Following the Pragamatic Bookshelf beta books program and O’Reilly’s Roughcuts, Apress introduced a similar program today called betaBooks:

Apress betaBooks give you access to the newest programming topics straight from the author, via weekly PDF chapters and updates, all before the final printed versions are published. Eight weeks before the book’s final publication—and before other books on the topic are released—the first several chapters of an Apress betaBook become available. After that, available updates or new chapters are delivered weekly to your inbox.

These betaBooks are a bargain since the price includes a copy of the entire finished eBook. At this time, betaBooks aren’t intended to solicit feedback or shape a final book. Instead, the main function of a betaBook is to give you two-month head start on technology that may boost your career success.

This is an attempt to reduce the “opportunity cost” I’ve spoken of before, but it is also an attempt to increase the value proposition of eBooks.  Because the marginal cost of selling eBooks is close to zero, most technical publishers would love to see people buying more of them.