Sure, I love me some e-reading, but the one big downside is that books have too many darn words!
Lucky for me a company called FT Press has my back: it's boiling down professional and self-help books into "Elements" and "Shorts." The former hovers somewhere between 1,000 to 2,000 words and sells for $2, while Shorts are a little longer at $3 for around 5,000 words.
So, why take existing books and truncate them? Timothy C. Moore, publisher of the FT Press, told The New York Times that it was "a good idea to be able to provide people with shorter, more expedient, more time-sensitive" versions of books.
FT Press's approach eats into publisher profits, as it's unlikely that someone would spring for the full book after getting the best bits. The authors of the original work, however, are entitled to royalties from the online sales.
So what's next? Who knows: maybe in the future people will buy their favorite chapters just as you would a song instead of an album.
