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“People would have heart attacks if they knew all the costs associated with digital publishing,” says Maja Thomas, senior vice president of the Hachette Book Group’s digital division.
I think Hachette should fire her and poach someone from Baen Books since Baen Books has figured out how to keep ebook prices at $6. Of course one of the ways Baen Books keeps costs down is not using DRM. The extra lawyers are so they can sue anyone they think is breaking DRM or pirating their books. They're also probably hiring extra legal help to aid in their lobbying efforts to make copy right more restrictive and extend it as close to infinity as they can make it.
All the DRM in the world isn't going to stop pirating. They should worry less about pirates and start acting like they care about the people who actually buy their ebooks. In my opinion, if they put some effort into producing reasonably priced, well formated, DRM free books, they would gain customers. But then the big 5 are afraid that ebooks are cannibalizing hardback sales so I'm not sure they really want to grow the ebook market.
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