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Originally Posted by mr ploppy
It certainly sounds like something a publisher would say. But they are basing those figures on the total cost of bringing a story to market. Most of that cost will be spent on editing, design and marketing, plus business lunches and bribes for distributors/chain-stores. All of those are costs associated with the original print edition.
The ebook edition comes later, when (hopefully) all of those costs have been recouped. At that point, the differences in production and distributor costs become more apparent. Amazon takes a 30% cut for distribution, compared with the 50% a traditional distributor would take. And, obviously, there are no print/transportation/warehousing costs associated with ebooks.
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But to be fair, now that ebooks are marketed concurrently with hardcover books, and are a significant and growing percent of sales, shouldn't they share the burden of editing, design, and marketing costs? Even placement in B&M stores can be viewed as an advertisement for the ebook, which it benefits from.