MobileRead Forums - View Single Post - Who owns the ebook rights to older books?

markbot · 12-13-2009, 11:05 AM

The total marginal cash cost + cost of capital of printing and selling a pbook is probably like $5.00, which excludes payments to the author. It depends on what you think the cost of capital and retail/distribution economic costs are per book. The inventory holding cost of pbooks for the retailer is part of the cost of capital.

http://ireaderreview.com/2009/05/03/...ok-publishing/

So, the ebook is like $5.00 cheaper to make than the pbook. Although, I think you should also factor in the reduced rights of ebooks since you can't resell them....this will vary per book. a new book will have this be worth a lot more than an old book. a recent Dan Brown book could be resold for $10. but let's say that only 30% of people resell their books....so this reselling right is only worth $3 on average. But let's also say that people who buy ebooks actually value them higher than pbooks for some reason (no waiting time, no gasoline costs to drive to the book store, take up less space, cooler, don't kill trees...etc)....so this might actually be worth like $3.

So, overall, ebooks could be priced $5 lower with all producers still getting the same economic benefits as with pbooks. Consumers get an economic benefit of $5!!! Woo hoo!

Dan Brown's Lost Symbol costs $12+shipping on Amazon. The used version cost $10.79+shipping.....so basically the same cost since the used book shipping is usually higher. The Kindle edition costs $9.60. So the Kindle edition is about $5 dollars cheaper.

So it looks like the ebooks on Amazon.com are priced about right based on my analysis.

Although, if you tend not to resell books then you would be willing to actually spend more on the ebook than the pbook. If you go to the library often or usually resell books then the ebook version would have to be around $7 cheaper in my Dan Brown example from the consumer’s perspective to be equivalent.

12-13-2009, 11:05 AM	#28
markbot Guru Posts: 612 Karma: 7511929 Join Date: Apr 2007 Location: New York, NY Device: Amazon Kindle Paperwhite 2	The total marginal cash cost + cost of capital of printing and selling a pbook is probably like $5.00, which excludes payments to the author. It depends on what you think the cost of capital and retail/distribution economic costs are per book. The inventory holding cost of pbooks for the retailer is part of the cost of capital. http://ireaderreview.com/2009/05/03/...ok-publishing/ So, the ebook is like $5.00 cheaper to make than the pbook. Although, I think you should also factor in the reduced rights of ebooks since you can't resell them....this will vary per book. a new book will have this be worth a lot more than an old book. a recent Dan Brown book could be resold for $10. but let's say that only 30% of people resell their books....so this reselling right is only worth $3 on average. But let's also say that people who buy ebooks actually value them higher than pbooks for some reason (no waiting time, no gasoline costs to drive to the book store, take up less space, cooler, don't kill trees...etc)....so this might actually be worth like $3. So, overall, ebooks could be priced $5 lower with all producers still getting the same economic benefits as with pbooks. Consumers get an economic benefit of $5!!! Woo hoo! Dan Brown's Lost Symbol costs $12+shipping on Amazon. The used version cost $10.79+shipping.....so basically the same cost since the used book shipping is usually higher. The Kindle edition costs $9.60. So the Kindle edition is about $5 dollars cheaper. So it looks like the ebooks on Amazon.com are priced about right based on my analysis. Although, if you tend not to resell books then you would be willing to actually spend more on the ebook than the pbook. If you go to the library often or usually resell books then the ebook version would have to be around $7 cheaper in my Dan Brown example from the consumer’s perspective to be equivalent. Last edited by markbot; 12-13-2009 at 11:20 AM.