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Jack - you must be referring to Chris Anderson who wrote about the concept of the long tail. It's exactly suited to the publishing industry because the publishing industry makes the majority of its money on backlist titles (as do authors). Having a title out of print makes no money for anyone except used bookstores. The authors don't get a cut of it and neither do the publishers. Making those out of print books available in ebook format can reduce the number of used book sales. It can also allow publishers to take more risks because of low overhead (distribution and print costs being virtually eliminated).
I am an ebook purchaser and frankly would have no problem paying regular paperback or hardcover prices for an ebook so long as I "owned" the ebook free of DRM. I also like Simon and Schuster's ebook pricing model which is 40% off its list price.
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