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Originally Posted by DavidI
Eventually enough people will have eReaders that a fair number of authors will be able to make a living selling only ebooks. We're already getting close, but I bet at some point (soon) Amazon will be selling eReaders for under $99, or giving them away free when you sign up for an Amazon Prime account. As this happens, authors will be able to start publishing ebooks directly and just cutting the publishers out of the loop. Once a few authors make this transition, and can prove they can make a living, it will become a flood of authors leaving publishers. Eventually we'll also see our first blockbuster ebook author along the lines of a J.K. Rowling or Stephanie Meyer -- one of those books that just everyone has to have. Just wait until someone makes millions without a publisher.
Do you think that as this starts happening publishers will suddenly discover that the prices they're charging for ebooks is too high, and the royalties they're paying authors for ebooks is too low? Or will they be left trying to sell books on their back list for exorbitant prices and trying to hold on to aging authors who don't like change?
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Complete wishful thinking. The ability to sell your own music through iTunes hasn't revolutionized music publishing; the vast majority of people still want music from the labels. (They may want to steal it, but that's a different issue.) Book publishing will be no different: people want quality books that have gone through the editing and development process of a publisher. They don't want badly written indie books, and very few people want to dig through dozens of indies to find the one readable book.
@leebase:
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There's nothing in that article that says "after pricing on Agency 5 books rose, sales of those books plummeted, while sales of books at $5 increased". We don't know what we don't know, and the numbers have not been provided to tell us if the decrease in per user ebook buying is simply the result of ebooks being cheaper than hard backs.
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Based on the evidence, this is correct. The Agency numbers are what tripled, and they don't sell $5 books.
@eric
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At the end of Q1 this year, before the iPad and the advent of Agency, there were (and this is a semi-educated WAG) between 6 and 7 million non-phone devices out there capable of reading books. The number now is at least triple. My gut says if your book sales aren't matching that trend, you're falling behind.
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This would only make sense if: (1) the people buying new e-readers didn't already have an e-reader (and it's clear that a lot of people are replacing old readers with new readers); and (2) people couldn't own two new devices (a lot of people own an K3 and an iPad); and (3) we knew what percentage of iPad owners were regular readers (i.e., the only reason someone would buy a Kindle or Sony reader would be to read on it, but reading is only a small part of what an iPad can do, and many people with iPads never read books on them).
Big publishers tripled their sales. That's good for any business, and it's pointless speculation to suggest that they could have (or should have) sold even more. Not to mention the fact that book sellers are in the business of making profit, not sales.