The used pbook conundrum

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by KenJackson

... You're not allowed to discount it to sell more than other sites. (Though I'm not sure what the punishment is.)
....

Death by immolation.

[Giggleton]

Originally Posted by KenJackson

Go look at Amazon's page for the Kindle version of The Wind Through the Keyhole (Dark Tower) (No. 1 on NYBSL). Below the price it says "This price was set by the publisher." That's what my understanding of agency pricing is.

That is, the publisher/author not only says how many dollars you'll pay him per copy sold, but exactly what price you'll sell it for. You're not allowed to discount it to sell more than other sites. (Though I'm not sure what the punishment is.)

This is what I'm saying should be outlawed as an unfair business practice. It keeps ebook prices artificially high.

Why shouldn't the agent/creator be able to set their own price? As I mentioned perhaps the agent does not want their book to be seen in a bargain bin somewhere...

Amazon does not sell ebooks, they market them and post links. You cannot sell that which does not exist.

[murraypaul]

Originally Posted by KenJackson

You've just laid out a good argument for why selling used ebooks is a silly concept which transparently circumvents paying for a new ebook.

I don't see anything silly about being able to resell ebooks.
Using Amazon DRM, for example, there is already the ability to loan a book, during which time I can't read it, but the person I lent it to can. Just make that loan indefinite, and I've transferred the book to someone else.
Buying a second hand pbook also circumvents paying for a new pbook. That is the point.

[KenJackson]

Originally Posted by murraypaul

Buying a second hand pbook also circumvents paying for a new pbook. That is the point.

But there's a difference between a new and used pbook. The used one is a little scuffed up, might be marked up and might have coffee spills on a few pages. Few people would give a used pbook as a gift. You can sell it because you're not selling quite the same thing that was originally sold, and after each sale its quality decreases until after a while it "gets used up" naturally by wearing out.

But ebooks are totally immune to coffee spills. If there were no limitations on reselling, the same copy could be sold and sold and sold. Artificially limiting resales to a certain number could be done, but to what end? It would be an attempt to make an ebook behave like a pbook.

Reselling ebooks bears some similarity to recording a movie you received over cable (you paid for it, after all) and reselling it.

If the free market is allowed free reign, ebook prices will drop and there will be little incentive to resell them. Already, Smashwords authors sell books at a fraction of what bigger name authors sell them for. And that site seems to be growing by leaps and bounds. I see promise in that.

[covingtoncat73]

Yeah, it is a problem. I have bought penny (plus shipping) used books from Amazon before (hardcover, even). I would rather the author get some money, even if I had to pay a bit more but we are talking a lot more.

Still, eBooks do have a couple of things going for them: 1) Instant book! If there is a new book from a favorite author of mine, I get it automatically delivered to my Kindle or Kobo app right there. 2) Free public domain books. I'll never have to buy a "classic" again.

[Giggleton]

Originally Posted by covingtoncat73

Yeah, it is a problem. I have bought penny (plus shipping) used books from Amazon before (hardcover, even). I would rather the author get some money, even if I had to pay a bit more but we are talking a lot more.

We are all pirates.

[Section8]

There is one characteristic of used pbooks that could be applied to "used" ebooks - you have to wait for it, but can get it at a discount.

If it's important to buy your favorite author's new novel the day it's released, you have to pay a premium price - new hardback or "new" ebook. If you're willing to wait, you can pay less - paperback/used pbook/"used" ebook.

[Giggleton]

Originally Posted by Section8

There is one characteristic of used pbooks that could be applied to "used" ebooks - you have to wait for it, but can get it at a discount.

If it's important to buy your favorite author's new novel the day it's released, you have to pay a premium price - new hardback or "new" ebook. If you're willing to wait, you can pay less - paperback/used pbook/"used" ebook.

That doesn't really work for ebooks though. Sure people will buy popular texts the day the are uploaded, but if they are read that same day by a large majority of the purchasers and resold the market wold quickly be saturated with used copies.

Perhaps ebooks should be rented instead...

[BeccaPrice]

Originally Posted by Giggleton

Perhaps ebooks should be rented instead...

isn't that essentially what the situation is today? that we don't actually buy our DRM'd ebooks, but we only buy a license to read them on specific devices.

[twowheels]

Originally Posted by BeccaPrice

isn't that essentially what the situation is today? that we don't actually buy our DRM'd ebooks, but we only buy a license to read them on specific devices.

If that were made more explicit people, in general, would be willing to pay less.


(I mean the general population, not the ereader nerds who argue about the merits or pitfalls of DRM on online forums! :-) )

[Giggleton]

Originally Posted by BeccaPrice

isn't that essentially what the situation is today? that we don't actually buy our DRM'd ebooks, but we only buy a license to read them on specific devices.

That has always been the situation, or have you previously believed to own anothers words? Regulations and laws only serve to restrict our reading habits, not increase them, and therefore they should be disregarded.

[KenJackson]

Originally Posted by KenJackson

I think the free market can solve this fairly easily. Agency pricing should be outlawed. If a grocer can sell ketchup at a loss as a leader to get you in the store, then ebook sites should most definitely be allowed to sell big names of their choosing at a loss to draw you in too.

Hmmm!? Agency pricing seems like a bad, non-free-market thing, so I'm against it. But I was very surprised to read what Smashword's Mark Coker had to say about it. I'll have to think about this.

If agency pricing is limited or overturned, it would allow Amazon to price ebooks at below cost and effectively eliminate the profitability of all its competing retailers. This would also discourage the formation of new competitors. It's ironic that the EC and US DOJ are pursuing these ill-advised campaigns that could lead to less competition in the ebook market, not more.
...
Despite fears to the contrary, we see evidence at Smashwords that agency pricing might actually encourage lower book prices. Indies, which are enjoying great benefits from the agency model (Smashwords only distributes to agency retailers), are using agency to offer customers lower prices, not higher prices. The average ebook at Smashwords is priced under $5.00, and we have over 15,000 books priced at FREE. Why do indies price their books lower when they have the freedom to charge anything they want? The reason is that indies realize that consumers value fair prices, and as a result these lower prices give indies a competitive advantage over the large publishers.

[BeccaPrice]

This is the "books are fungible" argument - if books are interchangeable, then lower priced books will sell better than expensive books. This should serve, then, to drive prices down. But if books aren't fungible, if some books do indeed have a higher value than other books, then publishers would charge more for books seen as more valuable - books by name authors will be more expensive than books by non-big-name authors. this is, in fact what's happening, which proves to me that publishers don't really believe that books are fungible after all. Like so much else, they're trying to have it both ways.

[tompe]

Originally Posted by BeccaPrice

This is the "books are fungible" argument - if books are interchangeable, then lower priced books will sell better than expensive books. This should serve, then, to drive prices down. But if books aren't fungible, if some books do indeed have a higher value than other books, then publishers would charge more for books seen as more valuable - books by name authors will be more expensive than books by non-big-name authors. this is, in fact what's happening, which proves to me that publishers don't really believe that books are fungible after all. Like so much else, they're trying to have it both ways.

But it can still be fungible. It can be a fungible in the specific category of books that will sell for the chosen price level. For example best sellers are probably fungible compared to other best sellers.

[petrucci]

Originally Posted by BeccaPrice

This is the "books are fungible" argument - if books are interchangeable, then lower priced books will sell better than expensive books. This should serve, then, to drive prices down. But if books aren't fungible, if some books do indeed have a higher value than other books, then publishers would charge more for books seen as more valuable - books by name authors will be more expensive than books by non-big-name authors. this is, in fact what's happening, which proves to me that publishers don't really believe that books are fungible after all. Like so much else, they're trying to have it both ways.

Something is fungible when it can be substituted for another such thing. The key point about fungibility is that the substitution involves the object serving some purpose, or having a value placed on it. Thus, an object is only fungible with respect to some value system. Most pbooks are fungible with respect to making a fire. Different people value books for different reasons. Some people only want to be entertained, while others may want to learn something.

It may be useful to consider automobiles. In certain respects they are fungible, as they can be used to get you from one place to another. However, in other respects they are not, as a Smart Car does not drive like a Ferrari.

If books were not fungible in any way, then a great book could demand a very high price, such as $1,000. We do not see such prices. In fact, most newly released pbooks have a very similar price. I believe that the prices are close to one another because they are fungible to some readers and this causes competition amongst the books.