ebooks...the price ascent to 'Everest'....

[hpulley]

Things are worth what people are willing to pay for them. People seem to think that the material costs figure in and that an ebook should therefore be cheaper but this is not so.

I support Kobo and the authors by buying books. Often when I do a search I will find a pirate PDF plain as day but that pays no one. If you like books you should pay for them. There are millions of free titles out there so you could read on your Vox forever without buying or pirating books.

[latepaul]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Absolutely. If you can wait a year after release before you read an eBook, it will almost always cost you an awful lot less than if you buy it when it's newly released.

I worked out the other day that my TBR backlog is at least 2 years' worth of reading so I should probably do this. At the moment I tend to hit buy when something new comes out that I and it's a reasonable price (£5-£10 depending on how much I want it)

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by latepaul

I worked out the other day that my TBR backlog is at least 2 years' worth of reading so I should probably do this. At the moment I tend to hit buy when something new comes out that I and it's a reasonable price (£5-£10 depending on how much I want it)

Much better (usually) to just addd it to a wish list. It's almost certain to be cheaper later on.

I almost always wait for a special offer. The only exception is books from Baen, since (a) they don't do sales and (b) their prices are reasonable anyway.

[latepaul]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

Much better (usually) to just addd it to a wish list. It's almost certain to be cheaper later on.

You're right of course the problem is remembering to check my wishlist. I guess I need to set reminders in my calendar.

I have used ereaderiq but so far none of the books I've entered into it have dropped the required amount to trigger an email.

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by latepaul

I have used ereaderiq but so far none of the books I've entered into it have dropped the required amount to trigger an email.

Well, with a 2-year TBR list, this shouldn't concern you for quite a while!

[ballfresno]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

Much better (usually) to just addd it to a wish list. It's almost certain to be cheaper later on.

Indeed; very good advice. I've only had an ebook reader for 4 months or so. The other day I realised I had well over a year's worth of reading on the reader so I created my "to buy" list to avoid buying immediately. I just have to train myself to avoid book lust...

[Reader Paradice]

Originally Posted by hpulley

Things are worth what people are willing to pay for them. People seem to think that the material costs figure in and that an ebook should therefore be cheaper but this is not so.

I support Kobo and the authors by buying books. Often when I do a search I will find a pirate PDF plain as day but that pays no one. If you like books you should pay for them. There are millions of free titles out there so you could read on your Vox forever without buying or pirating books.

-----------------------------------

Then, as you suggest, I'll set my own price (around $10.00 max) and will support the industry from that point or lower, either by discount codes, or the actual released price/settled price after being on the market a while. If the word count of the 'being eyed' book is massive, then I will allow for another $5.00 on top. As you say, there are many alternatives, but like you, would like to support the industry by patronage.

[Reader Paradice]

Originally Posted by TonyToews

For me the tipping point is $10. One author had her new book at $9.99. Bought. Another author at $13.99. Not.

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Yes, me too. Below $10.00, my 'ah...er...' hasn't been triggered. As also another poster pointed out, you no longer, with eBooks, can mitigate the original purchase price, by selling/trading the copy to a used/exchange book store 'down the block'. While I really am enjoying my eReader experience, I can and could go back to picking up my books via 'pulp method' for the advantages of such. Yes, there are both advantages to eReading and pReading. If the prices in the eReading segment keep climbing as I have seen after the record sales of eReaders and adoptation this past December...I will certainly blend the two to make my bucks go as far as they can. Present times are not good, job losses are becoming newspaper chronic...we are all going to have to hunker down. I do hope that the purveyors of books, also see the economic trends, and everybody gets to play in the present sandbox....

Originally Posted by hpulley

Things are worth what people are willing to pay for them. People seem to think that the material costs figure in and that an ebook should therefore be cheaper but this is not so.

Yeap, and what people are willing to pay is often tied to the perceived value of the materials and labor put into that product. Just because people don't like the feeling of being taken advantage of.

And there are other factors. Which do you think is going to give most people more entertainment: two books per month or cable television? After all, they pretty much cost the same.

Which may explain why one of the first things I installed on my Vox was OverDrive ...

[hpulley]

Originally Posted by BWinmill

Yeap, and what people are willing to pay is often tied to the perceived value of the materials and labor put into that product. Just because people don't like the feeling of being taken advantage of.

And there are other factors. Which do you think is going to give most people more entertainment: two books per month or cable television? After all, they pretty much cost the same.

Which may explain why one of the first things I installed on my Vox was OverDrive ...

As compared to the value of the Chinese labor that built the Vox?

I sure wish my cable bill was that cheap!!!

[buze]

Personally I don't buy ebooks at all, I read the free ones, and I even made a few with the "unbind + scan" method. For all the others, I get the paper ones.

I'll start buying ebooks when 1) the DRM is gone 2) the prices are reasonable.

There is no excuse for ebooks being priced as they are compared to a paperback. There is very little work required in making the ebook (despite what they try to tell you) and all they are doing is milking the consumer -- it's even worse since you won't be able to 'recycle' the book by lending/giving/reselling it, and that there is no second hand market.

crooks.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by buze

There is no excuse for ebooks being priced as they are compared to a paperback. There is very little work required in making the ebook (despite what they try to tell you)

This is nonsense. Virtually all the work that's involved in the production of a book (editing, layout, advertising, etc) is also there for an eBook. The only thing you don't have are the printing costs, which typically account for around 10-20% of total costs. An eBook that is priced 20% lower than the corresponding paperback is, therefore, reasonably priced.

This is complicated by the fact that, in many countries, paper books attract a lower rate of taxation than eBooks. In the UK, for example, paperbooks are "zero rated" for VAT, whereas eBooks attract the standard 20% VAT rate. The VAT therefore puts back the 20% that you might have saved in the production cost of the eBook.

[MrPLD]

Originally Posted by HarryT

An eBook that is priced 20% lower than the corresponding paperback is, therefore, reasonably priced.

I agree, this is a sensible approach - though of course due to the lack of a physical entity people do still feel the want for a cheaper price to justify the "absence".

In our publishing, the print edition is actually a lot quicker/faster to produce than the eBook, mostly because our workflow toolset is geared to high quality print production (Postscript / PDF output), so producing an eBook actually requires another processing step or two.

*EDIT: Sometimes the significant price difference at a domestic book shop can be attributed to the higher shipping costs involved with moving a few tonnes of books around. Shipping works out to be about ~$2 for a 450g paperback here.

Paul.

[buze]

I don't agree, the fact that the ebooks is unusable outside of your own account, and that you can't resell or even lend it means that is is LESS VALUABLE for the "owner" than a random paperback and that it should be cheaper, by a lot.

[MrPLD]

So... what about books that aren't DRM and aren't restricted as such?