It's Steve Jobs' fault..

[TallMomof2]

The only way the publishers could've pushed the Agency Model through was to either convince Amazon or another big player or potential big player. Enter Apple with a new device and the publishers knew that if they could convince Apple/Jobs then Amazon would have to follow and that would force all the ebook sellers to do the same.

*If* Apple/Jobs hadn't caved then we probably wouldn't have the Agency Model.

That's one way you could blame Apple/Jobs.

Amazon really liked their $9.99 sales model because it really helped to sell a lot of Kindles. I don't see them agreeing to the Agency Model if Apple hadn't done so first.

Just my opinion.

[charleski]

I suppose those with plenty of time on their hands have nothing better to do than keep whining about pricing, despite the fact that average prices have stayed about the same.

OTOH, now that ebooks aren't just a promotional tool for Amazon's hardware business, there's a much better chance that publishers will put more resources into getting them right.

[Crowl]

Originally Posted by Tamara

I don't recall ever seeing that on the Apple forums but I generally don't go to the iTunes related ones.

I mean the apple forum on this site, it seems fairly common for people to say that others aren't allowed to be critical about the ipad if they haven't got one i.e. if you aren't buying books you have no right to voice an opinion on their pricing either.

[daffy4u]

Originally Posted by charleski

I suppose those with plenty of time on their hands have nothing better to do than keep whining about pricing, despite the fact that average prices have stayed about the same.

Did I miss memo? Are there guidlines as to how much time one should have and what one is allowed to do with it. And maybe I misunderstand the dinfinition of whining because I don't know what you're referring to (maybe you're not talking t me but I'd still like to know).

[dyrinn45]

yea, books are close the same price.

Atlas Shrugged pre A5 - $5.99

Atlas Shrugged post A5 - $27.99

but the ebook prices are the same!

[bgalbrecht]

Originally Posted by Kali Yuga

The real issue that has temporarily affected availability is that a few smaller ebook retailers did not handle the transition to the agency model properly. Perhaps they didn't get enough notice, perhaps their DBA's suck, but whatever happened it was short-lived.

It wasn't just the smaller retailers, it was also two of the three major ebook distributors.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by daffy4u

One of the reasons they don't, IMO, deserve to charge higher prices for ebooks. Way too many of them have formatting and spelling issues.

I totally agree. I reformat most ePub I buy because they are not formatted like we get with a paper book. How many paper books have line spaces between paragraphs and some are huge. Also we get sometimes huge indents and also we get font sizes that are too small at the default size. No cover, and large margins also need fixing. So these sorts of things need fixing and I do it. So they should pay me.

[JSWolf]

The problem was that the publishers didn't have the leverage to say to Amazon... "Fine, we just won't sell through your shop.". Now the were able to say to Amazon... "Fine, don't sell our eBooks, we'll let Apple do it.". See how it's Apple's fault here?

[mykoffee]

Originally Posted by charleski

I suppose those with plenty of time on their hands have nothing better to do than keep whining about pricing, despite the fact that average prices have stayed about the same.

OTOH, now that ebooks aren't just a promotional tool for Amazon's hardware business, there's a much better chance that publishers will put more resources into getting them right.

Stayed about the same? Nearly every book on my wishlist went up in price, many by several dollars. They are now more expensive than their print counterparts and there is no such thing as 'shopping around' for them since the prices are fixed everywhere. Yeah, I'm happy to spend my time talking about it, complaining about it, hoping that something may change if people don't purchase the books at these higher prices. This topic is quite interesting to me and apparently many others right now, you too obviously since you took your own time to join in.

Linda

[Tamara]

Originally Posted by Crowl

I mean the apple forum on this site, it seems fairly common for people to say that others aren't allowed to be critical about the ipad if they haven't got one i.e. if you aren't buying books you have no right to voice an opinion on their pricing either.

I understand now .

[MerLock]

Originally Posted by cmdahler

Everyone ought to just keep in mind that this model of pricing only works because 90% of the people who are complaining about it are still buying the books. That is the only thing Jobs and the rest of the industry cares about. You can complain all you want, but if you're still buying the books, then the industry couldn't care less about the complaints. Just refuse to buy the books - good Lord, why would anyone ever need to pay for a book anyway? There are enough samples of quality literature on Project Gutenberg alone to easily fill a couple of lifetimes worth of reading, a good deal of which was written by people who write like they actually graduated from elementary school. Anyway, just vote with your wallet.

Agreed. I've stopped buying ebooks that I feel are overly priced or DRM I can't strip.