This is essentially the same thing that happened when the music industry switched from vinyl, then to cassette, then to CDs. Vinyl records often had beautiful covers and inserts, cassettes had measly, hard to read, scraps of folded paper, CDs have even less. Each time the industry charged us more whilst giving us less! So it is with e-books.
As an aside: Last year I saw an exhibition dust jackets at the V&A and bought the book whose cover won first prize, not for the content of the book but for the extremely unusual dustjacket. It was The Preservationist by David Maine - the dustjacket only covers two-thirds of the book and shows a wood engraving of the green sea, with a cut out 'wavy' top, on the front and spine. Above this, printed on the book cover, is an engraving of the Ark and sky. When you remove the dustjacket you effectively take off the sea to reveal an engraving of the Ark on land, surrounded by animals. I think it may become a collectors item so I have wrapped it in cling-film and have left it to my eldest grand-daughter in my Will!
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