"The short (somewhat obvious) answer, aside from errors introduced by OCR: because publishers cut corners by laying off proofreaders and copy editors, then rush the manuscripts out too quickly for their skeleton crews to catch gaffes. At least that’s what one editor confessed to Virginia Heffernan at the New York Times. Another editor, however, says in the era of word processors authors have gotten lazier and stupider: “It is amazing how little review seems to have occurred before the text is sent to the editor. Seriously, you have no idea how sloppy some of these things are.”"
Lazier and stupider authors? What a steaming pile of crap. The (huge) majority of the errors I've found in ebooks has been OCR related. Awkward grammar and (word-processor generated or original) misspellings are much more rare.
Unfortunately I think that the mess that is the current state of ebook publishing is lowering the standards of writing. It it not surprising that writers are cashing in on the lowered standards. We can only hope that the craft of writing benefits those who pursue quality over quantity. Frankly only time will tell. Talented writers will always be able to get their message out there and discerning readers will always be able to find talent.
We can only hope that the (rvolving) infrastructure rewards talent.
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