Amazon Caves To Publishers On eBook Pricing 236
AusPublishingWorker writes "With the iPad arriving on the scene, it seems that Amazon is feeling the pressure on eBook pricing from publishers. ITNews reports that Amazon has agreed to deals with both Harper Collins and Simon and Schuster which would allow the companies to select their own prices rather than the default US$9.99 price tag. Given the recent deal with Macmillan, it seems likely that we'll be seeing eBook prices moving up towards $14.99 in the near future."
$14.99 seems way too high for an eBook. (Score:5, Funny)
Re:$14.99 seems way too high for an eBook. (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:$14.99 seems way too high for an eBook. (Score:4, Informative)
I guess the publishers (years of experience working against them I fear) might be thinking that Amazon couldn't possibly stay afloat with this pricing model and don't want to see the other retailers go out of business as well. I for one am glad that Baen (the only publisher with any degree of sense about ebooks) has a few authors I actually like - they actually sell DRM free books and do very well. You guys should check out Eric Flint's writing on the matter (http://www.baen.com/library/). It is very refreshing to see an author (with the full support of his publishing house) writing something so exquisitely sensible about DRM and piracy and the whole "authors getting ripped off" crop of shenanigans.
Just remember that corporations, while proclaiming the virtues of the free market on the one hand, will gladly blow anyone (including the government or even their competitors) for a bit of protectionist backscratching. In fact, this whole Amazon debacle stinks to me of a Survivor-like scenario where the best people are knocked out early. There are no Hank Reardens or Dagny Taggarts in the real world - the sooner we accept it and move on, the lesser the number of ulcers we have to suffer through
I will stress again (for skimmers - NTTAWWT) - this is purely speculative. It seems plausible to me but I have no facts about this.
Re:$14.99 seems way too high for an eBook. (Score:4, Insightful)
Therefore I have the right to take it for free.
At your local library -- if you bring it back in 2 weeks. Otherwise,no, it doesn't. You not liking their pricing structure does not give you the right to violate their copyright. (Unless you are Google, that is.)
Re:$14.99 seems way too high for an eBook. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:$14.99 seems way too high for an eBook. (Score:5, Funny)
Do you guys not hear a loud Whooosh! as the feepness' sarcasm goes sailing over your heads?
Re: Whoosh (Score:4, Funny)
Whoosh is no longer allowed now that J J Abrams copyrighted for Lost.
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You are correct. He does not have the right. What this kind of rip off gives him however is the motivation. He is not the only one either. There will be many others who feels that these greedy bastards deserve what they get. Too bad about the poor authors caught in the middle.
Unless the person was lifting books from B&N or other bookstores before this all his statement (admittedly sarcastic) indicates is that he's gutless.
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Do authors and publishers get paid every time a their book is checked out from the library? If not, I fail to see the difference. You've paid your taxes support the library, who cares where the book comes from at that point?
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Therefore I have the right to take it for free.
At your local library -- if you bring it back in 2 weeks. Otherwise,no, it doesn't. You not liking their pricing structure does not give you the right to violate their copyright. (Unless you are Google, that is.)
Two weeks, I get to keep mine for pretty much as long as possible (except on a few select books with exceptionally high demand) by simply calling or logging in and indicating that I'd like to renew. No questions asked.
Re:$14.99 seems way too high for an eBook. (Score:5, Insightful)
Exactly. When CD prices went from 10-12 bucks to 18-20 bucks suddenly during the mid 90's I stopped buying CDs and I never have bought one since. I go to 20-30 shows a year though and usually buy tour shirts at the show.
I own a Sony PRS-600, a 1st gen Kindle and an Edge [entourageedge.com] and I have never bought a single e-book because they are worth to me about 3-5 bucks a piece, not 10 bucks. Maybe if you read a book a month that is worth it but I read 2-3 books a week and I'm not about to spend 100+ a month on books when for my entire life buying new and used paper books I have never even come close to that. Can't even sell the damn things. Powell's a book store in PDX where I live I used to be able to recoup 50-60% of the price I paid for the books by trading for store credit, with Amazon, Apple and Sony you get a 10 dollar book sitting in your Library that you will likely never read again.
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I own a Sony PRS-600, a 1st gen Kindle and an Edge [entourageedge.com] and I have never bought a single e-book because they are worth to me about 3-5 bucks a piece, not 10 bucks.
Why would you buy a kindle if you weren't going to buy the books? That just baffles me.
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It may not justify piracy, but that doesn't mean people won't be doing it. And this is what publishers might be doing to a technology that is responsible for increasing readership. Kinda shooting yourself in the foot.
The prices for ebooks will be the same, if not higher in many instances [1], as the paper versions for something you
- can't resell
- can't give away
- can't lend [2]
- might disappear from your device
So you paid $300 to lose some of the weight and increase your consumption of the product, with t
Competition good for consumers (Score:2)
I agree (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:I agree (Score:5, Interesting)
It's not enough to simply show that a law might not be relevant; you have to show that it is not relevant. The law prevents expedient copying from devaluing new artworks, which are both in demand and (unlike the copies thereof) scarce. The faster and cheaper the copying technology, the less likely a person is to support the artist, the less likely the artist will create a new work.
Copying has only become faster and cheaper. Now, more than ever, copyright is relevant.
Now here comes the difficult bit: convincing you that a legal document written 200 years ago might still be relevant. It wouldn't be the first, and I believe certain other documents (e.g. magna carta) break this record.
Re:I agree (Score:4, Insightful)
If you consider works that were made 70 years ago new, that's a problem.
If the purpose is to protect the artist, why are artworks from dead artists still under copyright? Who are we protecting? Are those artists, dead for 20, 40, 60 years going to produce new works?
That legal document was produced to protect artist from producers. Now, it's helping the producers subdue others. See the title? "Amazon Caves To Publishers On eBook Pricing". That was not their intentions when they wrote it.
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Copying has only become faster and cheaper. Now, more than ever, copyright is relevant.
Exactly why our copyright system is broken. It's designed for publishers not artists. Publishers are quickly going obsolete and we shouldn't be using copyright to prop them up.
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What give you the right to ignore the laws of the country you live in? You don't like a law? Work to change it. Work to change the laws concerning DRM and extending copyright.
I'm conservative and I agree with you that DRM, and copyright, due to the never ending extensions that Congress keeps tacking on to it, laws are broken. But, that doesn't give either of us the "right" to break other laws. There's lots of laws I think are unjust and counterproductive but ignoring them is not the way to go. You onl
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What give you the right to ignore the laws of the country you live in? You don't like a law? Work to change it. Work to change the laws concerning DRM and extending copyright.
Disobeying laws is a way of working to change them. Just ask that skinny Indian dude... Ben Kingsley.
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Ghandi didn't base his opposition in dishonesty. He based it solely on, and his protests in, highly moral principles and actions. That's why his opposition worked. He had the moral high ground and he kept it. What's being promoted here immediately takes to the "morally challenged ground", to put it nicely, and gets worse from there. It won't, and can't, work.
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What dishonesty? He believe the law was broken, so he publicly broke it and encouraged other to break it.
The fact that you believe he was right doesn't change the action.
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You're missing my point, and whether I believe Ghandi was right or wrong is immaterial. Ghandi's behavior was entirely ethical. He didn't advocate anything that could even be misconstrued as dishonest, or violent, behavior. That's how he took the moral high ground, and that's how he kept it. That's why and how he won....
What's being supported here is considered theft. That puts the adherents of what is being promoted here, in the public eye, as being dishonest. Maybe you guys don't consider it theft,
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He believe the law was broken, so he publicly broke it
That is a far cry from privately violating someone's copyright. If you went out into the public and started making copies and distributing them, then you might be on the same level as Ghandi, and you would be undertaking Civil Disobedience. Breaking the law, and attempting to hide your actions, as is common with piracy, is not civil disobedience. The important part is that to undertake civil disobedience you have to do it openly, and be willing to suffer the consequences of your actions. Remember that Gha
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He based it solely on, and his protests in, highly moral principles and actions. That's why his opposition worked. He had the moral high ground and he kept it.
Once you bring the word "moral" into the discussion, then "opinion" also enters into it.
A lady who is riding in the part of the bus where current law makes it illegal for her to ride because of her skin color is "moral" today to the vast majority of people, but when it happened, there were a lot more people who just thought she was "some damn scofflaw".
Today, there is a growing opinon (i.e., morality) that says grossly overcharging for a product is wrong (i.e., immoral). In many cases of vital (milk, bread
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
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...conservatives...I can't get them to understand that a legal document written 200 years ago might, just might, not be 100% relevant any more.
Let alone non-legal documents written much, much longer ago than that...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bible [wikipedia.org]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koran [wikipedia.org]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talmud [wikipedia.org]
etc.
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This would be why said document does have a method by which to change it. Liberals seem to forget about that part because it's difficult.
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As countless posters following will point out, you don't have the right to take it for free. But at a certain price, you will have the motivation. It is only human nature. We make cost/benefit analyses all the time, often without even thinking deeply about them. An industry which prices its product above that price point which the average consumer thinks is reasonable is just begging for trouble.
When VHS movies came out in the early 80's, they cost upwards of $100 or so. There were shortly illegal copies of
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Don't take it or nobody will be able to buy it. Leave a copy at least.
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Therefore I have the right to take it for free.
Or purchase the book in paperback where the price will hopefully be less. If not then 14.99 seems like a good deal as no other sales version of the book is cheaper.
Authors agree: $14.99 way too high for an eBook. (Score:5, Informative)
A lot of authors (and I'm one) would agree with you on the pricing issue -- if not on the "right" to take it for free. Some of them will give it to you if you ask nicely (or visit their website) though.
Author J.A. Konrath has been blogging [blogspot.com] recently about how much he's been making ($4200 last month) off of his low priced ($1.99, $2.99) e-books on Kindle (books he's selling directly, vs others of his that his publisher is selling at higher prices). Unsurprisingly, lower priced books sell better than higher priced ones -- and in his and a few other authors' cases, they're selling pro-quality, professionally edited stories, not unreadable crud by a newbie author. His view is that the high prices publishers want to charge for e-books is a serious mistake, and in his next book deals he's not going to give e-rights to the publisher unless they fork over some serious (six-figure) cash for them, and a better percentage royalty.
This very much parallels what some bands are doing with distributing their music themselves rather than going through RIAA companies. Indeed the term "indie author" is catching on.
There still needs to be some vetting of an unknown author's work, either by traditional publishing or word of mouth and reviews from early readers, but the change is coming. I'm certainly considering making some of my own work (initially previously-published stuff to which I have e-rights) available that way. Even a little success that way gives a bit more leverage with a traditional publisher (which is still the most profitable route to go and will be for a few more years yet).
Before the anti-ebook posts accumulate, (Score:5, Interesting)
let me just give a preemptive counterperspective.
I buy ebooks and I'll buy them at this price, too.
Yes, I prefer (by far) reading using ebook readers with eink displays. Since the first Kindle emerged I've probably read 10,000 pages or so using ebook readers. Love them.
Also, tools exist to unDRM and convert between just about every ebook format, including Mobi, Azw, Topaz, ePub, PDF, Lit, PDB, and others, so books can in fact travel with you as you upgrade devices in the future, should you choose to go this route.
Um, (Score:2)
to contribute a little royalty to the authors? And because I suspect brand new releases aren't on that "nice bay place," and I have better things to do than trudge all over the internet looking for something to read when I can just drop a few bucks and not waste my time?
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As long as they continue to sell, they'll keep them DRMed. You're hurting all consumers by promoting DRMed books.
I refuse to buy DRMed book, so I buy physical books, even if they're more inconvenient.
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I doubt any OCR scanned books you find on torrent sites have proper formatting for your reader. And that makes a lot of difference. So then you're stuck formatting a 400 page book yourself, to save $10.
And that is if you can find a copy of whatever book you want. It's hard enough to find them on ebook stores as one may have it, and another may not.
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I doubt any OCR scanned books you find on torrent sites have proper formatting for your reader.
Weird, I've... *cough*... heard... that the ebooks you download from an average torrent site are OCR'd to plain text, and so are readable on basically anything that will support that format (which is, AFAIK, essentially any reader on the market today).
Granted, you will suffer from more typos and errors, and definitely imperfect page layout. But they work just fine.
The Real Issue (Score:4, Interesting)
The same phenomenon could be observed with iTunes' .99 cents pricing. Attempts to raise the price higher (especially without unilateral price raises across the board of offerings and publishers) resulted in significant sales drops.
It is also one reason we may never see a $99 netbook. That sub-factor of 10 number is quite magical for sales numbers, but kills any hope of raising prices in the future to combat inflation, increased salaries, admittedly raising profits, etc.
Re:The Real Issue (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem with pricing books at $9.99 is the stickiness of the price tag. What is meant by this is consumer' perception of value. Although you can achieve large sales volume at price "below $10", if you ever try to raise the price by even a tiny amount, say $1, consumers *feel* like the markup was much higher than it really is, and sales subsequently drop off heavily.
You sound like a marketing major. They seem to be the only ones who believe that garbage. I don't know anyone who is fooled by pricing at 9.99 and being told "under $10". Just call it $10.
Re:The Real Issue (Score:5, Interesting)
You sound like a marketing major. They seem to be the only ones who believe that garbage. I don't know anyone who is fooled by pricing at 9.99 and being told "under $10". Just call it $10.
Almost everyone is fooled by 9.99 and "under $10" pricing.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychological_pricing [wikipedia.org]
Endless studies have been done on the matter and it works.
We like to pretend that demand curves are smooth, but they aren't.
They go through all kinds of weird contortions because humans are not 100% rational market actors.
Re:The Real Issue (Score:5, Funny)
Almost everyone is fooled by 9.99 and "under $10" pricing.
Those people are known as women and they do that to justify their spending addictions.
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Almost everyone is fooled by 9.99 and "under $10" pricing. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychological_pricing [wikipedia.org] Endless studies have been done on the matter and it works.
The trick is to call the $9.99 $10.00 and then stop looking at the damn number. (Out of sight out of mind anyone?) The longer you stare at it, the more of a phycological impact $9.99 will have.
Prices like $2.98 still make me personally totter a bit, though. I mean, what the hell is with that number!? Thanks for the wikipedia link
Re:The Real Issue (Score:5, Insightful)
I've seen it consistently at my mother-in-law's consignment shop and she confirms the behavior over the entire lifetime of the business (which has been in business for 14 years). Price it at $X.99 instead of $X+1 and you'll see almost twice as many sales. Similarly--though much more confusingly--people tend to buy stuff marked "Buy One, Get One 50% off," instead of "Buy One, Get One Free!"
I really don't get that one...
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I really don't get that one...
I can top that. Back in 7th grade, my cousin and I were selling lottery tickets door to door for charity. As a joke at the first house on our route, I said:
And the guy at the door wanted to buy four for twenty.
Figuring it was just a fluke, we tried it at the next house. Same thing. So we did it the entire route. Out of about a hundred houses, only a handful of people batted an eyebrow and asked if we didn't mean five for twenty.
I susp
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This reminds me of something that happened when I was in highschool that I found really funny. I was selling candy bars f
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The psychology of pricing is pretty weird.
Science Friday interviewed someone that wrote a book on pricing "Priceless":
http://www.sciencefriday.com/program/archives/201001015 [sciencefriday.com]
For most people, the psychology of pricing probably isn't conscious.
I'm not sure what the prices should be, but I don't think the low-ball pricing advocated by some in this thread is necessarily going to yield sales volumes that offset the lost per-unit profit, I'm not sure it's necessarily sustainable.
Anti-intellectualism (Score:2)
Would it kill you to admit that a marketing major might know a little more about this than you?
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While I don't doubt that reasonably intelligent consumers see through pricing psychology, there are numerous studies that clearly demonstrate the effectiveness of pricing endings (the cents) that are just one penny below the dollar (or euro or whatever) when large groups of consumers are involved. In fact, consumer preference for the $8.99 product over an identical product priced at $9.00 (or similar differences) is so commonplace that the questions being asked now aren't about whether it happens but why.
Re: Cents (Score:2)
It might have something to do with the next evil trick in the marketing book.
If your Fast Food Chain offers "Burgers for 99c" as a consumer it's easy to see that. But once it becomes "Burgers for $1.00" it's like a glass barrier broken. Then after some hand wringing, it will be "$1.25" and then "$1.35" and then it takes off like a bottle rocket.
It's harder for a consumer to price compare $1.35 at Ye Olde Tourist Trappe vs $1.25 Strip Plaza.
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I was at a store the other day and was rounding the numbers like that when talking about prices. Every time I said '$15' he would correct me with '$14.99'. I tried in vain to show how annoying it was, but he never got the hint.
I didn't buy from him. (I'm pretty sure I didn't even buy from that store.)
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From a comment in the engadget article: It's actually already out in the U.S. I was at a Kmart the other day and in the electronics dept. they had these sitting there but the kid had no idea if they were $149 or $99. I checked it out and it was terrible. The mouse buttons are insane, it has a 400Mhz Samsung CPU, and is pretty much worthless in build quality. They had 3 of them though on the shelf in the case.
So I should have qualified my statement with "legitimate, quality $99 netbook".
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It makes much more sense to buy the CD, rip it (at higher bitrates than Apple provides) and resell it, for a per-song price closer to $0.25.
You could save even more money by torrenting it, both of these are copyright violations. Format shifting is OK, but "making a backup" and then selling it is not.
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It makes much more sense to buy the CD, rip it (at higher bitrates than Apple provides) and resell it, for a per-song price closer to $0.25.
An immediate per-song cost of $0.25. A hell of a lot higher if you ever get charged for your copyright violations.
It's fair use, not a copyright violation.
No, fair use doesn't apply too something you don't own.
Time-shifting, format-shifting, etc., as fair use all rely on the assumption that you have the right to the content in some format. Once you sell the original, you have no right to that content any more, and are technically required to destroy any copies you have made for personal use.
It gets greyer if you own a vinyl album and in some way temporarily obtain a copy of the CD and rip that. I'd call it fair use, but I'm not a judge or jury.
Not All Books Will Be Priced Equally (Score:3, Interesting)
I think the shift to the eBook model will affect the publishing industry's current practice of releasing a hardcover first (at a higher price) and then a paperback once the hardcover has run its course. We're not going to get rid of hardcovers all at once but there will probably be more 'straight to paperback' titles than we're used to now.
monopoly (Score:2)
Amazon was to some extent using its pricing power to push the Kindle platform, and indeed to their credit, despite the monopoly this handed them, without their effort the ebook market may have continued to flounder. Now, as their monopoly collapses, they have the choice of seeing publishers vacate the platform possibly moving competing devices to the fore, or letting the prices rise.
The rise in prices, however, IMO cannot stand, and I don't think even the $10 price point can be maintained for long. Self-p
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That, and freely available classics. At least to supplement reading new bestsellers. But the end result would be lower sales.
No thanks (Score:5, Insightful)
I can resell it when I've read it, I can take it wherever I want and I don't have to worry about someone pressing a button and removing it from my read.
Best of all, I don't have to spring for the price of a reader before I can even start reading a book
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This sure seems to be true, but they'll be dragged along kicking and screaming. Just like the big music labels started losing ground to independent labels who WERE on the intertubes, so will the big publishers start realizing they're losing ground to the publishers who are supporting ebooks at reasonable prices and "reasonable" levels of DRM (if there is any such thing).
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Even if the readers were free and the books came without DRM I'd still buy real books because I like having them about.
Supply and Demand (Score:2)
Oh how convenient... (Score:2)
...to stick a little bit of completely unrelated paid viral marketing right in front of the “article”.
With the iPad arriving on the scene,
If you paid twice the price of the same thing from an other manufacturer, now you know where that money went. ^^
One could even make a meme out of it, since it really fits anything:
With the iPad arriving on the scene, the Haiti earthquake victims were all saved! ...
With the iPad arriving on the scene, war in Iraq ended and peace broke out!
With the iPad arriving on the scene, 351 people died in the latest terror attack!
With the iPad arriving on the scene, the Teabaggers finally managed to overturn the government and proclaim a theocracy!
With the iPad arriving on the scene, fanbois around the world came for a week straight.
Re:Oh how convenient... (Score:4, Insightful)
Did you forget that the reason Amazon was being pushed into this position was because of the deal the publishers made with Apple for the iPad, and thus MFN status would affect the discounts and other pricing given to Amazon?
These topics are not unrelated.
Oh look... (Score:4, Insightful)
14.99! Yay! I'll buy the PAPERBACK!
There is no reason why an ebook needs to cost more than a paperback, let alone 15 bucks. At least it can't be removed remotely from my reader. I suspect that brick & mortar book stores don't need to worry about their futures the way things are going.
--
BMO
More reasonable pricing (Score:5, Informative)
Considering the fact that you get no physical copy and are encumbered by DRM, it seems to me that fair pricing is as follows:
$9.99 for the period when the only physical copy available for sale is hardcover,
$4.99 once the paperback comes out.
Anything above these prices is, to me, a rip-off.
This explains why I have never purchased an e-book, yet the bookshelves in my home are overflowing.
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The problem with your reasoning, is that just a little bit of the cost is actually paper. Sure, you get rid of one middleman, but you replace it with another who want their cut (30% seems to be the going rate).
The "lack of value" you see doesn't show up as a saved cost for the publisher and author [nytimes.com], and most of the work is done anyway. And AFAIK, publishing isn't a business making money hands over fist. A few authors do - J. K. Rowling and Dan Brown are not exactly median earners - and publishing them is
Re:More reasonable pricing (Score:4, Insightful)
How does the existence, or non-existence, of middlemen affect my perceived value?
I see a hardcover at $20 - $30. I get a physical copy that can be used anywhere without special technology. I get the right to resell it when I am done with it. A hard drive crash will not delete it. To me, that has value.
A $14.99 digital copy that has none of these advantages seems to me to have little value. That perception does not depend on middlemen, or the cost of paper. It depends on the usefulness of the product. Whether or not the publisher and author save costs by publishing electronically is not my problem.
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How does the existence, or non-existence, of middlemen affect my perceived value?
Indeed, it doesn't. I'm just pointing out how it looks on the other side - publisher and author. Their costs are almost the same, and the point that I was making is that while one middleman is removed, another is added. Thus, there isn't a lot of savings to pass on to the buyer.
Given this, it may be the case that for most people the paper edition is indeed the best value. The idea "but all this paper isn't needed and the
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Books that I will want to re-read, or if I know someone else who would like to borrow it, I'll get a paper copy. If I don't plan on re-reading or loaning the book, or if it's DRM-free reference books
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I believe that's basically what they're doing. I've purchased a number of reasonably priced ebooks, un-drm'd, more than I have time to read. I did cave and buy a number of drm'd books that I really like, as I'm trying to get rid of my paper library (I'm *really* tired of lugging it around), but *only* after the kindle format was cracked last winter so I could guarantee my books were portable. They'll rip people off for the $10 as long as they can, just like with hardbacks (which at least have a justifiab
All Thanks to Apple (Score:2, Insightful)
I can't believe no one even mentioned this: /. all praised the iPad and Apple's scheme to make the publishers more money. Well here are the results of your joyous praise!
Now instead of Amazon keeping e-books at $9.99 and the industry in check--we now have a locked down, DRM-laden, inferior versions to the paperback, for...
$14.99! And that's only the beginning of the price increase!
Thanks Apple fanboys!
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In the mean time, look at the indie authors on Kindle. They set their own prices. There are some very good books and authors out there. The Amazon book review and rating method helps you find good quality books. You are no longer beholden to some publisher's decision about what
The good, The bad, The ugly (Score:2)
While I am upset that they feel the need to jack up the prices, it is nice to know that my local used book store will still feel a market niche. To some degree, it is almost feels better to buy a used book than a new one. With a used book, you can see the wear and tear on it, that someone actually has enjoyed this book and that they are passing it on to you.
Amazon was trying to protect them (Score:5, Insightful)
They were only trying to protect publishers from themselves. Amazon knows a lot more about what customers will pay for ebooks than publishers do, and their tactics which appeared heavy handed existed because it was the point where the maximum amount of profit could be obtained. Yes the $9.99 price point would hurt the sale of physical books, but you sell so many ebooks at that price that makes up for it tremendously.
The only concern publishers had was that in public you couldn't tell what books other people were reading if they all had Kindles. They felt they lost some free advertising when going to ebooks. What they failed to realize is with an ebook reader attached to a network you can tie it into twitter or facebook which is a far more powerful advertising vehicle than some random stranger in public.
It's really pitiful that publishers are incapable of adapting to the realities of the 21st century. Amazon tried to drag them there kicking and screaming, but have failed.
(ex Amazon employee, so my views may be biased)
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Yes the $9.99 price point would hurt the sale of physical books, but you sell so many ebooks at that price that makes up for it tremendously.
Do you have any basis for this statement? My understanding is that physical book sales still outpace ebook sales by far.
More Media BS (Score:2)
Re:More Media BS (Score:5, Informative)
I suggest you look into the Sony PRS-505. Sony & the publishers can't do shit to the stuff I have put on my reader.
It supports damn near every format of displaying books (use Calibre if you don't like a format), it reads the data from an SD-card.
The fact that it doesn't connect wireless to the world is a GOOD THING.
Guess we are not Apple's customers anymore (Score:2)
Apple's customers are media conglomerates.
So they cut deals with them and it trickles down in smacking us the paying customers who used to use their service and use other services. In other words, they came to the realization that real money is making deals with publishers of content, not the users. This causes the publishers to lean hard on anyone moving their product as they can hold "Apple" up as an example saying well we have Apple on our side and we don't really need you.
Yeah. thanks a lot Steve
I Think It's A Bit High (Score:2, Interesting)
Penguin and Hachette eBooks Too (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm traveling a lot now, so I'm reading a lot. I picked up the James Patterson "Alex Cross" series on my Kindle. I tried to buy the next book in the series Thursday only to find that no James Patterson books were available. Turns out that Hachette books had blocked all book sales while Amazon switched to the "agency model". Agency model means that Amazon acts as an agent for the publisher instead of a middleman/retailer like they do for paper books.
It was a short-lived outage, and I was able to buy the next book this morning. For a dollar more. Not a big deal, but I see the end of my love affair with the Kindle real soon now. If this is the way they're going to play, I'm just not interested.
Odd twist (Score:2)
It works both ways (Score:3, Informative)
These stories never seem to mention that while the publishers want $14.99 at the high end, they also want the ability to price below $9.99 for back titles. Amazon has pushed the $14.99 price point so hard in the hopes that people wouldn't notice the cheaper part.
Real issue: will Kindle owners feel betrayed? (Score:3, Interesting)
Hundreds of thousands of people bought Kindles on the basis of their perception of the overall deal. I think most buyers know that the cost of the razor (Kindle) is dominated by the cost of the blades (eBooks). Of course there was no written contract, but those hundreds of thousands of buyers thought they were buying into an ecosystem of $10 eBooks. An eBook delivers less value than a trade paperback, but that was OK because it cost less than a trade paperback.
Now, suddenly, the whole proposition is changed. They're being asked to pay meaningfully more than when they signed on. A big jump. Pretty much all at once. And they're now being asked to pay more than the price of a trade paperback for something that for most readers is less valuable than a trade paperback.
If you don't believe eBooks are less valuable than trade paperbacks, then please name your price for my copy of Bill Bryson's "A Short History of Nearly Everything." It's only six years old, and in mint condition (bits don't rot), and I'll sell it cheap. Oh, did I forget to mention it's a GemStar DRM-protected eBook edition, readable only on one GemStar eBook device in the world--mine--which I'd throw in for free if I hadn't already thrown it out when it crapped out last year. You can't buy a new one because they don't make 'em any more. And if you have a GemStar eBook device, GemStar customer service can't transfer my book to you because they're long since out of business
I believe this price increase, whether it's Amazon's fault or not, and despite the fact that $10 eBooks were merely an expectation set by Amazon, is going to make a lot of Kindle owners angry. Obviously publishers think they hold the balance of power and that it doesn't matter if their customers get angry. Maybe they're right.
Support Baen Books!!! (Score:2)
If you like sci-fi or fantasy, buy your books from Baen Books. They sell eBooks directly to the customer, no DRM, pricing at about $2 per book (more for collections). Also, they give many books away for free - the first book in a trilogy, etc.
The free books are in the Baen Free Library [baen.com], the shop is called Webscription.net [webscription.net]. Support publishers like this, and the other publishers will have to fall in line.
Re: (Score:2)
Don't forget distribution. Any books not sold are the responsibility of the publisher or distributor to buy back. Trying to gauge demand takes effort too. And I'm sure there are many other costs that people unfamiliar with the business are not aware of. What I do know is that serving 300KB files, with no regard for how many copies of each to stock takes no effort at all.
Re:$9.99 was too high for an ebook to begin with (Score:5, Informative)
``electroinc books have neither a cost advantage nor a "convenience factor".''
They are searchable, aren't they?
And also, for people who move around a lot, electronic books probably have a weight advantage.
Re: (Score:2)
Only useful for certain types of books. When's the last time you've taken out a fiction book and flicked through it to find something in particular (apart from your bookmark)?
That's not "probably". I only have a limited collection of books, but they still weigh about 50 kg. The upside is, that if someone drops a book down a flight of stairs, they're still able to use it afterwards.
Re: (Score:2)
Only useful for certain types of books. When's the last time you've taken out a fiction book and flicked through it to find something in particular (apart from your bookmark)?
This happens to me a lot. For example, if a scene references an earlier piece of dialog, I often find myself wanting to re-read it in its original context. Maybe it's just because I'm a slow reader, but I think the ability to search is a pretty useful feature.
Re:$9.99 was too high for an ebook to begin with (Score:5, Funny)
While I consume multiple novels at the same time
You consume your books? Aren't you aware that books were meant to be read and not eaten?
Re: (Score:2)
Maybe he is a book worm!
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
What about cook books? Or diet books?
Like this one: Dr. Tooshi's High Fiber Diet: A Revolutionary Diet that will Help You to Lose Weight, Prevent Cancer, Heart Disease, Diabetes, and Digestive Disorders (Paperback) [amazon.com]
It says so right on the front. High fiber diet.
Re: (Score:2)
Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested. --Sir Francis Bacon
Ahh, the things Leonard Nimoy has taught me...