Cutting Prices is the only way to stop piracy

[mr ploppy]

Originally Posted by elcreative

Geo-restrictions do apply to pbooks but they're ignored in reality for most individual purchases but if you were to import a couple of thousand copies of a US book to sell in the UK or France... that would trigger a warning and action from publishers... possibly the sellers think e sales may be easier to track form company records and/or they've already been warned off...

I'm not so sure about that. UK comic shops always have the American editions of graphic novels alongside the UK editions. One I used to shop at also had American editions of paperback novels.

[tompe]

Originally Posted by Piper_

Yes, that is the issue.

The problem all stems from a (crazy, imo) law that says the point of sale for a digital book is at the customer's computer.

The point of sale for a paper book is the store itself.

But the reason for it seems pretty rational. For physical items you have to pay postage and taxes and custom. So you will always try to buy locally if possible. For ebooks there can be no added taxes and taxes and there is no postage. So it is impossible to have a differentiated market that we have for physical items if it worked the same for ebooks and ordinary books.

[sabredog]

Originally Posted by Lemurion

And the previous one was a paperback original while the new one is coming out in hardcover, and the eBook is almost 25% cheaper than the paper edition on Amazon. The real question is going to be what happens to the Kindle price when the dead tree edition hits mass market in about a year.

With you on that, but it still dees illustrate that prices of ebooks are still too high. I purchased the last book in the series on day of release for around $6.99. Good old agency 5 pricing (fixing) at work.

Originally Posted by Lemurion

I'm also with HarryT, the question of whether a person would have bought something if they didn't download it is irrelevant to the question of whether they should have downloaded it illegitimately. Just because it may not be a lost sale doesn't magically make it okay.

I agree with you about downloading not being OK, however the lost profits figures are always artificially inflated by assuming a lost sale per download, when that is not necessarily the case.

Such an unknown factor should never be added to such reports and criticism should and is leveled at such deceit. However that assumption is added because it spruiks the entertainment industries point of view.

[tompe]

Originally Posted by sabredog

With you on that, but it still dees illustrate that prices of ebooks are still too high. I purchased the last book in the series on day of release for around $6.99. Good old agency 5 pricing (fixing) at work.

How does it illustrate that? Prices can be to low also. But the idea of a correct price seems very strange to me since the optimal price depends on your goals.

[sabredog]

Originally Posted by tompe

How does it illustrate that? Prices can be to low also. But the idea of a correct price seems very strange to me since the optimal price depends on your goals.

Of course it illustrates it. There is a clear $5 price increase from one book in the series to the last. It has no bearing on optimal price at all. A price increase is a price increase.

[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Are you sure that's the case? Bookstores in the UK import and sell US books all the time!

The restrictions are at the distributor level, not retail sales. Bookstores can sell to anyone; they can't import wholesale without paying whatever fees are arranged for international sales.

The problem is that the ebook stores are being treated like distributors, and customers are being treated like stores, not end-users--and location is based on some nebulous unchangeable condition based on bank contracts, rather than *anything's* physical reality. (A person who lives in the UK and visits the US for a week, can't buy Amazon's only-in-US kindlebooks during that week.)

I have no problems with people getting around geo-restrictions. It's legal to buy from any ebookstore. It's legal for the store to sell to anyone. It may be a breach of contract between the store and publisher for the store to sell to you, but it's the store's problem to figure that out.

[elcreative]

No not sure at all, only been associated with book and game retailing in the UK for more than thirty years, running my own specialist games (RPG and war) shop from the first release of D&D then working with a specialist SF bookshop for some ten years as a helper, the net (web design & sales) organiser and then the manager... often had dealings with the publishers over US imports but generally worked on the principle (as I said) that unless you were importing thousands of copies then you were unofficially allowed to slide under the radar, indeed we'd often be asked for recommendations for UK acquisitions based on popularity of US titles... being able to sell the stuff doesn't mean that ge0-restrictions on paper don't exist, just that they're rarely enforced because, what tends to retail in the UK, is usually tightly genre based - SF&F, Graphic novels, comics etc which don't seriously impinge on the pubs bottom line...

Why ebooks are being treated so much more tightly, I don't know but suspect it relates to the ease of any book being easy to buy on the net from any country unless artificially limited. You could buy a bestseller released in the US before release 6 months later in the UK and the UK publisher would find sales severely dented for eBooks - of course, the easy answer is too simple - simultaneous release dates but this is likely to change in the future as the stupidity of ebook geo-restrictions becomes clearer and authors/agents may actually decide not to irritate their customers... still not holding breath though.

Originally Posted by HarryT

Are you sure that's the case? Bookstores in the UK import and sell US books all the time!

[Sonist]

Originally Posted by Stitchawl

I think even if it were priced lower, people will still download pirated copies....

Sure, some people will.

But the whole idea is not to completely eliminate piracy, but to ensure that some optimum number of people will chose to purchase at a specific price, so as to maximize profits for the publishers/authors.

There is a level at which a purchase is simply easier (and more gratifying) than scouring darknet for a copy of the product. There is also a price level at which impulse buying comes into play for a large numbers of the target audience.

So, yes: cutting prices is the only way to dramatically reduce piracy among your target audience.

[dAhc]

Originally Posted by Sonist

Sure, some people will.

But the whole idea is not to completely eliminate piracy, but to ensure that some optimum number of people will chose to purchase at a specific price, so as to maximize profits for the publishers/authors.

There is a level at which a purchase is simply easier (and more gratifying) than scouring darknet for a copy of the product. There is also a price level at which impulse buying comes into play for a large numbers of the target audience.

So, yes: cutting prices is the only way to dramatically reduce piracy among your target audience.

I agree with you completely.

[sabredog]

Originally Posted by Sonist

Sure, some people will.

But the whole idea is not to completely eliminate piracy, but to ensure that some optimum number of people will chose to purchase at a specific price, so as to maximize profits for the publishers/authors.

There is a level at which a purchase is simply easier (and more gratifying) than scouring darknet for a copy of the product. There is also a price level at which impulse buying comes into play for a large numbers of the target audience.

So, yes: cutting prices is the only way to dramatically reduce piracy among your target audience.

Agree with this. The effect of lowering prices ( AND removing DRM and abolishing geo restrictions) will lower the rate of casual piracy as ebooks become more widely available,easier and more attractive to purchase.

[tompe]

Originally Posted by sabredog

Of course it illustrates it. There is a clear $5 price increase from one book in the series to the last. It has no bearing on optimal price at all. A price increase is a price increase.

Yes, and you can argue that the $5 price was wrong relative some goals. It was wrong if you want a sustainable market for example. So I just do not see how you can just state that one of two prices is the correct one.

[Lemurion]

Originally Posted by sabredog

With you on that, but it still dees illustrate that prices of ebooks are still too high. I purchased the last book in the series on day of release for around $6.99. Good old agency 5 pricing (fixing) at work.

The reason the last book of the series was available as an eBook on launch day for around $6.99 was because it was released in paperback at $7.99. The new one is being released in hardcover for around $26.00 (discounted to $16.60) with the eBook priced at $12.99.

The difference in price between the eBook and the paper edition is both absolutely and proportionately greater than it was for the last book in the series. They've more than doubled the price of the paper edition (even counting the discount - without it it's been tripled), and less than doubled the eBook price.

You can argue that $12.99 is too much because you feel all eBooks should be $9.99 or less - but as soon as the decision was made to release the new one in hardcover, the eBook launch price had to go up.

[obs20]

The best comparison is between music and books. They are both files that are small enough to be a practical download for most devices. Musicians have the advantage of having another revenue stream via performance. The distribution of free content is less devastating for them in most cases it increases the demand for personal appearances.

Writers do not have the advantage of this additional source of income. Free content has been devastating to journalism. The proliferation of blogs can never make up for the loss of well resourced investigative journalism.

That being said lowering prices will probably make a dent in the piracy of content.

[Hadel]

Some time ago I posted my price that I would readily pay for entertainment.
Roughly:
- ebooks = 2-3 Euro
- Movies = 1-1.50
- TV series = 0.50
- Games = 2-3 Euro
- Songs = 0.05-0.1
And I want all these in perfect HD quality, free of commercials, free to use on any device I choose.

Or they can hook me with, say, 10-20 Euro per month for all the ebooks, movies, games, music I care to use.

[Fbone]

Originally Posted by Sonist

So, yes: cutting prices is the only way to dramatically reduce piracy among your target audience.

Now all you have to do is determine this mystical price.