THE STANDARD

The IOBA Standard is the journal of the Independent Online Booksellers Association and covers the book world, with a special focus on the online used, out-of-print, and collectible bookselling markets.

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A passion for books but not proofreading

Shawn Purcell
Jul 15, 2008

Yesterday I received an email from AbeBooks which stated that I could save 48% on Stephan King’s Duma Key.

Stephan King? It seems that Abe’s ‘Passion for Books’ doesn’t extend to proofreading. Maybe I’m being overly critical but this is a company in the business of words, books and literature! You’d think that they’d go to greater lengths to ensure these types of errors didn’t occur. What would happen if TechCrunch had a headline that read ‘Steve Jubs predicts iPod success’?

I’d give AbeBooks a mulligan but they used that up a few years ago when they sent a message to their booksellers and accidentally referred to them as boobsellers. A very different business for sure.

Perhaps the AbeBooks tagline should be ‘Passion for ARCs’ which notoriously have these types of errors. Or is my criticism too harsh?

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