Quote:
Originally Posted by fjtorres
Careful with those last numbers: the euro decline vs the dollar over the last two years has turned US sales net dollar drops into net euro gains.
Plus a lot of those year to year "gains" are the result of mergers where the post merger result is lower than sum of the pieces pre-merger. (But it reduces costs by putting people out of work--sending them to freelance for Indie, inc.)
Plus the BPHs are putting out less Mass Market paperbacks and doing more trade paperback releases at higher prices; they sell less books but beef up their sales reports a lot and their profits just a bit.
A lot of those "gains" are really trading long term market share (and author income) for short term reportable "boosts".
Accounting games aren't limited to Hollywood.
The BPHs' business has been stagnant-to-declining all century long *despite* the mergers, staff reductions, declining advances, price hikes, windowing, author squeezes, vanity publishing plays, and format changes.
http://the-digital-reader.com/wp-con.../06/5Wide1.gif
http://the-digital-reader.com/2014/0...ustry-numbers/
And the funny part is they *aren't* actually trying to beef up a real cash cow (that's why you had the term in quotes, right?) since pbook net margins are about half the net of even "too cheap" $9.99 ebooks. The Agency price hikes in 2010 actually reduced their profits.
Watching sausage get made is rarely pretty but in this case it is amusing to see the obfuscation games they come up with. They are anything but slothful.
Reminds me of the Wizard of Oz (movie). |
Let's just say that I'm more willing to believe numbers where someone will wind up in jail if they are intentionally misleading over numbers that are based on someone's best guess estimate and wishful thinking.
There are a lot of different things going on in the publishing world. Rather obviously they are not reducing people's access to ebooks. The ebooks are out there, the question is how fast backlist books come out (not nearly fast enough for me) and how much the ebooks cost. Over time, prices are set by the market.