Do you want every ebook in the world in Logos?
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Does having a license to offer something mean that you must offer it? While I would much rather have all my ebooks in Logos, I would certainly not encourage you to become a purveyor of porn, which is what you'd become if you offered books like 50 Shades of Grey.
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Jack Caviness said:
"Would you be inviting the camel to stick his nose into the tent?"
A slippery slope maybe... When I see organizations stepping outside of their initial plans, which included serving Christ, I can't help but think of places like Harvard and its beginning.
Harvard's history includes its original motto: “Veritas pro Christo et Ecclesia;” not just Truth, but Truth for Christ and Church. That was true for the founders, however, it was later changed to just "Veritas." Christ and the Church has been dropped.
We can't answer the questions Bob raised. I just pray it will be a decision that honors God and exalts the Savior.
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Super.Tramp said:David Taylor Jr said:
With the example of the erotic fiction I would say has no place in logos.com. I will say if that ever made its way into the store I would cease using Logos on moral grounds.
For the same reason we ought not buy our gasoline from a store that sells cigarettes. Same with pizza joints that sell beer. And using Netflix, Amazon Prime and cable TV is off limits. Taking my car to a mechanic who swears should be a no-no. I could go on.
Whats wrong with beer?
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Kent said:
Veritas pro Christo et Ecclesia
I think it is great for Godly people and businesses to get involved in all manner of things because it is by being in the world that Christ redeemed the world. Logos for maths, medicine and everything else is a great idea.
A gradually secularized Logos which eventually no longer serves the Lord or the church would be a tragedy.
In the UK we've had long and sustained pressure to introduce by default internet filtering and such. I would like to see the internet clean as much as our bookshops etc. I'm not convinced that we can clean up the shop from the outside though. Crowd pressure on the publishers as well as political pressure may also be necessary. I think there is a pragmatic problem that many great books christian or otherwise are in the hands of purveyors of bad books. I don't think we are in a position to cut off the good with the bad. I think we need to get involved and try to weed the bad out.
I don't think that really solves anything or answers the question for Bob but I think it reminds us that our calling is not to separate ourselves in order to preserve our holiness but to bring holiness and freedom to a world caught in sin.
It may never work perfectly but it shouldn't upset the workings of such a system to build in filters? That I think is the best option for faithlife at this time.
For the rest of us, maybe we can petition the publishers? Maybe we can buy shares and address the companies from within?
גַּם־חֹשֶׁךְ֮ לֹֽא־יַחְשִׁ֪יךְ מִ֫מֶּ֥ךָ וְ֭לַיְלָה כַּיּ֣וֹם יָאִ֑יר כַּ֝חֲשֵׁיכָ֗ה כָּאוֹרָֽה
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No. I'm glad you asked, Bob. I'm pleased to give my reply.
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Maybe Logos should just drop "Faith" and "Logos" from their name, rebrand and go for it?
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Deleted. Could be construed as uncharitable.
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Bob as a pastor who is currently cataloging my print library I can attest to how many books slip through the cracks in biblical studies and also secular books in leadership, management and creativity that have a place on a pastors bookshelf.
I wholeheartedly support this venture, as it would value add the usability of Logos for me.
Many of the speakers at the Global Leadership Summit that Willow Creek Church/Bill Hybells hosts are only available thru secular publishers.
The Chronicles of Narnia would find a place, which would provide great access for sermon illustrations.
I could go on and on.
As per the '50 shades of Grey' just because it is available does not mean you have to buy it. My local grocery store has an alcohol section, just because they have alcohol for sale, many legalistic tea toattlers (people who are non consumers of alcohol), still show at this supermarket.
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Bob
I'm more than satisfied with Logos' offerings. Keep the main thing your focus. Being the best is so much a matter of saying no!
The mind of man is the mill of God, not to grind chaff, but wheat. Thomas Manton | Study hard, for the well is deep, and our brains are shallow. Richard Baxter
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Yes Yes Yes!Mark Barnes said:I would be quite supportive of a secular version of Vyrso.com, with three provisos:
- Entirely separate branding.
- It makes a net contribution to Faithlife.
- Your contracts allow us to send these books to Kindle.
Like most people on here I read secular books. I would prefer them in Logos format, even if all I do is send them to Kindle.
Just make it incredibly difficult to wander into anything objectionable - thinking specifically of the erotic "literature" that possibly will come down the pipe. Maybe individuals ought to be required to enter their credit card number to view the page (haha... bad joke RE all the posts about free books & cc number entry - but only half joking here). How would you feel if one of your kids, or a grandkid stumbled into verbal pornography on their dad or grandads website?
I doubt any of those will sell any way, at least at first.
I have said on here a couple of times that I would rather have the book in vyrso and untagged than not have it at all. Those popular titles of worth could then be updated.L2 lvl4 (...) WORDsearch, all the way through L10,
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My thoughts:
1) Would it drive the price down for resources I want to own? If yes, then by all means do it.
2) Just because every book is available, doesn't mean that it would change the way I use Logos. I use Logos for Bible study, and I would have no intention to buy Logos resources that didn't have anything to do with Bible study for my library (unless they were free/deeply discounted).
3) It would be hypocritical for me to boycott Logos if resources like Shades of Grey are available since I regularly purchase eBooks from Amazon today.
4) A bit off topic, but I personally don't like the different brand strategy (Vyrso, Noet, Logos, Faithlife, etc.). I prefer one common storefront where I can buy resources for my library. I don't want to look for sales on 4 different web pages.
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Bob,
I appreciate what you do and you have never steered us wrong. I live in a world where I can get anything I want. I make good choices most of the time and am confident if you make Amazon's products (which are already available to us) available to us then the choices I make to purchase will be to supplement my Logos library. I love the idea of textbooks for college in our library systems. I am now getting some of my textbooks in Logos from classes I took 5 years ago. I am all for you adding Amazon resources.
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David Paul said:
I have a question for all those who've posted here and said, "NO!" Have you ever bought a book from Amazon? Yes?? You do realize that Amazon sells 50 Shades, don't you? Please explain why it is okay for you to do business with Amazon, or B&N, or whomever, but not Bob.
Because, in brief, and to put it mildly, Amazon doesn't purport to be Christian; Faithlife does.
“The trouble is that everyone talks about reforming others and no one thinks about reforming himself.” St. Peter of Alcántara
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I agree with this post almost word for word. Well said and thank you Kelvin.Kelvin Niblett said:Bob as a pastor who is currently cataloging my print library I can attest to how many books slip through the cracks in biblical studies and also secular books in leadership, management and creativity that have a place on a pastors bookshelf.
I wholeheartedly support this venture, as it would value add the usability of Logos for me.
Many of the speakers at the Global Leadership Summit that Willow Creek Church/Bill Hybells hosts are only available thru secular publishers.
The Chronicles of Narnia would find a place, which would provide great access for sermon illustrations.
I could go on and on.
As per the '50 shades of Grey' just because it is available does not mean you have to buy it. My local grocery store has an alcohol section, just because they have alcohol for sale, many legalistic tea toattlers (people who are non consumers of alcohol), still show at this supermarket.
I would love to be able to search all of my books and I am almost exclusively purchasing ebooks these days. There are times when I spend a lot of time searching to find a quote in one of my own books for sermon or Bible study preparation, and this would be very helpful to me. To use your example, of the Chronicles of Narnia, I could find Eustice getting his scales scraped off or Lucy choosing to follow the crowd instead of Aslan in seconds, and then copy and paste the quote and move on!
Windows PC - Android Phone - Surface Pro 4
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Kelvin Niblett said:
My local grocery store has an alcohol section, just because they have alcohol for sale, many legalistic tea toattlers (people who are non consumers of alcohol), still show at this supermarket.
That's an interesting analogy. While my family routinely shops at the supermarket, we sometimes go to specialty stores for very high quality or unique ingredients. I very frequently shop at Amazon, but it's not really a specialty bookstore. That's how I tend to view Logos.com - it's a specialty retailer that is dedicated to serving a particular need better than the general retailers like Amazon can. I periodically go to a store that sells nothing but spices, because they have very, very good spices. That's all they do, and their staff are very knowledgeable. If they were to broaden and dilute their focus so that they turned into just another supermarket, I wouldn't bother - there are other perfectly good supermarkets that are more convenient.
Of course, for all I know the company that owns the spice store may also own supermarkets. I don't really care, because when they do spices, they really focus on spices and do them well. As a Logos.com customer, my concern is that they not lose focus or quality on what they're already doing.
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Bob Pritchett said:
What do you think?
Don't swamp the present websites (Logos, Verbum, Noet, Vyrso). Start a new one, Pritchett.com.
If you have reservations putting your name on it maybe you shouldn't do it.
I will buy from you whatever you decide.
Logos 7 Collectors Edition
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Bob Pritchett said:
I need your advice.
What do we do with a publisher's catalog that includes everything from academic biography to erotic fiction? The same massive publisher that has Timothy Keller's Reason for God also publishes 50 Shades of Grey.
While I am not surprised by this development (planning wise at least) from a business perspective, the fact that Bob would even ask saddens me greatly.
This is how I will see and deal with Faithlife if this happens (it does not matter if it is under one storefront or many, the principle is the same).
Doing so would make it clear that Faithlife (a name that might not be appropriate for very long if this happens) wants to become the Harvard of electronic publishing, a fate that would include a similar (more or less) prestige and financial prosperity but also the same spiritual desolation and ruin (only the latter matters for eternity).
This would only show that the company mission's is not to serve God but to worship mammon and the profits its bring (or are we getting possibly exposed erotica for research into human depravity?).
Just image the possible legacy summarized by statements such as , "I became hooked on pornography and extramarital affairs after discovering this erotica series through Faithlife (or whatever store front)." What a testimony. and no, the excuse, I was just the electronic distributor will not do anymore that I was just the drug-dealer and it was not even my main business venture.
Because Faithlife (Logos) began with a mission to serve the Church, it is held to a different standard than the one applied to Amazon for example that has never pretended to be Christian. 1 Cor 5:9-13 would apply here.
If Logos goes that route, I will cease to purchase resources and tools for the company except what is absolutely needed to maintain and use my existing collection.
As far as my students are concerned, how could I in good conscience recommend anything associated with Faithlife without showing that compromising Christian values for financial gain is acceptable and rewarded.
Yes, I feel strongly about this issue. I have heavily invested in Logos and that would be a betrayal pure and simple for me.
Alain
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I would prefer buying all my books from Logos, unless the cost was too high. But if the cost was close I would go Logos every time. I would pay a bit more to have any book in Logos.
"In all cases, the Church is to be judged by the Scripture, not the Scripture by the Church," John Wesley0 -
Bob Pritchett said:
Bottom Line: If we could offer every ebook Amazon offers, but only if we did offer every ebook Amazon offers, should we? And if so, how?
Clear NO from me. Until now, Vyrso content has very high standards. Compared to Kindle and other market places, where you often can't even distinguish between proper content and KDP and other self publishing junk yards, Vyrso content has always been reviewed and accepted by a proper publishing house.
So a proper publisher is the minimum standard I'd set. That should include all those school books. If it doesn't, then the school requiring them is probably a bit dodgy.
So what about erotic literature that's included in the catalogues? I personally don't care. I don't read it, but I'm not offended by it either. Everyone who is, should take themselves a pair of scissors, and cut the Song of Solomon out of their Bible....
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Alain Maashe said:
This would only show that the company mission's is not to serve God but to worship mammon and the profits its bring (or are we getting possibly exposed erotica for research into human depravity?).
Just image the possible legacy summarized by statements such as , "I became hooked on pornography and extramarital affairs after discovering this erotica series through Faithlife (or whatever store front)." What a testimony. and no, the excuse, I was just the electronic distributor will not do anymore that I was just the drug-dealer and it was not even my main business venture.
Because Faithlife (Logos) began with a mission to serve the Church, it is held to a different standard than the one applied to Amazon for example that has never pretended to be Christian. 1 Cor 5:9-13 would apply here.
First and foremost Faithlife is a business. If it were a "Mission to serve the Church" we would have much cheaper products and in general things would be added as needed and not in a pre-pub system. Bob is a Christian, Faithlife is a company offering Christian offerings but not necessarily a company run on Christian principles (sharing as any had need, giving all away). I do not believe it would be fair to say Bob is after filthy lucre. He seems more than happy to reinvest in products to outreach to people (faithlife study bible suite). I do not believe any publisher Bob is hoping to pursue is a primarily a pornography publisher. These companies may offer works that are borderline pornography but one pastor requested 50 shades of grey as an outreach tool. People with pornography addictions can find it anywhere.. indeed some would easily find it in the Bible in Song of Solomon and other more erotic passages of scripture. To suggest that one may develop a porn addiction from a broader offering in Logos offerings seems misleading.. I will admit I have not read them but "Christian romance novels" which are offered in Vyrso could lead some twisted souls to lust... that doesn't mean they should not be offered. Bob is doing his best to migrate Logos into broadening the offerings. I am not saying every work he offers will be worth getting but please take some responsibility. You enter a corner store where pornography is for sale and manage to not purchase it. Now a Christian corner store maybe assume to not carry it, but if they were told you cannot cary sports illustrated time magazine and christianity today without carrying playboy that might be an acceptable compromise in the store owners mind. He may send back every copy of PB to the publisher never selling one. If he can offer every book Amazon offers it will be a great blessing.The objectionable material will be a small minority and I do not think Bob would ever knowing have a book promoted that was questionable (you will never likely see get 50% off 50 shades of Grey on your Logos homepage) but because somewhere you have this you well may get thousands of Christian books you would greatly desire. You may well see it as a deal with the devil.... but I do not... every time there is a massive fund raiser in an organization there is a temptation for someone to embezzle money. We do not stop fundraisers because it puts some at a great temptation. I apologize for my rambling but while I can see some disadvantages to this I see them mostly as a tempest in a teapot. Heck I even know of Mormon owned restaurants that serve alcohol.
-Dan
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Dan Francis said:
Heck I even know of Mormon owned restaurants that serve alcohol.
Well, they sin then. You cannot make your sin not-sin by giving examples of others who sin. It's not God's standard.
Selling erotica is a sin.
Pushing Bob into selling erotica is also a sin.
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Jan Krohn said:
So what about erotic literature that's included in the catalogues? I personally don't care. I don't read it, but I'm not offended by it either. Everyone who is, should take themselves a pair of scissors, and cut the Song of Solomon out of their Bible....
Well, if you would have ever read it, you wouldn't be putting God's Word and that dirt into the same box.
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For those concerned ... we have no intention of abandoning our focus on the church. Ironically, at the very founding of Logos we imagined being a more general consumer software company, and Logos Bible Software was just one of our planned products. (We always intended to do what became NoteScraps!)
We named the company Logos Research Systems, Inc., and thought it would be known as LRS.
Since then we've focused on Bible software (though we did NoteScraps, because I wanted it -- I use it daily!). And within the past year we re-named the company "Faithlife".
I think it's safe to say we're 'not becoming Harvard.' We're focused on serving the church.
With that said... new information: while every publisher has different rules, it looks like we may be able to get a contract if we agree to distribute just 90% of a publisher's catalog. This would let us not offer the 10% least appropriate / most objectionable content. I'm hoping this will solve the problem.
Based on feedback here, I am leaning towards offering the broad library at a completely different storefront. We'd remove the most objectionable content (note: while we'd put in a category filter, if possible, we'd probably end up doing some of this the day after it automatically appeared in the feed) and design the store to showcase the most relevant material to our users. The primary goal, of course, wouldn't even be new customers (unlikely anyway -- Amazon is almost unassailable in the general market). The goal would be to have a pool of resources we could use to meet your needs and requests, and those of the Christian colleges and seminaries we're hoping to serve, ensuring every title a pastor or student could need was available in one platform.
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Rokas said:
Selling erotica is a sin.
Pushing Bob into selling erotica is also a sin.
I am not trying to push him to do anything... nor is Bob's goal to sell erotica... his goal is to gain the widest selection of Christian books to do that he may have to end up selling every book a publisher offers. I am a sinner without doubt (but I strive through God's grace to not sin and to turn around to Christ when I do), but I do not believe I sin here (but then again I see nothing wrong with serving beer and wine in a restaurant and obvious they see no issues either). I do thank you for your concern and perhaps Bob will decide this is not the right direction for him to pursue. But to me saying Bob is going to be selling erotica is like saying pharmacist is selling meth. A responsible shop owner is only able to do so much to stop abuse of their products. They should never encourage wrong doing, perhaps Bob could set up a behind the counter thing... [WARNING this book is intended for a mature audience and may not be suitable for all readers] I do not know the answer but until I hear you are promoting a boycott of Amazon.com and other book retailers I am not going to take this too serious.
-Dan
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Bob Pritchett said:
With that said... new information: while every publisher has different rules, it looks like we may be able to get a contract if we agree to distribute just 90% of a publisher's catalog. This would let us not offer the 10% least appropriate / most objectionable content. I'm hoping this will solve the problem.
This is great news, Bob. I was actually thinking of proposing trying to work out something like this, as most publishers would be happy to do that as long as you are the ones doing the filtering and not them.
I would hope Faithlife would never end up directly selling morally provocative material (which would probably be what moral scholars sometimes call "formal cooperation with evil" - Google it for some interesting discussions about difficult cases like this, where a distinction between "formal" and "material cooperation" is often made, and can be helpful in discernment).
Hopefully a solution like this should take care of that. It's important that Faithlife keep high ethical standards (and I'm not saying that as a businessman)! [:)]
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Bob Pritchett said:
With that said... new information: while every publisher has different rules, it looks like we may be able to get a contract if we agree to distribute just 90% of a publisher's catalog. This would let us not offer the 10% least appropriate / most objectionable content. I'm hoping this will solve the problem.
If the dollar sums add up so it that it should quickly become self funding and not be a drain on the rest of Faithlife, I would say go for it.
If you can filter off most of the objectionable material from the initial WOOSH of books coming online, filtering the new stuff should be a quite manageable.
You might want to do a trial with one publishing house first though ...
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Dan Francis said:
First and foremost Faithlife is a business. If it were a "Mission to serve the Church" we would have much cheaper products and in general things would be added as needed and not in a pre-pub system. Bob is a Christian, Faithlife is a company offering Christian offerings but not necessarily a company run on Christian principles (sharing as any had need, giving all away). I do not believe it would be fair to say Bob is after filthy lucre. He seems more than happy to reinvest in products to outreach to people (faithlife study bible suite). I do not believe any publisher Bob is hoping to pursue is a primarily a pornography publisher. These companies may offer works that are borderline pornography but one pastor requested 50 shades of grey as an outreach tool. People with pornography addictions can find it anywhere.. indeed some would easily find it in the Bible in Song of Solomon and other more erotic passages of scripture. To suggest that one may develop a porn addiction from a broader offering in Logos offerings seems misleading.. I will admit I have not read them but "Christian romance novels" which are offered in Vyrso could lead some twisted souls to lust... that doesn't mean they should not be offered. Bob is doing his best to migrate Logos into broadening the offerings. I am not saying every work he offers will be worth getting but please take some responsibility. You enter a corner store where pornography is for sale and manage to not purchase it. Now a Christian corner store maybe assume to not carry it, but if they were told you cannot cary sports illustrated time magazine and christianity today without carrying playboy that might be an acceptable compromise in the store owners mind. He may send back every copy of PB to the publisher never selling one. If he can offer every book Amazon offers it will be a great blessing.The objectionable material will be a small minority and I do not think Bob would ever knowing have a book promoted that was questionable (you will never likely see get 50% off 50 shades of Grey on your Logos homepage) but because somewhere you have this you well may get thousands of Christian books you would greatly desire. You may well see it as a deal with the devil.... but I do not... every time there is a massive fund raiser in an organization there is a temptation for someone to embezzle money. We do not stop fundraisers because it puts some at a great temptation. I apologize for my rambling but while I can see some disadvantages to this I see them mostly as a tempest in a teapot. Heck I even know of Mormon owned restaurants that serve alcohol.
-Dan
“About Logos” still states “our mission is to serve the church”, whether or not Logos/Faithlife is true to that mission is another matter, the fact remains that this company claims to have said mission. Serving the Church strongly implies (and even requires) Christian principles and values. If anything, you are highlighting an increasing dissonance between what Logos claims to be and what it actually does.
When it comes to sexual ethics, you and I stand at the two opposite ends of the spectrum. With such dissimilar worldviews, it is pointless to argue on what is acceptable in the Church and organizations designed to support it when it comes to sexually oriented material and what standards apply to such entities.
For conservative Christians like myself, there is absolutely and categorically no scenario under which selling immoral material is acceptable for an individual and company claiming to have (even remotely) anything to do with Christ and serving the Church. No amount of “greater good”, “opening new horizons and possibilities”, “not that bad”, “you could just act like if it is not there” or other “practical” arguments will change that principle. What you do not seem to understand is that it is a matter of principle, the ends can never justify the means.
I am not writing with the hope of convincing you or those who are just fine with this potential change. Most people here already have a well formed opinion about the appropriateness (or lack thereof) of such resources and their distribution. I will not convince you and you will certainly not make me change my mind.
My aim to convey in no uncertain terms that for some of us, Logos would be crossing the line and that it would have consequences (isn't Bob’s purpose to test the water and see how this would be received?) Some who used to be Logos evangelists will be signing a totally different tune.
It is also likely that Logos has already done the math and that from a financial perspective, the revenue lost from these customers will be replaced and even greatly exceeded by the new markets and their customers.
I do not doubt to financial success of such venture, I just do not want any part of it as a customer if this is the direction the company chooses to go.
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Is there a need for a massive search engine for all books in the world? It is nice to have all books in the world. But many of them do not need the powerful search engine that Logos provides. I am sure some can find use in research to have such a search engine behind it. Amazon offers books cheaply. The disadvantage I see in Amazon is that it is hard to organize an Amazon Library. That at least has been my experience.
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Bob Pritchett said:
With that said... new information: while every publisher has different rules, it looks like we may be able to get a contract if we agree to distribute just 90% of a publisher's catalog. This would let us not offer the 10% least appropriate / most objectionable content. I'm hoping this will solve the problem.
Yes - I recon that would solve the problem - I would revise my "No" to "Yes" - on the basis this was in place and YOU (i.e. Faithlife) took responsibility for the filtering. Even the 24 hours after would be acceptable in my view.
By the way I don't consider the buying from somewhere that sells something else! the major issue. The major issue is what you are prepared to sell. Not every buck is a good buck!. We recently on this side of the pond (in the UK) are grappling with the huge legal issues of when we can discriminate over a "Cake sale". Northern Ireland is the context.
Blessings all - it has and remains an enlightening debate - not least of all seeing those "knee-jerk" reactions from people who haven't read careful what Bob was proposing.
Shalom
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John Goodman said:
I think you should go for it but add 6 zeros to the price of all the bad stuff... We get all the books we want and you never sell bad stuff except to incredibly stupid billionaires;)
THAT is one of the best suggestions I've seen so far :-)
Also, I keep wondering whether nobody else reads the Song of Songs as erotic ficton??
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I wouldn't buy all but a lot more. ANE, semitic languages, Arabian peninsula, islam, linguistics...
Kindle has problems displaying correctly all the phonetic signs, so it would be nice if Logos provided books about linguistics in Logos' quality.
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Mark Barnes said:
I'm still in favour of this, not least because I have 43 Christian books on my Kindle that I'd love to have bought in Logos format.
Same here. There's so much not available in Logos that I'd like to read through using Logos.
Mark Barnes said:One possible way to minimise the impact of some of the more controversial content without getting into contractual issues would be to add an adult filter, so that by default erotic titles were not displayed. Initial filtering could be done programmatically, but with the option for users to report titles that have slipped through the net.
That's also a good idea. Default "not displayed" would be good. And it might be possible to take it further so that anybody that wanted access to the adult books would have to write to Logos and request access to the filtered books.
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Mark said:
Is there a need for a massive search engine for all books in the world?
I am not sure that any engine will ever be able to keep up with all the books in the world, especially those published in less known areas. But the closest to this is www.worldcat.org.
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Bob,
Thanks for the additional updates and comments. I like the new 90% concept, such that you could not enable selected titles.
If it was permitted, it would be better for someone to QA and "tag" each new title so they arrived "ready to go", e.g. with the Logos or Vyrso etc sticker in the metadata. This would be better than "Nasty Title" goes on sale for 24 hrs until someone notices it and pulls the plug.
I buy little fiction, but many science/electronic/robotic/maker/computer themed titles (my hobbies and work). I'd love the markup, indexing and searching abilities of the Logos apps and desktop client for such titles.
For those that say FL is in danger of going over some line, or already has: there are many titles already in the library that I dislike and wish were not there. But if we went to the other end of the scale, there would only be a single title: the original KJV just as Paul penned it, right?
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I hope Dracula would not again end up on the "bad and sinful" book list... [:D]
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Bob Pritchett said:
it looks like we may be able to get a contract if we agree to distribute just 90% of a publisher's catalog. This would let us not offer the 10% least appropriate / most objectionable content.
Is this a new development? I think we were under the impression that it was all or nothing. I think the responses in this thread would have been different if we knew this.
Either way, this is great news.
Using adventure and community to challenge young people to continually say "yes" to God
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Bob Pritchett said:
. Based on feedback here, I am leaning towards offering the broad library at a completely different storefront.
Great! Go ahead! With the new info I am even more excited about this whole prospect. I really believe in what Faithlife is doing, and I'd rather give my money to Faithlife than another company.
I hope this will give more opportunity to have even more missions titles available, as well as cross-cultural communications. Here's hoping for the best! [:)]
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- Faithlife is compromising with their core belief to gain more money.
- When business is higher than faith, this is what happens. Money rules.
- So what if your company doesn't grow larger as you would think without selling selling erotica books? You can't carry your cross... Oh Faithlife??? Can God not able to open other doors to make your company grow without compromising?
- Is not always that if you could that you should...
- The choice is actually isn't about financial gain, is about moral attitude and ethics. So Bob is definitively responsible standing to be blameless & spotless at the end.
- If Bob makes the move then Bob has just given an example to compromise with the world and shows the type of leadership he has. Both to his employees and customers and ...his family.
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Bruce Dunning said:
Is this a new development? I think we were under the impression that it was all or nothing. I think the responses in this thread would have been different if we knew this.
In Bob's post he does say this is new news:
"With that said... new information: while every publisher has different rules, it looks like we may be able to get a contract if we agree to distribute just 90% of a publisher's catalog. This would let us not offer the 10% least appropriate / most objectionable content. I'm hoping this will solve the problem."
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Graham Criddle said:Bruce Dunning said:
Is this a new development? I think we were under the impression that it was all or nothing. I think the responses in this thread would have been different if we knew this.
In Bob's post he does say this is new news:
"With that said... new information: while every publisher has different rules, it looks like we may be able to get a contract if we agree to distribute just 90% of a publisher's catalog. This would let us not offer the 10% least appropriate / most objectionable content. I'm hoping this will solve the problem."
You are right. That is pretty clear. I think I was so focused on reading the 90% I just overlooked the obvious. [:$]
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For what it is worth, Vyrso books are only good if you are using them in a Logos Environment. Example, a book you would use for research. If I am buying a book for just reading, I don't buy it from Logos or Vyrso, why? Because even though I can send it to my Kindle the quality is not there. It can't even get the formatting for the table of contents right.
That being said, even with 90% of the catalog, that still means there is a chance of title that have no place being associated with a faith-based company making it into the store. I still say no.
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I also am not convinced. What are the summary arguments for wanting to have every book in the world in logos?
I like logos for the search engine. Easy to study the Scriptures and search for topics etc. For every book in the world I would not need that
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I think that solves your problem. Go for it!Bob Pritchett said:With that said... new information: while every publisher has different rules, it looks like we may be able to get a contract if we agree to distribute just 90% of a publisher's catalog. This would let us not offer the 10% least appropriate / most objectionable content. I'm hoping this will solve the problem.
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Bob Pritchett said:
With that said... new information: while every publisher has different rules, it looks like we may be able to get a contract if we agree to distribute just 90% of a publisher's catalog. This would let us not offer the 10% least appropriate / most objectionable content. I'm hoping this will solve the problem.
Based on feedback here, I am leaning towards offering the broad library at a completely different storefront. We'd remove the most objectionable content (note: while we'd put in a category filter, if possible, we'd probably end up doing some of this the day after it automatically appeared in the feed) and design the store to showcase the most relevant material to our users. The primary goal, of course, wouldn't even be new customers (unlikely anyway -- Amazon is almost unassailable in the general market). The goal would be to have a pool of resources we could use to meet your needs and requests, and those of the Christian colleges and seminaries we're hoping to serve, ensuring every title a pastor or student could need was available in one platform.
That sounds like a very reasonable plan.
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Bob Pritchett said:
we have no intention of abandoning our focus on the church.
Bob Pritchett said:I think it's safe to say we're 'not becoming Harvard.' We're focused on serving the church.
Thank you. That is always a worry for me as you expand your company.
Bob Pritchett said:new information: while every publisher has different rules, it looks like we may be able to get a contract if we agree to distribute just 90% of a publisher's catalog.
That is indeed good news.
Bob Pritchett said:Based on feedback here, I am leaning towards offering the broad library at a completely different storefront.
Awesome. Thank you for listening to your customers. This was my main concern.
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Bob Pritchett said:
With that said... new information: while every publisher has different rules, it looks like we may be able to get a contract if we agree to distribute just 90% of a publisher's catalog. This would let us not offer the 10% least appropriate / most objectionable content. I'm hoping this will solve the problem.
Two cents from me and my jerking knee: Taking on 90% instead of a full catalog will not make much of a difference in the amount of nasty junk you'll get. There is a TON of filth in the Amazon ebook catalog and a lot of it lives between innocuous titles and tame book descriptions. And thinking that 'hiding' it away in a separate store (and with filters???) will take the problem away is just wrongheaded, IMO. People will visit this store, they will find objectionable/inappropriate books, they will buy objectionable/inappropriate books, and Faithlife will take the money from the sale of objectionable/inappropriate books.
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ExactlyYasmin Stephen said:Bob Pritchett said:With that said... new information: while every publisher has different rules, it looks like we may be able to get a contract if we agree to distribute just 90% of a publisher's catalog. This would let us not offer the 10% least appropriate / most objectionable content. I'm hoping this will solve the problem.
Two cents from me and my jerking knee: Taking on 90% instead of a full catalog will not make much of a difference in the amount of nasty junk you'll get. There is a TON of filth in the Amazon ebook catalog and a lot of it lives between innocuous titles and tame book descriptions. And thinking that 'hiding' it away in a separate store (and with filters???) will take the problem away is just wrongheaded, IMO. People will visit this store, they will find objectionable/inappropriate books, they will buy objectionable/inappropriate books, and Faithlife will take the money from the sale of objectionable/inappropriate books.
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This would make MANY if not ALL my textbooks available in some way for logos (be it vyrso, noet, or Logos proper).Mark said:I also am not convinced. What are the summary arguments for wanting to have every book in the world in logos?
I like logos for the search engine. Easy to study the Scriptures and search for topics etc. For every book in the world I would not need that
in a given year at seminary I have 6-15 text books, and 2-3 of those are available in Logos. I spend ~600$ on text books each semester out of amazon because I can't get them in Logos.
Plus from your perspective they wouldn't ALL be in your library instantly, you'd still have to pick and choose what is useful to you. Only the things you license will end up in your library. Its like going from 10,000 titles in the logos store to a few million covering every rabbit trail and research opportunity you can think of. Primary religious texts and their commentaries would now be available. Cultural anthropology texts, linguistics material, stuff about ancient Israel from an Israelis perspective and on and on and on.
For those of you saying it would let "trash" filter into logos... Hate to break it to you but depending on your denominational bias there may well already be things you consider in that light.
For me, and my part, I will shop at Logos for the books I want like I would stop at a grocery store that sells booze & porn - or basically Barns and Noble.
Whether or not that conflicts with Bob & Faithlife's mission is not for us to decide or to be offended about. We project this ideal of ministry on FL, when in truth they are a business.
IF selling the whole (or 90%) of the catalog funds better bible software, then that serves the church. Then that is in a way fueling ministry by using the enemies funds...
There is a missions organization funded by the Guinness family fortunes :PL2 lvl4 (...) WORDsearch, all the way through L10,
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Keith Larson said:
Some thoughts:
It seems that there is a need for four book stores:
- Tagged Biblical Research Books = Logos
- Tagged Academic Research Books = Noet
- EPub Christian Books = Vyrso
- EPub General Books = “New Store”
This being the case there need to be a search option at each of the stores to show results from all for book stores. It is already a pain to have to search both Logos and Vyrso to see if I can purchase a Christian book I am interested in.
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