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Message: <blockquote data-quote="delericho" data-source="post: 5063716" data-attributes="member: 22424">The last time I bought books in Borders (or any brick-and-mortar bookstore, except my FLGS) was Christmas Eve 2008, when I picked up a couple of novels for the holiday. At the checkout, I was given a voucher good for 15% off any single purchase in January.I was quite pleased about this until I remembered that Amazon routinely offer 15% or more off every book, all of the time.Amazon also have a much wider range than the brick-and-mortar store can possibly have, and are much more convenient as well - to get to a good bookstore I have to drive for thirty minutes; getting to Amazon takes seconds.Up against that, the brick-and-mortar stores simply cannot compete. I may occasionally pick something up, if they just happen to have several books I want in a "three for two" offer or similar, but otherwise I don't see myself buying anything there.I do make an exception for my FLGS, mostly because I've shopped there since I started gaming (in fact, I bought my Red Box Basic Set there), because I have a good rapport with the owner, and because I don't want to see the store go away. However, that does mean paying higher prices (sometimes much higher), it does often mean waiting some weeks while he special-orders a particular item, and it does mean putting up with his somewhat erratic opening hours.However, if that store does close, or pass to new ownership, then that will be that. I'll switch my RPG purchases online without a second thought.(Of course, my RPG purchases have dropped right away anyway, as my preferred edition of D&D is 3.5e, my preferred edition of WFRP is 2nd, and so the only 'active' game I still play extensively is SWSE. And if WotC wrap up that game, even to produce a new edition, I'm not going to be interested...)The one thing that does concern me about this approach, though, is that the faster bookstores migrate online, the faster we get to the day that eBooks supplant paper books. In fact, I fully expect to start seeing eBook-only novels within the next couple of years. But an eBook reader is frankly a very expensive way to produce something that is not as good as a paper book. In fact, they're not even close. So, this is one part of the future that I definitely do not want.</blockquote>

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