Blurb: Who Will Use It?
The darling of the Demo conference thus far has been, by most accounts I’ve read, Blurb. Blurb is an online publishing service that lets anybody create and publish a book with just a few minutes of work. They offer high-quality products and allow users to put a professional stamp on a personal blog, photo album, cookbook, or anything else you can dream up.
Here’s the issue, though. This thing is expensive. I mean, really expensive. For the Beta, there’s an introductory price point, but even at this supposed discounted price Blurb is going to turn a lot of users off. Prices start at $29.95 for a simple 1-40 page book, and runs all the way up to $80 for a 300-400 page book.
Who is the target for this thing? I can’t imagine power users flocking to it in any way, shape or form. It’s too expensive. If geeks want to publish a book based on their blog, they’ll just use LuLu. It doesn’t cost anything to the author, and fees are only charged to the person actually buying the book. It’s a hell of a lot cheaper, too; a 300 page full-color book from Lulu will cost you roughly $45, which is a far cry from the $80 you will pay for a black and white version of the same thing at Blurb.
I can see this working for the single mother who wants to make a special recipe book with grandmother’s secret recipes for a potential Christmas gift, but I don’t see it taking off with any other demographic. LuLu does the same thing and does it far cheaper.
