Judge approves settlement. Says It's In The Public Interest To Stop Price Fixing

[JoHunt]

I can live without $9.99 bestsellers, but what I can't live without is true price competition between ebook sellers. Hopefully this will now return.

[sabredog]

Excellent.

[david_e]

I think a lot of people are going to be very disappointed.

There is no reason to expect prices to come down as the majority of bookstores are device specific. I think we forget the huge majority of device owners who only purchase from their device branded site because we have the knowledge and 'tools' that break us from that particular bond.

Sony, Amazon, Kobo, and all the other sellers are no longer in competition once the customer has chosen a device. To get even the roughest, loosest idea of what a minority we are, compare how many devices have been sold in the last few years with the number of Mobileread members.

[murraypaul]

Originally Posted by david_e

I think a lot of people are going to be very disappointed.

There is no reason to expect prices to come down as the majority of bookstores are device specific. I think we forget the huge majority of device owners who only purchase from their device branded site because we have the knowledge and 'tools' that break us from that particular bond.

Sony, Amazon, Kobo, and all the other sellers are no longer in competition once the customer has chosen a device. To get even the roughest, loosest idea of what a minority we are, compare how many devices have been sold in the last few years with the number of Mobileread members.

All of that was true before price-fixing went into effect, and prices were lower.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

I love this quote:


And, as to flooding the judge with an astro-turf campaign... not wise...


So much for special snowflake astroturf campaigns to force hearings and delay the innevitable.

Good at least this judge understands that it's about law, not about politics, media campaigning or influence.

[rhadin]

Originally Posted by AnemicOak

Just because Agency goes away for those pubs doesn't necessarily mean we'll see $9.99 bestsellers. We don't know what list and wholesale prices will be or anything like that.

I think we will see higher list prices and the first trendsetter in that regard is the new J.K. Rowling book, The Casual Vacancy from Little, Brown, which lists at $35.00. Even under the old wholesale model, and even with a 60% discount, you are still talking $14. Amazon is selling the Kindle version for $17.99, a 49% discount from the list price. I think the likelihood of seeing $9.99 bestsellers is low. In the end, the DOJ and Judge Cote will be able to take credit for increasing prices, not lowering prices.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by david_e

.....
Sony, Amazon, Kobo, and all the other sellers are no longer in competition once the customer has chosen a device.....

That is just simply wrong (thanks to Alfie and others) and will be even wronger once DRM is out of the picture -- which it will be one of these days.

It simply isn't an issue even now as far as I'm concerned.

[rhadin]

Originally Posted by Andrew H.

And if most readers choose to buy their books from Amazon because of lower prices or better service or whatever - that is good for the consumer. Eliminating price competition is bad for the consumer.

Yet it is likely that there will be little to no price competition. Both Amazon and B&N, for example, list the preorder price for the J.K. Rowling ebook, The Causal Vacancy, at $17.99. Not much competition in a book that is likely to be a giant seller.

I expect that there will be little price competition even if agency pricing is done away with for all publishers. In fact, I would guess -- and I admit I do not know, this is only a guess on my part -- that the pricing of the new Rowling book was done in anticipation of the settlement being approved and in preparation for Cote ultimately finding against the non-settlers. I expect that new books will be priced in the $28 to $35 range with most about $30, so as to prevent the $9.99 price from rising again.

I also suspect that with the requirement that ebooks have to be profitable across a publisher's line, not across an ebookseller's whole business, it will be significantly more difficult for ebooksellers to compete on price in the manner they did pre-agency.

[david_e]

Originally Posted by murraypaul

All of that was true before price-fixing went into effect, and prices were lower.

But what would be the incentive to lower prices now? If I have a customer base that is accustomed to paying $7.99 why would I lower my price? Aside from some special offering centered around a holiday or other event, I just don't see a motive for it to happen.

Originally Posted by kennyc

That is just simply wrong (thanks to Alfie and others) and will be even wronger once DRM is out of the picture -- which it will be one of these days.

It simply isn't an issue even now as far as I'm concerned.

But I did address this, remarking that the population here is quite small compared to the number of devices in the hands of the public. We are in no way the typical user and you can't compare what people do here with what the average person would do.

I also don't hold to the belief that DRM is going away. There might always be a way to circumvent or remove it but to get to the point where hands are thrown up in surrender just doesn't seem realistic.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by david_e

I think a lot of people are going to be very disappointed.

There is no reason to expect prices to come down as the majority of bookstores are device specific.

Other then Apple, Amazon & B&N, the rest are not device specific.

[kennyc]

You're still wrong. DRM removal is trivial (whether this MR population or the population at large) and it will go away just as it did for music.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by SteveEisenberg

I didn't know it. I still don't. The judge didn't hear witnesses cross-examined. There was no trial.

Of course *not*!
The trial for the recalcitrant trio is *next* June.

*Then* we'll see the witnesses cross-examined and dirty laundry aired for all to see, with names named and halos tarnished.
(*If* the trio don't settle before then.)

The judge didn't pronounce verdict on the whole case: all she did was accept the settlement between the three conspirators that prefer to take their two-year penalty and pay their $69 million in fines and *not* have to spend on lawyers and get their dirty laundry aired in public *and* risk getting hit with even worse penalties.

As pointed out, the settling trio is getting off cheap. (US$030 per book cheap).

[kevinp]

Originally Posted by kennyc

That is just simply wrong (thanks to Alfie and others) and will be even wronger once DRM is out of the picture -- which it will be one of these days.

It simply isn't an issue even now as far as I'm concerned.

"Wronger"???

[david_e]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Other then Apple, Amazon & B&N, the rest are not device specific.

But (when we add Sony, unless I've missed a recent change) that's practically the entire market.

I know of a few sites that aren't device driven, and I know the rest of you are going to know a lot more of them than I do.

But what about the average Mom, Dad, Aunt, or brother-in-law who got their Ki-So-No-iP last Christmas? I feel the vast majority of these casual users don't see a need to reach out of the comfort zone that is their tied in bookstore. It's simple and it works for them.

These sites that sell to everyone, they have the most to gain, but only if they can figure out how to answer this question. How do you tell your potential customer what you can offer them when that customer doesn't even know you exist?

[Graham]

Originally Posted by david_e

How do you tell your potential customer what you can offer them when that customer doesn't even know you exist?

Advertise through other channels? Like just about any other product?

The cost of the devices is dropping dramatically; even if DRM doesn't go away manufacturers will still be concerned about losing customers.

Plus, a lot of reading of Kindle, Kobo, and of course ePub is done on multifunction devices, with the other formats also available. And Apple shouldn't be included in this argument anyway as their format can only currently be read on devices that are also capable of reading the others.

Graham