Thread: Hachette complains about eBook prices
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Old 08-31-2009, 01:19 PM   #31
Kali Yuga
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Ralph Sir Edward View Post
I are one of those IT'ers. Soon I may be selling burgers (at 52). You don't hear me complaining about it on these threads. The world changes, and I must change with it.
Then I salute you for your enlightened attitude... but I still think yours is a minority view. I've heard lots of complaints over the years about H1-B tech visas as well as offshoring (and not just in IT).


Quote:
Originally Posted by Daithi
If I go to Amazon's site, and view the books section (not the Kindle section), I see that in the first 3 pages or so of newly released books that the price for hardbacks is between $13 and $16....
The wholesale price can be up to $14. Again a lot of hardcover best-sellers are also loss leaders for the retailers. The key (and unanswerable) question is if Amazon or B&N lose more or less money with e-books than paper books.


Quote:
Originally Posted by JSWolf
The reason to get rid of hardcover and other overly expensive editions (IMHO) is that eBook prices are based upon them.
Well that's an innovative argument. Ebooks are still a fraction of the market, and publishers don't want ebooks to cannibalize the high-margin sales or for the public to devalue the worth of their product. It seems much more likely that the wholesale prices are set based on the publisher's expected margins than an arbitrary link to another edition's pricing.


Quote:
Originally Posted by JSWolf
eBooks don't have different bindings and the price to produce an eBook has nothing to do with the price of the pBook.
On the contrary, the majority of costs of publishing a title apply equally to paper and digital -- i.e. the aforementioned author's advance, editorial costs, marketing costs etc. The paper-specific portion is allegedly around 12% of the cost of a title, so a $25 hardcover less 12% is only $22.

I may be in the minority, but I don't object to $12-15 prices for a limited time on selected / new ebooks.


Quote:
Originally Posted by JSWolf
One other reason for lower eBook prices is also due to the restrictions placed on them vs. placed on pBooks.
So should we then pay extra for the added advantages of ebooks?

Granted you can't resell or loan out an ebook. Then again, I can't feasibly make 3 duplicates of my 1500-page paper copy of The Tale of Genji, shrink one of them to pocket size, keep another on my computer as backup, and burn another to DVD and store it outside my house in case of a fire.
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