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Originally Posted by Giggleton
GET OVER IT.
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No.
Quote:
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Originally Posted by Giggleton
One of the neat things about ebooks, and digital/digitally printed physical goods is that there does not need to be any more retailers.
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This became true with the advent of ecommerce generally, and yet retailers are still a massive part of the marketplace. This is not for nothing. I don't want to hunt down every product from every manufacturer/producer (Certainly not the big ones -- little ones can be more customer friendly and responsive though) individually with new accounts and passwords at each location. I want Amazon and Walmart et al to buy in bulk, present everything in one place and pass some savings on to me. I want the retailers to use sales as retail advertising so I can further lower my costs by delaying certain purchases until sales occur.
eReader/Fictionwise was great at this with ebooks -- and they helped create an ebook market long before the big players even knew ebooks existed. Their big discounting made my ereading habit and conversion from the used pbook market possible. Without that, I might still be reading paper for cost reasons alone. As it stands, my ebook spending has frozen as I try to find a way to fill my entertainment hours on the same budget. I'm not just going to buy half as many ebooks for the same yearly cost and go on like that's okay. I'm going to adjust spending and that will almost certainly mean less goes to the big 6.
Individual publishers have less incentive to discount than a retailer whose discounts draw an audience to a library from many different publishers (this is even more true for a superstore like amazon where a discount on any segment of products potentially increases sales of all other categories of goods from movies to games to clothes etc). I'd be thrilled if I could get my books under agency for the same price as I did under retailer discounting -- but the reality is that that just won't happen (sorry Kali, but the big publishers just don't want price responsiveness or democratization, they want barriers and windows and control). Retailers are essentially a market voice that aggregate individual consumer voices to pressure prices lower. Agency pricing as it operates today silences that voice.
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Originally Posted by Giggleton
I agree, If what we want is a direct to reader market, and we all want that right?
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Also no. Indeed, I'd rather see publishers fall by the way side than retailers, but in the end, I find some middlemen useful.
Why can't you state your opinion for yourself instead of trying to presume or demand universal agreement? I can respect that you don't value what retailers add to the equation (which for me equaled a savings of about 50% off retail for my entire elibrary), and I'd be happy for you to have the right to overpay for books as much as you'd like, so what makes it so hard for you to respect that I do value retailer expertise and practices and prefer to get the most bang for my buck?