access, but rarely a major exclusive work.

That's exactly what it is.

Yes, and the article (sort-of) mentions that, but also a few additional reasons I wouldn't necessarily thought of.

Yes, this seems obvious to me. If it were not, then publishers would release the hardback and paperback at the same time and let readers choose the format they preferred, wouldn't they?

The question is, why would anyone want a paperback? It's clearly a format for disposable or travel books, which are easily replaced with a digital media. Paperback are not suitable for repeated readings and a really high-quality paperback, if there was one, would be prisewise on par with a hardcover anyway. I don't get paperbacks.

I might be strange with this opinion but I like paperbacks and the style of paper they're printed on in the UK. There's something about a well-worn book that I find quite appealing, with the folded corners or creased spine and the yellow-ish pages that are quite soft to the touch. A nice, dusty hardback comes close. They've been broken in already so you don't have as much trouble setting the book down without it closing back up on itself.

What I immensely dislike are the possible fake prints you get from Amazon. They're printed on bleach-white paper, same as you'd get for a textbook, sometimes even slightly glossy.

I completely agree, with the paper quality and all, except hardcovers are actually difficult for me to hold. I need the cover to flex a bit to get a grip on it and hold the pages in place - on a hardcover the pages will flex while the cover can't, slip out of my fingers, and I'll be interrupted reopening it where I was.

- much lighter - can fit more on bookshelves with less room / meant for apartments - some people don't like dust jackets or the cardboard feel - better for smaller hands - i personally love seeing the creases in the spine and other little hints of a well-read paperback; read a few of mine at least 50+ times and they're still hanging in there.

I have limited shelf space so I'd rather buy paperbacks 'cause they will take up less space. Yes, my books are there for aesthetic reasons but above all, they're in my shelves because I want to have access to them whenever I want to read them. The more I can cram my shelves, the better, presentation be damned.

Paperbacks are also easier to just read. I don't manhandle my books but I often read in unconventional positions: while in a crowded bus, or while laying down on my back before I sleep. It's just difficult to handle hardbacks in these situations. The "give" of a paperback's cover makes it ergonomic.

Being cheaper is a plus for my CS books too. Hardbound original versions are indeed prettier, maybe even easier to the eyes due to the paper. But for a book I would use in a semester and consult sparingly thereafter, the price of an original is unjustifiable.

I'd make an exception for Biology books where color is often important to the diagram. But I don't really have strong feelings on this as I did not major in Biology.

> Paperback are not suitable for repeated readings

Paperbacks wear and tear faster than hardbounds but to say they are not suitable for repeated readings is just exaggeration. Heck, my local library stocks up on paperbacks. If any book experiences repeated readings, it's got to be those in the library.

Also, from personal experience, wrapping your paperbacks in good enough plastic cover makes it last longer. I've "repaired" old paperbacks whose covers are all but ruined by reinforcing the weathered covers with index cards and thick plastic cover.

> really high-quality paperback, if there was one, would be prisewise on par with a hardcover anyway

Again, I disagree. For, say, a Harper Collins fiction the price difference between a paperback and a hardcover could range from anywhere to 40%-70% mark down. I specifically cite Harper Collins (and subsidiaries) because I'm really hard pressed to find a significant difference between their hardbounds and paperbacks. Obviously, the size and the binding differs (duh!) but other than that everything compares: the quality of the paper, the legibility of the print, the illustrations, etc.

I would agree, but somehow ebooks cost same or more than paperback books... and they also come full of DRM.

Not to mention licensing nightmares - i wanted to buy one ebook in english.. and i couldn't because someone else had rights to distribution in UK, so i couldn't order US ebook as i was from europe. To make matters worse - UK publisher/rightholder/whatever had no plans to even release an ebook.

Format-shifting is allowed in USA copyright law, iTunes even facilitates it (it's not allowed in UK, it was briefly allowed). So, presumably a company could format-shift a copyrighted book too. Then customers could choose paper weight, cover style, binding type, etc., or just have an ebook with no DRM?

This is it for me. If I'm going to buy a book, I'm not going to buy DRM, so my choices end up being paperback or hardcover. I prefer to read paperback because it's more portable, so that's what I end up buying.

If ebooks without DRM were available, I'd probably buy a lot of them. However, DRM drastically reduces the value of an ebook for me, so they'll have to drastically reduce the price of an ebook for me to buy (or maybe have a reasonable rental option). Until then, I'll buy paperbacks and restrict my ebook reading to my library and copyright-free titles.

This is only tangential to the matter of media, it's a problem of distribution.

In such case one could buy a paperback and make an ebook, or, you know, ask the web to "produce" you one. I would go one step further and recommend this method even if an ebook is available but DRM'ed.

Re: "not suitable for repeated readings"

I have seen this sentiment repeated elsewhere and this thread, and I feel compelled to ask what atrocities are you folks committing to your paperback books on a daily basis that they can only be read once before they are evidently turning to dust in the wind?

I regularly check out paperback books from my library which have not only withstood dozens of readers before me, but also the automated sorting machines that my library chain (Queens NY) uses, as well as regular shipment between different libraries. Despite all of this, most of these books are still entirely readable and some of them honestly look pretty good for their usage.

There seem to be a lot of people in this thread who value books primarily as an art medium for filling up bookshelves, and I'm happy that they get enjoyment from that, but the point of getting a paperback book is the ability to read a book, take in its content once or twice, maybe lend it to some companions, and then move on with your life without worrying about the proper conditions under which to store paper for archival purposes.

I guess a lot of people commit the unpardonable crime (tongue firmly in cheek) of folding the paperbacks open .. no wonder they don't last

Even if you'd fold them open to the point they almost break and individual pages get loose, it still does not yield the book unreadable. I've read books like that. No, it's not exactly the best experience, but as long as all pages are there and in order then I still don't really see it as a major problem, there's already enough thrash in the world.

(not addressed toyou, but don't feel like making separate comments and it in agreement with OP): Likewise for the yellow pages problem another commenter mentions. If it's just the color the only real effect is, I think, a bit less contrast between the letters and background. I seriously wonder if this has an actual effect on reading. I get that if you somehow attach, for whatever reason, value to paper being white, you consider yellow paper as less valueable. But imo this is in most cases purely artificial value: for reading the content matters way more than the medium. Those hundreds of years old yellow books do have value because of their content, and are perfectly readable.

Agreed.

Any book I've purchased new - either paperback or hard cover - after I've read it is virtually indistinguishable from the new item state.

Folding corners, breaking the spine, using it as a sandwich plate / umbrella / fly swatter -- these are things I can not abide.

What is harder for me to understand is why do they still use softback. Whatever I buy - I want it to be as heavy-duty as possible. Whenever I can choose between paperback an hardback I'm always buying a hardback unless the price difference is too serious. I don't even see how do softbacks make any sense to exist today when you can get an electronic book whenever weight and production cost are among your major concerns.

I've had a few books disintegrate in my hands. I was the last one reading them because the pages would come off as I turned them. Those damned paperbacks.

If I want a truly disposable book I can read the electronic version.

The simple answer is that is what most people buy. For some types of books—uncomplicated genre texts—ebooks have a significant market share, but for much nonfiction they don’t.

Funny, I find softback more durable. Hardback books seem “brittle”. Their rigidity makes me more likely to separate the binding from the cardboard shell and “break” the book, which never happens with my softcover copies.

I would love to buy ebooks, but they're riddled with DRM, which makes me feel like I'm renting instead of buying, so I just don't. Finding DRM-free ebooks is pretty rare, so I stick to paperbacks, especially since they're often similarly priced.

If I could reliably get DRM-free ebooks, I'd buy a ton of them.

You probably already know this, but just in case: you can trivially strip the DRM from Kindle books using the free Calibre software.

I stopped buying physical books for most of what I read after my last move, but I missed having books around as decoration, conversation starters, and things to loan or for guests to read. And I didn't want to have a bookshelf that reflected only what I read decades ago. So now I've decided that for anything I read that I think is among the best I've read, that I'd unconditionally recommend to anyone, I go buy as nice a physical copy as I can find. This keeps me from having to lug around books that I'm not especially proud of, and leaves me with a wonderfully compact bookshelf full of things I genuinely love.

"Hardbacks are also more profitable for publishers: they will often sell at twice the price of their paperback equivalent but do not cost twice as much to produce."

That was a mistake of the print-on-demand machine enthusiasts. They generated disposable paperbacks. E-readers ate that business. Now, a machine that prints and binds good hardbacks on demand - that might be useful.

If I need to put a hardcover book down for a moment, I can leave it open on a table or desk. Paperbacks won't stay open like that.

This is particularly annoying if I need to copy or reference something from a book on a separate device of piece of paper.

Same reason vinyl outsells CDs? If you just want to consume the content, there are cheaper choices, but for something you want to save and make a statement with, hardbacks are superior.

I only ever buy print in hardcover.

The last paragraph sums it up well; I'm almost solely digital now, but if there's something I particularly enjoy, I'll hunt for the hardcover.

If I'm buying fiction from an author I know and like, that I think I'd like to last for decades (and maybe leave to my children one day) I'll buy hardcover. That's maybe half of my fiction purchases.

For authors or books I'm unsure of, or just trashy stuff, I'll buy Kindle.

For technical books, I'll usually try to buy non-DRM PDF or eBook from the author, or failing that, a paperback.

I periodically (like, once a year or so) try to strip the DRM from my Kindle collection and back it up, but I basically assume that they could disappear at any time, so I don't trust them for anything I consider important.

I used to use an iPad2 for reading my Kindle books, but it's too slow to open the collection now (since I have a few hundred Kindle books). I'll likely get a Kindle reader of some sort one day, but for now I just read them on my phone most of the time.

Curious, do you find iBooks (Apple Books) on the iPad2 any faster at opening books or scrolling lists of books? Or is it about the same as the Kindle app?

I don't have anywhere near the same number of items in my iBooks app (only a few PDFs actually).

Once a book is open, it's ok, but it just took 40s to open the app. That actually seems a little quicker than it has been, so maybe Amazon has done some work on the app.

As book author the royalty on hardcover books were higher compared to the softcover books. But still the ebooks were the better deal as they gave the highest royalty. Personally, I enjoy buying nice hardcover books. The Folio Society books are gorgeous

I know a of relatives who only buy hardbacks -- even if all they're reading is one-read genre stuff.

Myself, I tend to buy paperback, read and then donate. If the book was good and I want to keep it for my personal collection. I track down a hardcover copy.

As Hyphen Press explain, hardbacks used invariably to be bound properly, but now they are often simply paperbacks between boards.¹ Signalling alone as above is the correct explanation. Cloth books can have practical advantages, such as the possibility of rebinding, but modern hardbacks mostly lack them.

1. https://hyphenpress.co.uk/journal/article/bookbinding_survey

Hardback books seem like a magnet for collectors (hoarders) they know they could more conveniently get the book as an ebook or from the library but they are buying them primarily as an item to store on a shelf. I have seen people buy books they don't even intend to read simply because the hardback is well decorated and the edge of the pages is gold.

Perhaps they think the sight of a large bookshelf full of books they never read makes them look smarter. They are probably right as well.

Why disparage collectors by conflating them with hoarders?

I purchase books both to read and to collect if they are well-made pieces of art.

It seems you have something against collecting such things based on how you frame your comments though. I personally do not understand the desire to disparage another person because you do not see value in collecting books.

You are correct. I am critical of the practice of collecting items that have no continued use to the owner and would be better off sold or gifted to a new owner who could get more use out of it.

I will admit though that they can serve as art and part of the room decoration which is a valid usecase.

I'm mostly digital but i recently snatched a paperback... which reminded me I'm growing old because the font was too small for me :)

So I guess in the future I'll get more hardbacks instead of less. They tend to use larger fonts, and sometimes (if the paper isn't crap) even have better contrast.

This depends on the book (or perhaps the publisher).

For example, I just bought the Illuminatus Trilogy in one cheap paperback, and it’s got a terrible typeface, it looks like a smeared typewriter.

But all other books I’ve bought the past couple months (mix of paperbacks and hardcovers) have had clear typefaces. In fact I never noticed typefaces consciously until seeing this book which takes a noticeable amount of effort to read the fonts.

Simple answers are, because people still buy them and they can charge more.

My impression is that paperbacks from US publisher tend to be superior to their hardbacks.

But for constant use such as library books get, hardbacks might hold up better.

Price differentiation. Well known theory in economics. It's like asking why do ppl still release movies in cinemas.

My reason for buying them wasn't mentioned as far as I saw--I like them better.

A good solid book printed on good paper is a joy, a gem.

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