Now, I thought that the reason the publishers gave for chosing agency pricing was because amazon etc were deep discounting the new release ebooks (making a loss on all new releases according to some reports). So the publishers - not wanting the general public to think that $9.99 was the going rate for new books - decided to change the rules a bit.
So, who here thinks that after amazon had as close to a monopoly as possible on ebooks (kindle = amazon only) thay would continue to make a loss on ebooks, they would either raise the price or force the publishers to lower their selling price.
So of course new release agency prices should be higher, it was the entire point of the exercise.
BTW : Baen, not just fixed agency price but an
actual monopoly as you can't buy their ebooks anywhere other than webscriptions. Of course no one complains about this as we all like the price they set
In the UK (at least outside of amazon) the agency pricing has made pretty much sod all difference, yes there is no discount but the undiscounted price is about the smae amount lower than the RRP of non agency books as the discount from RRP - Well if you do a straight compare of Harper Collins to Random House anyway - I'm ignoring self published and small (and niche) publishers (So Agency Priced Jim Butcher books (Harper Collins) cost the same as non Agency Priced Terry Pratchet (Random House).
Bearing in mind that Random House are non agency in the UK at the moment.