Everywhere you go the answer seems to be Yes. But is it?
For one thing the sheer power of data processing has allowed governments to dictate a million and one new rules in every business which needs massive changes to processes and processing power for businesses to meet, for example in banking those changes costs millions for each bank just to implement. Who pays for that? Not the government who wants all this you can be sure. Now look at your shopping bill, VAT and tax added straight on by computers, Age checks, maximum amounts in a purchase, a million and one stupid legislative changes that are all being forced on the manufacturers and suppliers to meet everything from diversity quotas to enforced purchasing quotas. Most easily circumvented by the public. All this red tape is only made possible by computers.
I’m not so sure that computers are the boon we make them out to be for businesses. Of course, you now cannot do certain businesses without them and many businesses actual get real benefit from them with all the Just In Time delivery and stock control capabilities. Even the smallest business today needs computers to run but at that level it is a valued tool not a burden.
However, this is what made me ask the question. I’m an avid reader, not as much as some though (Ivan), and like to read all different types but exclude biographies, history and romance.
So, I’m online looking at some books and one of them has a Kindle option. To my surprise I find that the Kindle option is £1.10 more than the dead tree version. I was amazed. How can Amazon justify that?
If people are making profits all the way down the line in both versions then we have to think of the supply chain. There are a lot more people in the chain with dead tree books but it works out cheaper? Makes no sense. Someone not in the paper chain is making a killing. So who could it be? Rather than go into the details of what is in the paper chain, mainly because I can’t remember them all and do you count the lumberjacks?, let us instead have a look at who is in the Kindle download chain. Author, publisher, the Kindle production system and finally Amazon. Short and sweet. I would imagine Amazon is also the Kindle production System. The author will probably get the same pittance but the publisher and Amazon seem to be making a killing here. Seems to me they may very well kill the idea of the Ebooks right there.
Oh well. I prefer the dead tree version anyway. It also helps share out the take.
Is IT driving costs down?
Everywhere you go the answer seems to be Yes. But is it?
For one thing the sheer power of data processing has allowed governments to dictate a million and one new rules in every business which needs massive changes to processes and processing power for businesses to meet, for example in banking those changes costs millions for each bank just to implement. Who pays for that? Not the government who wants all this you can be sure. Now look at your shopping bill, VAT and tax added straight on by computers, Age checks, maximum amounts in a purchase, a million and one stupid legislative changes that are all being forced on the manufacturers and suppliers to meet everything from diversity quotas to enforced purchasing quotas. Most easily circumvented by the public. All this red tape is only made possible by computers.
I’m not so sure that computers are the boon we make them out to be for businesses. Of course, you now cannot do certain businesses without them and many businesses actual get real benefit from them with all the Just In Time delivery and stock control capabilities. Even the smallest business today needs computers to run but at that level it is a valued tool not a burden.
However, this is what made me ask the question. I’m an avid reader, not as much as some though (Ivan), and like to read all different types but exclude biographies, history and romance.
So, I’m online looking at some books and one of them has a Kindle option. To my surprise I find that the Kindle option is £1.10 more than the dead tree version. I was amazed. How can Amazon justify that?
If people are making profits all the way down the line in both versions then we have to think of the supply chain. There are a lot more people in the chain with dead tree books but it works out cheaper? Makes no sense. Someone not in the paper chain is making a killing. So who could it be? Rather than go into the details of what is in the paper chain, mainly because I can’t remember them all and do you count the lumberjacks?, let us instead have a look at who is in the Kindle download chain. Author, publisher, the Kindle production system and finally Amazon. Short and sweet. I would imagine Amazon is also the Kindle production System. The author will probably get the same pittance but the publisher and Amazon seem to be making a killing here. Seems to me they may very well kill the idea of the Ebooks right there.
Oh well. I prefer the dead tree version anyway. It also helps share out the take.