Of course the main problem with publishers pricing back list books to match used paperbacks is that it's commercial suicide, before you start frothing at the mouth please read on and feel free to point out the error in my reasoning.
I'm going to read a book this week (and next etc), I'm not going to get an eBook that is a hardback equivalent release (About £12 in the Uk for agency titles) but I've no problem with a paperback equivalent (About £5-8 for agency titles).
Before eBooks I generally wandered into a waterstones every so often and grabbed a stack of paperbacks that looked intersting (Generally about £8 per book).
So someone is going to get about £5-8, thats fine by me, I have no problem paying that.
Now at the moment at Waterstones the publishers Allison & Busby have a £1.99 sale on certain books and as I wanted to read one of them anyway I bought it.
Now here is the flaw in the argument that if you price it at half the price you sell more than twice as many.
I now have a book, I don't need another, I'm not going to read twice as many books because they are cheaper. My addiction is sated for another week
Now I'm not saying that Allison & Busby are not going to sell twice as many books while this promo is on, in fact, I suspect they are. But if all publishers drop their paperback equivalent eBook price to £2 all they are doing is losing £3 per book - because for most of the people buying new books (especially the ones buying hard covers) the main thing that limits how many books they buy is time, not money.
Now I know that some people are going to flame me here for this and generally the people here read a lot more than most so price is more of a factor, but the (possibly sad) fact of the matter is, I can't think of a single person I know, that doesn't spend more money on beer/eating out that on books (myself included).
Ok, I've rambled on a bit - let the flames commence.
