Apple at it again did not learn from the ebook fiasco

[dickloraine]

30% is okay if you sell your own product, were you can set the price. It is impossible to pay 30% of the sale for a product you have to buy from someone else. Take the mentioned agency priced eBooks. You can't make a profit this way. That is the reason why apple does not charge this for physical goods. Nobody would sell them through apple. But of course apple customers want to buy this things from their idevices with comfort. Since apple does not sell such products, it doesn't charge the fee. But digital products they either sell themselves or maybe will in the future, because they have the infrastructure for it. This effectly makes buying ebooks, movies, music etc. uncomfortable to buy outside of apple. In that way they hinder competition on products they sell themselves.

[pwalker8]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Oh well I am tremendously sorry that I didn't lay out the metaphorical neon signs indicating I was talking about... um... ebook retailers selling digital goods.

Thank you for your elucidation.

Gee, my bad. I thought when you wrote "demanding 30% shares in all business", you actually meant all business. Sorry I didn't read your mind.

[DuckieTigger]

Originally Posted by dickloraine

It is impossible to pay 30% of the sale for a product you have to buy from someone else. Take the mentioned agency priced eBooks. You can't make a profit this way.

Exactly. That is why it is not even a business decision to sell ebooks on iThings or not. Unless you are in the charity business. It is very ironic as well that Apple has the tendency to somehow steer every discussion back to their collusion to fix prices. Use any semantics you want, at the end of the day it makes perfect sense why Apple was pushing so hard for agency pricing with a 70/30 split. What a coincidence that it is the exact same split as anything else app store. Nothing surprises me any more when it comes to anything Apple.

[pwalker8]

Originally Posted by dickloraine

30% is okay if you sell your own product, were you can set the price. It is impossible to pay 30% of the sale for a product you have to buy from someone else. Take the mentioned agency priced eBooks. You can't make a profit this way. That is the reason why apple does not charge this for physical goods. Nobody would sell them through apple. But of course apple customers want to buy this things from their idevices with comfort. Since apple does not sell such products, it doesn't charge the fee. But digital products they either sell themselves or maybe will in the future, because they have the infrastructure for it. This effectly makes buying ebooks, movies, music etc. uncomfortable to buy outside of apple. In that way they hinder competition on products they sell themselves.

No, actually the reason that Apple doesn't charge for physical goods is because you don't use Apple's infrastructure for physical goods. There is nothing nefarious about it. Amazon charges 3rd party resellers who use Amazon to sell goods. Do you think that is wrong and an attempt to hinder competition, as well?

[murg]

Originally Posted by pwalker8

No, actually the reason that Apple doesn't charge for physical goods is because you don't use Apple's infrastructure for physical goods. There is nothing nefarious about it. Amazon charges 3rd party resellers who use Amazon to sell goods. Do you think that is wrong and an attempt to hinder competition, as well?

The reason that Apple doesn't charge 30% on physical goods is that no one would sell them through Apple. It wouldn't be financially feasible.

And you would be using Apple's infrastructure to sell the physical goods, just like you're using the Apply infrastructure to sell digital goods.

Amazon doesn't charge 30% (oops, apparently they do). Amazon has half a clue about fostering people who want to sell things through their website.

[murg]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Oh well I am tremendously sorry that I didn't lay out the metaphorical neon signs indicating I was talking about... um... ebook retailers selling digital goods.

Thank you for your elucidation.

You should be ashamed of yourself.

Go stand over in the corner until we say you can come out.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by murg

Amazon doesn't charge 30%. Amazon has half a clue about fostering people who want to sell things through their website.

Amazon does charge 30%; in fact they charge more.

This is my most recent Amazon seller account statement:

Product charges: £16.38
Promo rebates: £0.00
Amazon fees: -£5.78

Fees of £5.78 on sales of £16.38 is 35%.

[murg]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Amazon does charge 30%; in fact they charge more.

This is my most recent Amazon seller account statement:

Product charges: £16.38
Promo rebates: £0.00
Amazon fees: -£5.78

Fees of £5.78 on sales of £16.38 is 35%.

I stand corrected.

How does anyone make money on Amazon if they are siphoning off 30%?

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by murg

I stand corrected.

How does anyone make money on Amazon if they are siphoning off 30%?

You'll be looking at that sort of percentage fees through pretty much any sales channel. In my case I'm selling second-hand books, and I'm probably making more by selling through Amazon than I'd get by taking them to a second-hand bookshop, for example. Their charges are lower if you're what Amazon call a "Pro-Merchant", in which case you pay a fee of £25/month and then a lower per-item percentage. I don't sell enough through Amazon to make that worthwhile.

[murg]

Originally Posted by HarryT

You'll be looking at that sort of percentage fees through pretty much any sales channel. In my case I'm selling second-hand books, and I'm probably making more by selling through Amazon than I'd get by taking them to a second-hand bookshop, for example. Their charges are lower if you're what Amazon call a "Pro-Merchant", in which case you pay a fee of £25/month and then a lower per-item percentage. I don't sell enough through Amazon to make that worthwhile.

The pricing makes sense for the type of selling that you do.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by murg

The pricing makes sense for the type of selling that you do.

I agree. I think it's reasonable.

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by pwalker8

Gee, my bad. I thought when you wrote "demanding 30% shares in all business", you actually meant all business. Sorry I didn't read your mind.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Context_(language_use)

[pwalker8]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Context_(language_use)

So you are claiming that everything said in this thread applies _only_ to ebooks by context? I don't think so. You know it's really not a big thing to simply say "I meant only ebooks". I would have said fine, thanks for clarifying if you hadn't been a jerk about it.

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by pwalker8

So you are claiming that everything said in this thread applies _only_ to ebooks by context? I don't think so. You know it's really not a big thing to simply say "I meant only ebooks". I would have said fine, thanks for clarifying if you hadn't been a jerk about it.

I'm sorry, there is just something about:

1. Apple apologists
2. people who nitpick about terminology when basic assumptions serve to make everything extraordinarily understandable

that sets me off. Unfortunately, your behavior matched both patterns.



This is beside the point that the thread is talking about digital music sales as it compares to digital book sales, and the antitrust potential of one in relation to the conviction of the other...

...which means that yes, I do expect people to assume everything in this thread is applicable to the shared trend of digital sales, and going beyond that should require explicit mention.



Feel free to continue being a nudnik about the issue, but as far as I am concerned, this ended here, which means I have nothing to respond to.

[murg]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

which means I have nothing to respond to.

You really should learn to apply yourself more...