Are Attitudes About E-Book Prices Changing?

[tompe]

Originally Posted by mr ploppy

The market for used books is vast compared to the market for new books.

How do you know that? Shops selling both new and used books sells more new books and have trouble selling used books. I know a lot of people that would never buy a used book. I do not know anybody that will not buy a new book.

[ficbot]

Originally Posted by tompe

Eh, when the paper-back is released an ebook version of the paperback is released with frozen price, of course.

But it's not. That's the whole problem. If we could reliably count on them to lower the price of the ebook when the paperback came out, there wouldn't be an issue.

[Greg Anos]

Originally Posted by tompe

How do you know that? Shops selling both new and used books sells more new books and have trouble selling used books. I know a lot of people that would never buy a used book. I do not know anybody that will not buy a new book.

How much "product" had been created in the last 50-100 years? how much still exists? how much of that reached the marketplace?

Then how much new "product" is sold inany particular year?

Unless total sales is on a long-term power growth curve, most likely the amoutn of product available used should exceed the amount new. There's just much more of it...

[anamardoll]

Originally Posted by tompe

How do you know that? Shops selling both new and used books sells more new books and have trouble selling used books. I know a lot of people that would never buy a used book. I do not know anybody that will not buy a new book.

If you're willing to count online people, you do now.

I never buy new -- even before I bought an eReader, Half Price Books was my one-stop shop. And Swaptree and the Amazon used market. The only time I would buy new was when the book was cheaper new than used. (Usually that scenario involved shipping fees.)

[tompe]

Originally Posted by ficbot

But it's not. That's the whole problem. If we could reliably count on them to lower the price of the ebook when the paperback came out, there wouldn't be an issue.

Well, it seems to be in most cases. But what we talked here about the problem with frozen prices at different levels. And what I thought was strange was to accept frozen hardback prices but not accept frozen paperback prices. Imperfect implementations are another aspect and another argument that was not made here.

[tompe]

Originally Posted by Ralph Sir Edward

r?
Unless total sales is on a long-term power growth curve, most likely the amoutn of product available used should exceed the amount new. There's just much more of it...

But market size is not measured in number of books. It is measured in money. Also you are talking about the number of titles. That does not take into consideration the bestseller numbers for new books.

I do not know of any city in Sweden were there are more used books available than new books.

[pidgeon92]

Originally Posted by Fallingwater

Speaking of eBook pricing, I'm a bit puzzled by the fact that the publishers aren't screaming bloody murder about piracy drowning them, the way the music industry does...

They absolutely are. There have been dozens of articles on this topic. That's one of their excuses for keeping ebook prices high, so they can use the extra funds to circumvent piracy.

[emoorman]

The eBook is a superior product for me personally. Resale value is irrelevant for me, since I never resell books, whereas physical space is a very important consideration, since I live in a small house. The books I buy have, on the whole, been well-formatted. If a book was poorly-formatted, I'd return it.

Harry,

You've hit the nail on the head again, in my opinion. I hate to get rid of books, but I'm running out of space. Thank goodness for the computer and Kindle for Android.

Ed

[Fbone]

As people have stated before, you don't necessarily buy an ereader to save money. Speed, convenience and limited real estate are often primary concerns.

Printed editions may always (with patience) be less expensive.

[anamardoll]

Originally Posted by Fbone

As people have stated before, you don't necessarily buy an ereader to save money. Speed, convenience and limited real estate are often primary concerns.

Printed editions may always (with patience) be less expensive.

But why should they be? We can all quibble over how much less expensive eBooks are to produce than pBooks, but I think we can all agree that the profit margin on an eBook over a pBook is very likely higher. So why shouldn't they be priced AT LEAST the same, if not less on the eBook side??

[vaughnmr]

Originally Posted by Fbone

As people have stated before, you don't necessarily buy an ereader to save money. Speed, convenience and limited real estate are often primary concerns.

Printed editions may always (with patience) be less expensive.

I sure did. And as far as the prices going down with time, you are at the mercy of the publishers (unless you're talking about the Agency 6).

[ficbot]

Of the last dozen ebooks I have read from mainstream publishers, 7 of them have had sufficient OCR and proofing errors that I either returned them and asked for a refund, or opened up Sigil on my laptop and corrected as I read. 'Superior' product? I don't think so. Certainly not worth *more* than a paper edition that costs 10-15% more to physically manufacture!

[FizzyWater]

Originally Posted by tompe

So if it is acceptable to have hardcover frozen cover price why is it not acceptable having it for paperbacks?

Because the "hardcover" price is discounted at similar rates that I could get if I did some comparison shopping for print version. The MMPB prices do not give the same option.

[HansTWN]

Originally Posted by anamardoll

But why should they be? We can all quibble over how much less expensive eBooks are to produce than pBooks, but I think we can all agree that the profit margin on an eBook over a pBook is very likely higher. So why shouldn't they be priced AT LEAST the same, if not less on the eBook side??

As much as this makes sense from a buyer's point of view, the sellers will take more if they can get it. And at the moment they can charge more, ebooks are selling very well. Cost often has very little to do with selling price. I would guess that this is especially true in publishing where some products have to subsidize loss makers.

All we readers can do at the moment is to refuse to buy when prices are higher than paper and let them know why. We can argue all we want about "fairness", it won't do any good.

[mr ploppy]

Originally Posted by ficbot

Because if the ebook price is frozen to the hardcover price, then when the paperback is released, the ebook will cost more than the paper version. And given that even the publishers admit that the cost of paper accounts for $10-15% of the book's price, it's highway robbery to charge more for the ebook than for the paper. I am fine with paying a premium when the book is new and hot, but when a decades-old paperback can be purchased new for $6 and the ebook is on the offer for more than double, I feel robbed and I won't pay it.

There's no reason why ebook prices would need to be static. Premium (hardback) price when it's new, dropping down to paperback price when sales drop off, then used paperback price to mop up the rest.