Quote:
Originally Posted by da_jane
I think that there is a fundamental misunderstanding at what goes into the publication of a book. The major costs that are excised in ebook is a) shipping; b) storage and c) printing. The costs of an editor, the artwork, the advertising, and distribution costs (although reduced) still exist.
The creation of the ebook costs nothing, but the creation of a published work, regardless of format, does have costs. True, there are fewer copies that need to be sold in order to break even and that is advantageous to authors, publishers and readers, but there are still costs.
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I agree with this assessment... although the last point, number of books to break-even point, depends on the cost of the book. If the public will not accept the sale of an e-book at hardback (or even paperback) prices, then a larger number of books will have to be sold to hit breakeven.
This might be one of those areas where publishers will have to accept the need for a lower price and larger volume of books sold, and figure out new marketing methods to sell more books.