Quote:
Originally Posted by HamsterRage
I wonder if we are starting towards the tipping point, where ebook sales are going to start to overshadow pbook sales?
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Not any time in the near future, I'm sure. Amazon has said its ebook sales now exceed hardcover, but refuses to say how they compare to paperback, which typically sell far more than hardcover.
Several points to ponder:
1. Amazon customers are, by definition, more tech savvy than most, more willing to go high tech; they aren't a representative sample of the reading population in the US.
2. Despite all the press Kindle and ebooks have been getting of late, I venture to say the vast majority of book purchasers still haven't heard (or have barely heard) of ebooks, don't know what an ereader is, and likely can't see the point in any case. Having to plop down hundreds of dollars for a device that allows them to do what they can do for free makes little sense to most dollar-concious folk.
3. Remember that, as big as Amazon is, a) it still only acounts for 10-15% of all book sales in the US, b) its ebook sales are only a single-digit percentage (Amazon won't say, exactly) of that 15%, and c) that 5% of 15% represents some 80% of all ebook sales in the US. Overall, ebooks still account for 3% or less of the total market.
3) The only way Amazon can afford to sustain its prices on ebooks long-term is by forcing publishers out of the picture entirely. Which is what, apparently, Amazon hopes eventually to do. But that depends in part on capturing enough of the market to be able to force a sea-change. Doing that is far less of a sure bet for Amazon with Apple and Google (who are no competitive slouches themselves) entering the market.
Quote:
Originally Posted by HamsterRage
I mean, how many books will people like Steven King or James Patterson need to write, where the ebook copies outstrip the pbook copies before they say, "Screw the publishers and their giving me $0.70 a copy, I'll get it up on Amazon without them and take $3.00 a copy".
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First, I believe authors generally collect around 15% of cover price on hardcovers -- that'd be $3.90 for a $26 retail book. That said, I think I heard something about Amazon offering authors 70%. On a $9.99 ebook, it'd be a better deal; at $4.99, not so much.
Second, I don't see a self-published ebook (even by a first-tier) author making the NYT bestseller list any time soon. Marketing (and we all know how publishers game bestseller lists) is still key to the big numbers, and self-published authors have nothing but word of mouth. Of course, Amazon's vision for ebooks may mean the end of blockbuster authors. Whether that's a good thing, who can say?
That said, I have a hard enough time reading King now. God forbid I'd have to slough through a King story that hadn't been lovingly caressed by an editor's axe. There are very few authors who can stand on their own without the benefit of good editing (JK Rowling and Dan Brown make that eminently clear), and rare is the author who could afford to pay for editing out of his own pocket.
--Nathanael