Murdoch Says E-Book Prices Will Kill Paper Books 538
hrimhari writes "The settlement between Amazon and Macmillian got the attention of a known dinosaur. Consistent to his views, Mr. Murdoch wants to defend his book editors by killing the cheaper solution. '"We don't like the Amazon model of selling everything at $9.99," Murdoch said. "They pay us the wholesale price of $14 or whatever we charge," he said. "But I think it really devalues books, and it hurts all the retailers of the hardcover books.'"
This just in... (Score:5, Insightful)
another old wrinkly dinosaur doesn't like change! news at 11.
Re:This just in... (Score:4, Funny)
another old wrinkly dinosaur doesn't like change! news at 11 on FOX!.
There, fixed that for you.
Re:This just in... (Score:5, Insightful)
Murdoch is not simply the old dinosaur; this is merely another case of one form of extremism (loads of cheap ebooks) begets another (kill ebooks).
Both models have their place, or in the words of Thomas Edison
"We will make electricity so cheap that only the rich will burn candles."
Personally, I can't wait to find a decent ebook reader - don't like what I have seen in the Sony ones available in Europe. Might go for the iPad instead. But on the other hand, I still want paper books - I find there is something very calming in holding and reading a paper book, on a medium where you neither have to worry about power (eventually) running out, nor do you have the temptation of quite as easily switching back and forth between different books, ... It's more effort to change the (physical) book, and hence I find it more likely to actually stick to it. For work-related/reference books I want the ebook reader, for novels etc. I don't.
But unlike Murdoch (or people wishing the end of paper books), I won't go for eliminating either form, as I can see the advantages of both.
Not mentioned that often in the context of ebooks - I remember reading a short story as part of my school English lessons, which seemed to predict 'ebooks' - and it was written in the 50s: Isaac Asimov's The Fun They Had ( http://users.aber.ac.uk/dgc/funtheyhad.html [aber.ac.uk] )
Edison model different (Score:4, Insightful)
Both models have their place, or in the words of Thomas Edison "We will make electricity so cheap that only the rich will burn candles."
You are mis-interpreting Edison - this statement does not at all represent the Murdoch model. If it did Edison would have said "We will make electricity so cheap that the candlemakers will have us banned". All Edison is saying is that if they can make electricity cheap enough then, given its inherent advantage over candles, why would anyone want to use them? He is not suggesting that anything be forced upon people like Murdoch is i.e. he is not saying that he wants to kill candles, just that most people will probably not want to use them in most cases because electricity will be so much cheaper.
This is exactly what I think will happen with books: nobody wants to set out to deliberately kill paper books but in the future I would imagine that only very popular "classic" books will end up in physical, high quality bindings and that the cheap paperback novels of today will be replaced by electronic media simply because eBooks are cheaper to make and more convenient.
Re:Edison model different (Score:4, Insightful)
You got it the wrong way round -
I did not mean that Murdoch represents the Edison model - it's closer to the ebook model (ebooks cheaper, therefore only 'rich' will buy them on paper), i.e. the printed book is becoming the 'niche' product to read (just as candles are now almost a 'niche' product to provide lighting).
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
This is exactly what I think will happen with books: nobody wants to set out to deliberately kill paper books but in the future I would imagine that only very popular "classic" books will end up in physical, high quality bindings and that the cheap paperback novels of today will be replaced by electronic media simply because eBooks are cheaper to make and more convenient.
And it will revitalize the market for fiction by eliminating the compression of the midlist -- authors whose books sell consistently but not rapidly. Because e-books don't have to compete for physical rack space in stores against 'blockbusters' and have no inventory costs, e-books by authors can remain "in print" from their publication date until their copyright expires.
The same also applies for scholarly works, which generally have low print runs because of their slow sales and high inventory costs; e-book
Re:This just in... (Score:4, Interesting)
For once Murdoch has a point.
Amazon wants to kill paper books and gain a monopoly on ebooks.
The low prices are are designed to kill off the competition - much like MS offering better deals to OEMs who did not sell BeOS.
I agree ebooks should be cheaper than paper books, but how long do you think they will stay cheaper once Amazon has us all locked into Kindle? How long will you be able to buy books once you only read on a device that has DRM - pay per read or rent by the week is quite possible.
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I'd be all over ebooks IF I can do the following...
move the ebooks to my new reader from a DIFFERENT COMPANY without contacting someone.
Share an ebook with my wife on HER READER.
Sell my used ebooks at a used ebook store.
The first two they can do, they choose not to. The last, they want used book stores to die, they hate the idea of anyone buying their "precious" second hand.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Like Custer's valiant last stand at Little Big Horn, how America is at it's root a "Christian Nation," and that the pilgrims and the indians got together and sang kumbaya on the first thanksgiving?
No, history has never had to be factual. [amazon.com]
Re:This just in... (Score:4, Interesting)
To make it worse, he has no excuse. The music industry does, they were the first to miss the boat on digital content. The movie industry should have caught on, but somehow didn't. The publishers should really have been able to figure it out; they had fair warning and opportunity and, seemingly, just couldn't connect the dots.
Big Content screwed up and is on the way out no matter how much they complain. Books are absolutely here to stay, but the profit model is shifting. Hopefully the huge economies of scale afforded by e-Books will allow the authors to profit more than under the current model. In any case, Amazon is sure to come out on top for the near future.
Re:This just in... (Score:5, Insightful)
His assertion that Amazon was losing 4 bucks on every ebook sold is utter nonsense. You can't sell that many kindles to make up for that kind of losses.
He has a problem with loss leaders. Too bad. What he seeks to do is nothing more than to forcibly repeal the First Sale Doctrine [wikipedia.org] and Bobbs-Merrill vs Straus [wikipedia.org].
I say fine. The sooner all the publishers band together and collude with Steve Jobs to raise book prices and dictate the Retail price the sooner the DOJ can step in and smack them down for price fixing.
If the publishers want more money they could have just started rising price (regardless of the fact we are in the midst of a rather major depression). But to attempt to dictate retail prices by banding together is nothing but an assault on copyright law.
I notice no crocodile tears are shed by Murdoch for the authors, who are still stuck at 5 to 10% of revenue.
Re:This just in... (Score:4, Insightful)
I say fine. The sooner all the publishers band together and collude with Steve Jobs to raise book prices and dictate the Retail price the sooner the DOJ can step in and smack them down for price fixing.
Where does Jobs fit into this? I mean, apart from conspiracy theories and what you reckon might happen.
And while I'm at it, the history of Apple's music sales is that they kept the prices down. The music industry wanted variable pricing, with new songs around $2.50 instead of $0.99.
Murdoch is way out on this, arguing against capitalism itself.
Where does Jobs fit in? (Score:3, Insightful)
Jobs fits in because he is now selling eBooks to iPad users at a price agreed with the publishers. While this may smack of "cartel", Amazon's no better -- selling books at a knock-down price to encourage people to buy the expensive Kindle, with the single-minded goal of gaining a monopoly on the market. Looking at the case of MacMillan, Amazon were selling at 66% of the RRP for the eBook. As I understand it, if this became standard pricing, the publishers and authors would end up with less money than for
Re:This just in... (Score:5, Informative)
the DOJ can step in and smack them down for price fixing.
It's hard to successfully nail IP industries for price fixing as copyright itself is price fixing and the products are not exactly fungible. Even when you nail them in the short term, monopoly pricing is set as a function of the consumers disposable income, not as a function of production cost and competition. Thus the prices will always tend to rise (in nominal terms, as reductions in disposable income will be hidden with inflation in the current economic system) and are unlikely to diverge far from each other (either lower or higher prices will result in lower revenue than the optimum monopoly pricing). You'll get the effect of price fixing whether they collude or not.
Basically the only way to affect pricing is to encourage large scale private copying and distribution of the products in question, which is pretty much what passes for 'competition' in that segment of the economy.
Moderation (Score:5, Funny)
Re:This just in... (Score:5, Interesting)
"Capitalism" as we know it was an industrial philosophy. It was devised in a time where value came from physical objects, because physical production was expensive. This was a time where a physical object had one purpose and one purpose only, and its value came from how well it fulfilled that purpose.
But look at the computer sitting in front of you. Chances are, you've spent more money on software than on the PC itself. The true value of a computing device comes from its configuration, because physically it is a general purpose device with the potential to do anything but the ability to do nothing. Software adds value to it.
No, this doesn't make sense in an industrialist-capitalist context. Something non-physical with value?
But consider AutoCAD, which costs three or four times the price of the PC it runs on. It took millions of man hours to create, and save millions of man hours every year for its users. If it sold at it's physical "value" it would be free. If it was free, Autodesk would go out of business and wouldn't write any more software. No materials or environments updates means no more AutoCAD. Which means people go back to pen and paper. Value is lost for everyone.
But going back to eBooks, there is still competition. Amazon UK has 451 books on "Ruby on Rails", for example. Copyright protection keeps prices high enough that a new entrant can afford to launch a book, while the reality of competition means that people are undercutting each other as much as they can afford to in order to get the needed market share. The market has reached equilibrium, and these books add genuine value by costing the same as about 3 man-hours of programming time, but being the product of thousands of man-hours for authors, proofreaders, typesetters etc and saving the buyer lots of time. Value is created, and the creators of that value must be rewarded.
HAL.
Re:This just in... (Score:5, Informative)
The following book price breakdown from Kindle Review (http://ireaderreview.com/2009/05/03/book-cost-analysis-cost-of-physical-book-publishing/) is instructional:
Book Retail Price: $27.95.
Retailer (discount, staffing, rent, etc.) - $12.58. That's 45%.
Author Royalties - $4.19. Exactly 15%.
Wholesaler - $2.80. Exactly 10%.
Pre-production (Publisher) - $3.55. That's 12.7%.
Printing (Publisher) - $2.83. Translates to 10.125%.
Marketing (Publisher) - $2. That's approximately 7.15%.
Basically the numbers of interest are the retailer (45%), printing (just 10%), and the wholesaler (10%). So it's fairly easy to see that online books can dump wholesaling and printing costs... but that's just 20%, or $6. Retailer costs can drop, but most retailers still need to make a profit, even selling ebooks (servers cost money).
Given the breakdown, I can see how a publisher might charge Amazon $15 for a first-run book, and how Amazon might decide to eat the $5 (for first run books) if it means gaining ebook market share and if it also encourages people to buy older books on which they DO make money. And sells the occasional Kindle.
And if you think Amazon would not decide to lose some money now in order to build up market share, then you're completely forgetting how Amazon became Amazon in the first place.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
It's nice to be ripped off ;)
I always thought that Cisco should almost give you those books for free, to make more CCNAs so it would be a no-brainer for companies which hardware to buy as finding support would be easier. But in the real world...
Anyway, all technical books are like that. MCSE from MSFT is 40 quid each.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
If you're selling your books as bits, then "making it into a book" is a software process. The proof reader can do it as an incidental step.
Technical works are statistically insignificant.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
To make it worse, he has no excuse. The music industry does, they were the first to miss the boat on digital content. The movie industry should have caught on, but somehow didn't. The publishers should really have been able to figure it out; they had fair warning and opportunity and, seemingly, just couldn't connect the dots.
Big Content screwed up and is on the way out no matter how much they complain. Books are absolutely here to stay, but the profit model is shifting. Hopefully the huge economies of scale afforded by e-Books will allow the authors to profit more than under the current model. In any case, Amazon is sure to come out on top for the near future.
I don't quite agree with the analogy with music. People were downloading music files en masse and the recording industry was still refusing to budge their business model from the good ol' CD days. We had ipods in Australia before we had any real ability to buy music online (legally). With books, the situation is different - how many people download books compared with how many people buy them? This is not consumer-driven - it is a reaction of the publishers who can see the writing on the wall with the ever-
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Stephen King tried this. And it didn't work. Because he didn't get enough money at the end of each chapter, he stopped writing the story. Thereby screwing every single one of his fans who DID pay up, because they paid for an incomplete story.
Now, if a best selling author like King couldn't make this model work, what makes you think it's viable?
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
It was AFTER he broke all records by writing the ebook "Riding the Bullet", so I don't think you can say there was no demand or that the lack of e-readers was a barrier to success.
The difference was, Riding the Bullet was complete, and relatively cheap. And it made King a TON of money.
The Plant was done chapter by chapter. Even when the fans had a 75% or better payment, he increased the price and the audience disappeared. Then he stopped updating the tale.
All in all, he showed that the latter model (as advo
Re:This just in... (Score:5, Insightful)
Absolutely. Books are here to stay.
His real problem is a different one. With ebooks, many of the people living in the ecosystem BETWEEN the author and the reader are superfluous with ebooks.
If I like Neil Gaiman, and I read his blog. And he makes a new book, which is a pdf.
What do the two of us need anyone else for ? I can send him some cash, he can send me the book, end of story.
That's not an ending that Mr. Murdoch likes though, because it makes him irrelevant.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
We once had to cut dow
"Murdoch Wants" (Score:5, Insightful)
Well hell, there's reason enough for me to oppose whatever else is in the paragraph below, never mind TFA.
However, upon reading TFA I learned that he owns HarperCollins. So there's another publisher I don't need to feel bad about ignoring.
Re:"Murdoch Wants" (Score:5, Informative)
To those who modded this Flamebait: Ten media conglomerates control over 75% of the media in the U.S.A., and over 50% of the media in the world. But Fox "News" viewers are some of the worst-informed Americans. [people-press.org] Who do we blame but the CEO? And why would we believe different standards would apply to any other media under his control?
As an aside, I was asked to download comment.pl the first time I clicked reply. Then I got a reset connection. Finally, I got a reply form. Coincidence? :)
More context for that study. (Score:5, Informative)
Re:More context for that study. (Score:5, Insightful)
Blogs are almost by definition sources of opinion, not news. There is a big difference between the two. If they called it "Fox Televised Blogs" or "Fox Biased Opinions" then I would feel that they were being fair (in their title) but unbalanced. What is most irksome is that they are calling it news when it is actually opinions and propaganda.
I don't see how the context you provide makes it "not nearly as bad". The bottom of the pile is people who get no (non-local) news at all. The next rung up is people who get one-sided versions from blogs and Fox News and then above that is people who get their news from quasi-legitimate news sources.
At least Fox is rather blatant about being totally corporate controlled. The other so-called news sources, NYT, CBS, CNN, MSNBC, etc. are also corporate controlled but they are just a bit more subtle about it. I haven't looked at the study but I don't consider anyone who gets their news solely from American mainstream media to be well informed.
Re:"Murdoch Wants" (Score:5, Interesting)
I don't know if you want to keep putting that out there. Because a little further down you get to:
Men, on average, knew more than women, all other factors being equal
And it's apparently dramatically more than women. 45% vs. 25% "knowledge level high." That's inconvenient.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
I think I may be able to explain the discrepancy between the sexes; the government is beaming propaganda about world events via the mind control beams. Men will, of course, raise their tinfoil hats when meeting a lady.
Re:"Murdoch Wants" (Score:5, Interesting)
In other words, news junkies are better informed about various political hot topics (because that's what the survey measured) than people who don't give a damn, and the show that they watch is pretty much irrelevant. If you don't like Fox's opinionists, watch CNN. And vice versa. Odds are, you'll be just as well informed.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Sorry, but accuracy is important here, especially when so many people don't read the article.
The lowest scorer among "high knowledge" was... network news.
Wrong. The lowest scorer among high knowledge was Network Morning Shows. And if you've ever seen one, that should come as no surprise.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:"Murdoch Wants" (Score:5, Funny)
LOL at random idiot #105,908
You got my UID wrong.
who thinks that Fox is biased
You think it isn't?
and yet I'm sure that CBS, CNN, and MSNBC are somehow great news organizations.
Well, then you're not paying attention to my comment; please see my sig. CBS, CNN, and MSNBC are also all owned by one of these megacorporations.
Let me guess, registered Democrat?
Strike four, you must not be playing baseball or you'd already have been out. I'm a registered member of the Scorched Earth Party.
Yours shall, I hope, be the only troll comment to which I reply, mostly because you're logged in, and most of the others are anonymous cowards. Plus, yours seemed like the most fun to poop on.
So what he's saying is... (Score:5, Funny)
If a new product comes along that is cheaper and more desired by consumers the old product becomes a dead market? What fascinating insight! How can I pay money to see more news from this "Murdoch" guy?
Re: (Score:2)
Given that Murdoch is a conservative, you would have to believe the "consistent with his views" is a sarcasm. Why would he think his products are exempt from market demand? Live by the free market, die by the free market. Or at least adapt to the market.
Re: (Score:2)
I think he's a conservative in the older, pre-Reagan/Thatcher sense, which is more about maintaining the business status quo than promoting the "creative destruction" of free markets.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_assets_owned_by_News_Corporation [wikipedia.org]
Hurry, he's almost 80, the clock ticks on, and he can't spin that no matter what.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Surprised they own Gamespy and Hulu. Then again, Gamespy is garbage now since they changed up their site (as if they were somehow awesome before though) so I wouldn't care one way or another but Hulu is actually a pretty good site IMO.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
You realize his 101-year-old mother is still around and apparently doing quite well?
Silly Rupert (Score:4, Funny)
He thinks everything exists for the sole purpose of carrying a price tag.
Price??!? (Score:5, Insightful)
First they have to be cheaper then paper books.
Re:Price??!? (Score:4, Insightful)
Amazon's pricing is kind of weird. If I were the kind of person that HAD to have books when they first came out I might be tempted to buy a $9.99-$14.99 ebook rather than a $25.00-$30.00 hardcover. On the other hand, I'm quite likely to pick up the hardcover anyway - those things only sell because they're basically collectors editions.
The older books priced at around $2.50 look great. Those seem to be priced just right, although the public domain classics really should be $0.99.
Then there's the weird class of Kindle books that Amazon seems to be pricing around $8.39 (CAN). In most cases they seemed to be more expensive than the equivalent paperback, as Amazon's helpful price comparison pointed out.
There's no way I'm paying more than 50% of the price of a paperback for an e-book, and that fraction goes down the older that book gets.
Re:Price??!? (Score:5, Insightful)
If only there were people willing to do that work for free...
http://www.gutenberg.org/catalog/ [gutenberg.org]
http://books.google.com/ [google.com]
9.99 isn't CHEAP for an ebook you don't own (Score:5, Insightful)
You don't own the book, you can't sell it, you can't loan it and you can't donate it to a library. The paperback edition will eventually cost less than the 9.99 to 14.99 that Macmillan wants to charge. They need to enter the real world where you can go to a used bookstore a couple of months after a book is published and get it for less than their ebook prices.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Their new 'real world' is the one they seek to promote. One where there is no second sale, because there's nothing physical to sell.
Book publishers really dislike second sales of their work. They'd rather consumers threw them away.
The e-book market is tailor made for their strategy.
Re:9.99 isn't CHEAP for an ebook you don't own (Score:5, Interesting)
In music, of course, this revolution has come and gone, but-- I don't like downloading MP3s. I buy CDs, a good chunk of those used, either online or at the place down the street. I think of this as an 'automatic backup' of sorts. My friends, particularly the ones still in their 20's, think I am insane. "But dood, yo can get itoonz in like one click!" they say. Those are the people who will probably buy an e-book. They can buy it while they're on a bus or something. Very convenient.
* In publishing, not only do the big publishers know exactly how their stuff is selling (like what is sold, what is returned, what is stolen, what enters the second-hand market...), but they buy information they don't have so they know what their competitors are doing, too (e.g., a company called Monument Information Resource sells this). But not just that... publishers also occasionally sample bookstores to get a third view of that data. And, of course, there's lots of fraternizing between companies because employees switch jobs all the time. Anyway... they know what's going on, even at the piracy end. They are very clued into this by now.
Re:9.99 isn't CHEAP for an ebook you don't own (Score:4, Insightful)
The paperback edition will eventually cost less than the 9.99 to 14.99 that Macmillan wants to charge.
Yes, and you'll quite likely find that the price Macmillan wants to charge will drop as the paperbacks come out.
It's simple economics. Those who want it the day it comes out are generally prepared to pay a price premium for the privilege. Over time, the price drops, and others come in (trade paperback, mass market paperback.) Me? I only buy Terry Pratchett in hardcover; everybody else has to wait until mass market paperback, for various reasons.
Remember that publishers don't just print the books. They also edit them, lay them out, and market them. There are costs involved in those. Yes, the marginal costs of an ebook are so close to zero as to be almost indistinguishable. But if you have $20,000 in sunk costs, you're losing money unless you can make that back - so if there's a market for (say) 10,000 copies of the book, you need to charge, on average, over $2 a copy just to break even (yes, over two dollars - because there's an opportunity cost in sinking the money into books; if it takes ten years to make back the $20,000, you've lost money, even though on paper you've broken even, because of that opportunity cost - typically charged by banks as interest.)
So I expect to see the publishers of books take full advantage of the inherent price flexibility of electronic books by pushing the prices up high to start, and gradually dropping them until they're selling for maybe a couple of bucks a pop ... because that way, they'll make more money, which means they can publish more books for us to read.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
....now take a book to the beach
and watch the guy with the kindle squint to read the same as a ebook, then bet on if his batteries will fail before the kindle dies due to overheating in the sun, or becomes unusable due to salt or sand damage?
ebooks are now at least usable, but the readers are still too expensive and fragile to replace books (so far ...)
When the readers are much less fragile, and come down in price, then perhaps the book printing industry will contract, but if the publishers are smart they
Devalues books... (Score:4, Interesting)
Yes, eBooks DO devalue books - as they should. Books are just a very (very!) old medium.
What eBooks don't devalue is content, or at least they shouldn't. Up until now, the content has been tied to the medium in the publishing world. We've seen what happened when the two became decoupled with music and movies (and even video games, to some extent - at least for PC gaming), and it's about damn time that the same thing happens with the written word.
As for companies that sell hardcovers... well, sucks to be them. That's what happens when your business model is tied to a single medium.
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The part about hardcovers really confuses me.
Aren't they already hurting? Doesn't everyone just buy the paperback because they're so much cheaper? Does anyone actually buy a hardcover who doesn't specifically value a durable physical copy of a book for collection purposes? If I'm going to buy a hardcover over a paperback, I'm going to buy a hardcover over an eBook for my Kindle.
Otherwise, if ebooks are the more convenient and cheaper format, then yeah, they win. What's the big surprise? Oh noes, the sa
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
If hardcovers and paperbacks were released simultaneously, I expect many more people would flock to paperbacks. Take Harry Potter for example - if both versions had been available at one of those midnight releases, don't you think many people would have taken the cheaper route? They wanted it that night, and hardcover was the only option, so that's what they paid for.
I agree - if I'm going to buy a hardcover over a paperback, then I'd probably also get a hardcover over an ebook. But usually if I'm buying a
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
The problem with hardcovers in the US is the extortionist pricing (it's just paper and cardboard FFS) and the sometimes multi-year wait until softcover editions come out. Hop over to Canada and you will see much saner retail pricing in their bookstores. Books are much cheaper in Japan too and the paper, printing, and binding is WAY higher quality than what you can get in North American mass market publications. If hard cover book sales suffer in the US it's because we're tired of being raped and finally hav
Competition (Score:5, Insightful)
"But I think it really devalues books, and it hurts all the retailers of the hardcover books.'"
No kidding. Competition is funny that way.
Ok by me... (Score:2)
I buy most books that I own, used, discounted or remaindered. I was thinking about kindle, but you have to be a better overall solution than the one that I am used to.
Re:Ok by me... (Score:4, Insightful)
5) Being able to change the fonts type and its size.
What is his problem? (Score:5, Insightful)
If they're getting paid $14 and the retailer is selling it at a loss, well, he already got $14 for it!
What about the power part? book don't need them! (Score:2)
What about the power part? real books don't need them!
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
What about the power part? real books don't need them!
You have to ask yourself how much energy it takes to produce a book. Certainly they contain quite a bit of energy [metro.co.uk]...
Books (Score:3, Insightful)
Paper books will always live. One the one hand, there are still a billion people in the world without access to regular electricity. On the other, we might have limited resources in the future to make new electronic devices, due to peak oil and climate change. Yet, we can always make paper on a small, local scale if necessary. But electronic devices require a large industrial infrastructure.
After all, we have thousands of years of written human history, but only a tiny moment of digital history. It would be presumptuous of us to assume the latter will last longer than the former.
http://www.selfdestructivebastards.com/2009/10/ebooks-versus-paper.html [selfdestru...stards.com]
Re: (Score:2)
Uh we have thousands of years of bits and pieces of history -translated and adulterated as the editors saw fit. Thera nothing wrong with the written word but I would say we've recorded a million more times the history in the last decade than was recorded in all of history due to the digital revolution.
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Disagree... paper's days are limited as a mass media medium. Sure we'll still have limited paper runs for certain "classics" and for official documents. But your general "Michael Crichton" book will no longer come in paper format. This is of course once we've figured out how to do the ebook properly.
The information market was like the housing market (Score:3, Interesting)
Information has artificially inflated in value. The prices coming down are a natural result of people realizing this.
We have been paying too much for books, films, and music for years. Party's over. They still get to make profit, just not obscene profit.
Re:The information market was like the housing mar (Score:2)
It really depends though. Some information has a large cost associated with its creation.
Re:The information market was like the housing mar (Score:5, Insightful)
Book publishing is an expensive business and e-books level the playing field considerably. The three biggest costs in book production are (not necessarily in this order):
1. Printing
2. Marketing
3. Distribution
A publisher needs to have confidence that a book will sell X copies at Y price in order to know that they will at least break even on publishing it. And I guarantee you that every publisher has a warehouse full of books they guessed wrong on and nobody bought. But those costs are sunk. They pay get pennies on the dollar at the paper recycler but otherwise they've blown a lot of cash printing books they never sold.
As on-demand, and now e-book, publishing has become more and more viable the break-even point has come WAY down and books that would never have seen the light of day are getting their chance.
And publishers should LOVE eBooks - it takes printing and distribution largely out of the equation and means far greater profits off a much lower price. I wouldn't mind if my publisher did Kindle versions of my books, that's just one more medium and a much higher net profit from the books.
Books vs. E-books (Score:3, Interesting)
That said. I can't afford the dead-tree versions of alot of the books I want. So I have to resort to e-books. The people like Murdoch need to catch up with the times. Amazon makes it to where I can afford to read the books I love. As far as I'm concerned, they get my business because they tend to do things for the customers from what I've seen, not their wallets.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
As much as I like having shelves and shelves of books, I'm really paying for the data, not the storage. If an ebook is the cheapest, I buy it unless it is on a very short list of authors I like in hardback.
If, for some idiotic reason, the ebook costs more than cutting down a tree, pulping it, and printing words on the dried remains, then I buy the paperback and warez the ebook(or drop it in the hopper of the industrial scanner at work).
And I imagine the publisher doesn't make as much the second way.
Re: (Score:2)
Looking at a screen trying to read an e-book just sucks in my opinion(admittedly I have yet to use the Nook or other such devices).
I'm with you, and still generally prefer dead trees, but e-ink has really changed the experience of reading digital documents. You're not staring at a screen. You're staring at a print-out. You can sit on the couch and read it. It's still doesn't have the charm of a real book, but everything that sucks about e-books is gone and the nice things (like digital bookmarks and ta
Re:Books vs. E-books (Score:5, Insightful)
That's funny. I prefer my Kindle for the exact same reason. There's just something I love about sitting on a recliner with my Kindle in my hands, turning the pages as I read, without having to worry about holding down the pages so that the pages don't close on me or damaging the spines of the books permanently by opening up the pages too much.
I'd rather very much focus on the book and its content, as I can with Kindle (or any ebook reader with reflective screen, really), not how I am struggling with its physical manifestation.
Re:Books vs. E-books (Score:4, Insightful)
admittedly I have yet to use the Nook or other such devices
Try an e-Ink screen. It's great. You have to read a lot to make it worth your while to buy an e-Ink reader, but unless you're one of the few who can read LCD all day and all night without eyestrain, it's a real pleasure to use.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
ASCII text
Tough Choice (Score:4, Insightful)
Feudal corporatism in action (Score:2)
this is what happens when you let a handful of individuals own huge economic resources. they become like feudal lords, asserting their own will to majority of the people. here, behold, technology has improved, there is a possibility of cheaper goods being available to public. but, the feudal corporate structure doesnt want to let it happen. so much for 'free market', so much for 'invisible hand'. this is just in line with another observation i posted in a similar thread before :
http://slashdot.org/comments. [slashdot.org]
Paper trumps electronic (Score:3, Interesting)
e-readers have their place. I'd say it would be for viewing more dynamic docs or quick reference over a networked feed for tech docs. Paper books, for me, are not replaceable. You don't have to worry so much about a paperback. I can smack my son (allegedly) with it when he acts like a kook. I can throw it off a twenty story building and it still works. I can treat my book like the $6.00 price it cost.
I know this is an old argument. I am an old dude, (allegedly), but I see what my son reads. And how he reads, and he decidedly did not want an e-reader for his reading needs.
I just wish I could buy books printed on hemp like God intended.!
Duh! (Score:2)
Prices (Score:5, Insightful)
This is a preemptive reply to the ten million people who are about to post variations on the following theme
"e-books should only cost a few dollars because they don't have the cost of printing/shipping/storing a book"
This is wrong.
This is wrong because actually printing a book is the smallest cost involved in making one. When you look at the price of, say, a $35 hardcover book perhaps $4 is physical costs. Almost all of the cost of a book is the cost of paying the author/editor/proofreader plus the retail markup. These costs remain the same regardless of format.
And you will note that I have not mentioned publisher's profit. That's because there basically isn't one. Publishing is notorious for having no profit margin. Always has been. It was famous for not making money a century ago, famous for it fifty years ago and still a great way to get well known while losing money today. Publishing is not the music industry and it is not the movie industry. Almost all the profit is spent in up-front costs before the product even hits the streets.
Because of this, publishing has always had a very sane pricing policy. First they publish the hardcover for a high price point. Everyone who can't wait to read it buys it. Then if it is popular enough to pay off the costs six months or a year later they produce a softcover for $10 to pick up everyone who didn't want it enough to pay the hardcover costs.
Now, this doesn't mesh very well with the electronic music or video markets which is why Amazon tries to run with a fixed price point. But that's a nuts way of doing things when you are talking about books. Doesn't work because it doesn't pay off the fixed costs involved in paying the people who produce the books.
So, really, a fair e-book price is about $5 less than whatever it is selling for on the shelf. When a book first comes out that means $30-$40. A year or so later $6 is pretty likely. If you can't stand waiting don't bitch about the higher price.
For a real understanding, check out this post from John Scalzi (author) that is really fantastic
http://whatever.scalzi.com/2010/01/30/a-quick-note-on-ebook-pricing/ [scalzi.com]
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MSRP may be $30-$40, but I've never seen an actual hardcover that was actually selling for that that wasn't giant book o' stunning pictures. Most of the time you get them for "40% off!!!" which brings new hardcovers into the 17-24 range.
Publishing is not the music industry and it is not the movie industry. Almost all the profit is spent in up-front costs before the product even hits the streets.
Got it, it's the movie industry. Unless those "up-front" costs are actually printing and storage costs. But that wouldn't jive well with your assertion that printing is a tiny fraction of the cost of bringing a book to market.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Baen's eBook price is a lot lower than $9.99...
Re:Prices (Score:4, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
"....blah blah blah about why ebooks should be almost as expensive as real ones..."
Bullshit.
Double Bullshit, in fact.
See, the point you're overlooking is that the costs you mention are FLAT.
What the author is paid for his intellectual and (very hard) work is a flat amount. Note, I of course recognize that this isn't true in the real world, most authors are paid a floating number - this make sense, as they are 'sharing' the profit over time, mainly so that the publishers can pay them less to start. They're
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Almost as common are books that bleed money and end up in a bulk recycler by the thousands
Part of the advantage of ebooks is that you avoid the wastage problem. Ebooks are always "on demand" - you never have to do a 10,000 run "on spec", only to sell 200 and ditch the rest.
Even so, I'd consider 25% off the physical pretty good
Okay (Score:5, Interesting)
How is this NOT price fixing? They use licensing semantics to do an end run around the idea, but in the end it's price fixing. Last I heard, anti competitive practices like that are illegal in the United States.
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How is this NOT price fixing?
How is what not price-fixing? Murdoch's desire to sell goods for a higher price, or Amazon's desire to sell them for $9.99 or less?
In both cases, the answer is no. Price fixing is when an oligarchy of industry players collude to set prices. A single player desiring certain prices is not price fixing.
You have it backwards (Score:3, Insightful)
Price fixing is when multiple producers of a similar product collude to fix the price at which all of them will sell.
That's essentially what Amazon is trying to do.
It's not price fixing to sell to your wholesale customers in a contractual arrangement that includes a retail price floor.
This is called business.
Let's do the math. (Score:5, Interesting)
eBook: $10.00
# times you can loan: 0
# years you can own: probably 10
Resale value: $0.00
Paperback: $7.00
# times you can loan: personal best, oh, about 10
# years you can own: personal best, 34
Resale value: personal best, $27.00
Yeh, I can see how eBooks are undercutting paperbacks.
Hardcovers? Who buys hardcovers?
eBooks (Score:3, Informative)
Hi,
First of all i have to mention that i am addicted to reading.
This was already a problem as a kid: Once i was ill my aunt gave me five books as a gift. The next morning i called her and asked for more. In a hindsight, this was really embarrassing.
But once i started earning good money, this problem has multiplied. I am running out of shelf space. With my marriage i gave away about 1.000 books to friends just to have a little space for my wifes books.
So started with ebooks as a measure of self defence. I started with the Iliad Irex about 3-4 years ago. Since then i purchased several hundred ebooks. The good thing is: i drive on vacation without any fear of running out of input.
Therefor i am very interested in everything that concerns costs of books.
I totally hate any kind of DRM. Since i started i went through several different reader. Any restriction to move a book with me feels like theft. This one reason my favorite publisher is Baen. They have the most honest approach towards the reader. I think Eric Flints Introducing the Baen Free Library [baen.com] gives the best summary on that topic ever written.
I also worked as author, editor and publisher for books (on a very small scale). Therefor i know how much money is in the production (very little) and distribution (a lot) process and how little ends up with the authors. So i think that ebooks will greatly improve the percentage an author will get from the book sales (but not the overall revenue).
Current contracts give authors a certain percentage of all revenue. So it is in the interest of publishers and authors to get the prices as high as possible. But while the publishers still get the same share, they do a lot less for the sale of an ebook than for one of a paperback.
So at this point customers are on the side of Amazon, that an ebook should cost significantly less than a paper based book.
Currently the frontlines run between Amazon and the customers on one side and publishers and authors on the other. But the authors are not on that side due to their own interest but due to the current publishing system. I don't think that this situation will remain static. The publishers are bound to loose the authors as allies and then the fight next.
A typical question is: It's the same book, why shpould the reader pay less for an eboook?
It is the same book but it is not the same service. With a paper based book, they have to print it, ship it through the world, provide shelf space in the bookstore, pay the cashier guy,...
The transport of an ebook is by a factor 1.000 cheaper than a paper book, the cashier is fully automated, it does not take shelf space,....
If the producer has less costs, the product should become cheaper.
Where i agree: The author provides the same service, so he/she should get the same amount as before.
Who works less is the publisher and the bookstore. They should get less for an ebook.
The problem is the typical contract between author and publisher. Usually there is a certain fix percentage of the revenue (no matter wether ebook or paper book) designated for the author. While the percantage of an author at a book is around 10-15%, it should be higher (e.g. 30%) for ebooks. Of course the publishers are not in favor....
Publishers dislike ebooks not just due to the prices. If ebooks become too popular, the need for publishers is decreasing. An author could go just directly to Amazon without the help of publisher. Currently an ebook will not sell very well if there is no paper book to create demand. But this will change. The publishers (like the RIAA before them) wants to fight it. But they will have as much success as fighting entropy....
Personally i am totally in favor of the development. The service i am interested in is someone like Pat writing fascinating novels. I am also willing to pay for the editor and the distribution. But i am not interested in trees getting chopped down and trucks blowing carbon dioxide into the air while carrying harcovers.
CU, Martin
Not a New Concept (Score:4, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
The Encyclopedia Britannica costs $70/a for an online subscription. It costs $1300 for a paper copy. People still buy the paper copy.
Not many. Britannica has been in trouble for years. When Microsoft did Encarta, they talked to Britannica about some kind of business arrangement. Britannica turned Microsoft down. Years later, with Britannica doing badly, they went to see Bill Gates, who told them that, because of their expensive sales force, their organization now had "negative value".
Of Course it devalues Books (Score:4, Insightful)
The real issue here is that Murdoch and other redundant publishers no longer get to control the scarcity in the market, plus with the lowered cost barriers to market entry, a LOT more fish are now feeding in the same pond.
A solution (Score:4, Interesting)
1) If you want to charge me $15 for an ebook, I would like to get the ebook immediately, followed by the real printed book in snail mail. Don't care how long it takes to arrive, as long as it does.
2) If you want to charge me $15 for a paperback, I would like to be able to register online somehow and also download the ebook.
ie: the ebook costs practically fuck all to duplicate and distribute. Leverage that advantage and turn it into a bonus.
I will not pay $15 for an ebook, ever. Especially if it's festooned with DRM. I will wait until the paperback is out (of course, I'm in Australia, where we get royally fucked because of bullshit book distribution laws, so it'll be more like $22 for the paperback, but still).
Well Yeh (Score:4, Insightful)
Sure ebooks hurt the retail merchants but so what? Industries are not protected nor should they be. Buggy builders were slaughtered by the automobile. The telegraph industry was murdered by the telephone and computer industry. Telephone operators were blown out of work by electronic switchboards. Lawn workers were smacked down by gasoline mowers. The list is endless. So just why are we to be concerned about the loss of retail book sellers? Take a peek at movie theaters. In 1930 theaters were absolutely enormous. Today there is no such thing as a theater that seats 20,000. Soon even the small theaters that still exist will probably vanish as the television industry has better and better technology.
Uh, yeah.... (Score:5, Insightful)
... it's that the basic point... eBooks are SUPPOSED to kill paper books. Or at least replace them, for those who use eBooks. Who will more every year, particularly once the proprietary formats fail and eBooks can be ready by every eBook reader.
As for Hardcover prices... well, there's a difference between the quality and longevity of a hardcover versus the paperback. That's the only true value of the hardcover book. The rest is marketing... the early release... like seeing a film in the theater now, or waiting for the DVD or Blu-Ray later... or the HBO presentation later still.
But that's not true of an eBook... there is virtually no cost of duplication, far cheaper to make than paperbacks. And more restricted, at least with DRM; you can't resell them, or lend them in any real way. You may not be able to annotate them, either. Thus, much less value than a paperback, in the same way that MP3 and AACs are of lower value -- the product itself, then a CD. Some value may be regained at the point-of-sale; they're sold in other ways: singles and impulse... I can buy a piece of a CD, and have it right now. That keeps the basic individual price relative high.. and yet, I've still managed to buy whole MP3 albums on Amazon for $2-$4 each. Which is about the right value, versus an $8-12 CD, or $15-$20 SACD or DVD-Audio Disc.
It's understandable that the publishers don't like this, in general. For one, they understand hardcovers and paperbacks, but can't quite get their heads wrapped around an eBook as being something different. They want it to be a hardcover, Amazon wants it to be a paperback, but delivered at about the same time as a hardcover. I think, in reality, this is a different form, and needs to be treated as such. For one, there are lots of publisher's expenses associated with a hardcover: printing fees, distribution, in-store kiosks, maybe shelving fees, etc. All of these, at the very least, should be subtracted from the retail price and the publisher's piece of the book sale. Otherwise, they're going to be using this as a trick to increase revenues, even though they're performing significantly less of a service.
And in fact, that's the real issue here. The book publishing industry has never been quite as abusive of "the talent" as the record industry, but they still want the bulk of profits if they can get it. If I buy a book, it still lists the author's copyright... most CDs will claim a copyright by the record company, despite their being just another kind of publisher. This has resulted in push-back by artists, some self-publishing, some going all digital or mostly digital. That works, particularly for established artists (Prince, Radiohead, Nine Inch Nails, etc). The rise of eBooks will enable this same route by writers. Maybe not for awhile.. the eBook reader is a relative new thing, but already at some level of acceptance due to the use of general purpose computers, just as the walkman and similar personal stereos laid the ground for an easy acceptance, then dominance, of the MP3 player/PMP.
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I noticed that pictures advertising the iPad always have the New York Times front and center. I think a deal has already been done between Apple and News Corp.
Re:Not for My Personal Library (Score:4, Informative)
Exactly... Especially when the government decides to ban a book and all your copies of it mysteriously disappear... Maybe not in the USA, but I can see it happening in many other countries.
China decides to ban a book and everyones government provided ereader deletes it. Book burning of the 21st century.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re:One other thing (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Just let Ebooks die already (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Just let Ebooks die already (Score:4, Insightful)
If you're seen the e-ink based electronic book reader such as the Sony Reader, I have to disagree with you. With e-ink, the text is very sharp and readable, and the weight of the PRS-600 Sony Reader with touchscreen interface is around 10 ounces--lighter than many hardback novels nowadays. If you're going on a trip and plan to read a lot, lot easier to carry one PRS-600 than carrying a whole bunch of books.