Seeking to clarify the Pre-pub process (Welwyn)

Greetings fellow Logossians,

Bob and team, I continue to be thankful for your product and I use it daily. My question today is about the pre-pub process behind the Welwyn Commentary series but I imagine it has applicability to many other products as well.

Over the years I have collected a number of software packages in addition to Logos because they had some value to me in providing good books cheaper than print and searchable (Pradis, Doxa Press, Wordsearch, Quickverse). Of course there is some risk to this (as I stare at my Pradis disk), so, recently, I have resolved as much as possible to be a one product guy. But because of my past purchases I am on a number of mailing lists. Recently, I received an email from Wordsearch for the very commentary set that I'm anxiously awaiting in Logos as it is an excellent, conservative and pastoral set (that everybody should preorder :-) ) the Welwyn Commentary Series (49 volumes) that is listed on prepub for $299.99. This is by far one of the most expensive sets I would ever consider ordering, but, I believed that it was important to support the digitizing of this collection.

My confusion is based on a recent notification I received from Wordsearch to say that they have the set already in production (i.e. that it's available now and you can order it right now) for $129.99 special (that special is now over - regular price is way higher - the Logos pre-pub is cheaper). This leads me to some questions that I hope some of you, particularly Logos staff can answer for the community to communicate transparency. Like I said, I really appreciate Logos and what they are doing and at the moment I do not want to buy any other theological e-book platform. I am even willing to pay a bit more, but I'm confused.

Why has Logos' product been in pre-pub for a year or more when there are digitized copies available from other publishers? I thought that the cost and the delay of pre-publication is the digitizing of the material. I understand that there is tagging and referencing that is involved, but, there would hardly be the same effort is the product is already digital. Am I misunderstanding this? Would it be possible for you to give us some insight into the process? I am not interested in buying this set for anything but Logos.

Thanks in advance for considering the question.

Chris.

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Comments

TCBlack

Excellent questions all around Christopher!

In particular this resource (Welwyn Commentary Series (WCS) (49 vols.)) is in prepub but not under contract.

Logos Prepubs currently go through three stages.

Gathering interest in which a product is "pre ordered" by a number of individuals. In this stage the product is not under development - rather the gathering interest stage is instrumental in guaging the interest level and assuring that production costs will be covered. Logos has a reasonable idea after all of this time precisely what a resource will cost (usually) based upon page count and complexity of text. They calculate that cost out and set a price based upon contract agreements/cost of production/keeping the lights on /etc... They take that final cost and divide it by a set number of people and wait to see if that set number of people will pre-order the material.
Under contract in which the product moves into active development and the electronic files (if any) are given to the tagging group in Electronic Text Development. This is where the Logos tagging and linking happens.
Shipping - that's when you get it. :-)

Since as you indicate the electronic text is available I would suspect a fairly quick move between 2 and 3. All of the time is being invested in 1 at the moment because, judging by the "thermometer" on the page there is not a sufficient number of people interested in buying to cover production costs.

NB.Mick

Chris,

as far as I can understand, the pre-pub phase your commentary is in ("gathering interest") serves Logos to determine sort of a minimum revenue they will get from the product. They may already work on the resource in this phase, but they may as well leave it alone until a sufficient number or pre-orders has been made, so they determine the revenue will outweigh the work investment. Thus Logos minimizes the risk of investing into a product they don't sell afterwards. The pre-pub discount we get reflects that we help Logos with their business risk - and wait veeery patiently until the commercial treshold has been reached.

Then they will start producing the resource (status "under development"), which will include obtaining a digitized raw text (scanning of old books or getting a file from somewhere, in this case maybe directly from the publisher - but they may have this already). It also includes the tragging and indexing etc. which connects the different Logos resources with others - say your commentary references another commentary that is available for Logos, you should be able to jump right there. I understand that this is the time-consuming part - otherwise Logos could produce much faster than they do.

The existence of digital raw text at a publisher or in the public domain (note that digital text that belongs to a competitor who invested effort to bring it into his format may not be used by Logos for copyright reasons) may speed up the production process a bit, but maybe not very much, as far as I see it, but the status "gathering interest" would indicate to me that this process has not yet startet.

Hope this helps,

Mick

Terry Cook

I don't think the other brothers addressed part of your question which I understand to be: "Why the price difference ($300 Logos prepub vs. $130 Wordsearch prepub)?" I have asked similar questions myself over the years. In my opnion Logos is the most expensive of all the Bible programs. Additionally, they offer far fewer "free" resources than many if not most of their competitors. The price of print books is often if not always cheaper as well which is inconsistent with pricing by other Bible software firms.

So, the answer to THIS question is.........

Terry Cook

sDg

Mark Smith

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/245870#Comment_245870

So, the answer to THIS question is.........

They work in Logos, the best PC based Bible Study software available (I'll leave the Mac evaluations to the Mac users). If you don't care about that then you will probably buy them in Wordsearch.

Having said that (and I am not paid nor supported by Logos), I understand the basic thinking behind the question. Same resource, so what gives? The answer we've had before is two-fold: greater complexity in production because of the greater usefulness in Logos, and resource sales support the development of the engine and free tech support (oh, and that T-shirt I got on sale for $1.00). I am not defending the Logos pricing model, but I am glad they have stayed in business and want them to continue to do so.

The individual volumes on Amazon run about $12-20 each in paperback. I guess that would work out to about $600 minimum for all 49 commentaries. Logos' pre-pub price is half of that. I don't know how Wordsearch markets and what their costs are and whether they are losing money on this offer, so can't speak to that price.

Matthew C Jones

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/245870#Comment_245870

So, the answer to THIS question is.........

I don't know for sure but I will postulate two guesses;

Copyright holders know Logos is a the best Bible software available so they require higher dividends for their titles to be available in Logos format??
Because Logos is written to return more comprehensive search results, there is more work involved in tagging & preparing resources.??

fwiw: I do own Wordsearch 9 (& Accordance, & QuickVerse 2008 , & PC Study Bible 5 , & BibleWorks 8 &...)
Logos 4 is the best overall.

Rick

Pricing between Logos and Wordsearch can vary greatly and it is really a two-way street. Compare the Pillar New Testament series for example, granted the Wordsearch series includes one additional volume (2 Peter and Jude) but that does not (in my humbled opinion) justify the vast price difference.

Logos: $249.95

Wordsearch: $390.55

Juanita

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/245913#Comment_245913

Pricing between Logos and Wordsearch can vary greatly and it is really a two-way street. Compare the Pillar New Testament series for example, granted the Wordsearch series includes one additional volume (2 Peter and Jude) but that does not (in my humbled opinion) justify the vast price difference.

Logos: $249.95

Wordsearch: $390.55

Just to clarify further, Wordsearch runs specials every week and that price is not the sale price. Why purchase software unless it is Logos pre-pub or Wordsearch on a half price sale?

Jack Caviness

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/245884#Comment_245884

They work in Logos, the best PC based Bible Study software available (I'll leave the Mac evaluations to the Mac users).

Personally, I would say that L4 is also the best Mac based Bible Study software available—even if it does still need much improvement. [H]

Keep Smiling 4 Jesus :)

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/245930#Comment_245930

They work in Logos, the best PC based Bible Study software available (I'll leave the Mac evaluations to the Mac users).

Personally, I would say that L4 is also the best Mac based Bible Study software available—even if it does still need much improvement.

[Y] Thankful for immense Logos 4 Mac improvements; looking forward to Logos 4 becoming better on Mac & PC [8-|]

Keep Smiling [:)]