Publishers still missing the point on e-book prices

[Kevin8or]

edit: never mind. i was veering off topic

[MrsJoseph]

Originally Posted by Kevin8or

Sorry, dude, but you're diverting attention from Elfwreck's observation with something irrelevant to it. Publishers' customers aren't on the torrent sites. Their customers are actually sustaining their businesses.

Thank you. I'm a damn good customer and I know it. I spend crap loads of money on books every year so I can't feel any sympathy for a publisher that doesn't know how to keep customers/clients. I work in the real world where acting like an ass and doing nothing but bitching to your customer gets you nothing.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by sabredog

I took a different path than using a VPN to circumvent geographic restrictions

Which was what?

[stonetools]

Originally Posted by FizzyWater

It's frustrating that the argument here always seems to boil down to an all-or-nothing mentality. I don't think a book someone worked on for months, that has had adequate editing, that has a cover that actually hints at what's in it and catches the eye, is only worth $1.

I don't think everyone on this thread, let alone on this forum, thinks all ebooks should be almost free or completely free. There are those who do, but it's not everyone. I really believe that most people in this argument have a moderate view on what a book's value is worth.

My frustration - and I can only speak for mine - is that publishers want me to pay differently for an ebook that the print book. Hell, I was ticked off when publishers started using trade paper books as an intermediary between hardback and MMPB. I don't think ANY fiction book is worth $26 or even $15. My personal "sweet-spot" for the average-length fiction story is $5-$6, but I'm happy to pay less if I can get a nice deal and have been known to pay more if I want it NOW and don't want to wait for it to have a deal or come down to a MMPB price.

If I can walk into Wal-Mart or Target and buy a book at 25% off cover, I want the same for my ebooks. Or at least, I want that opportunity, depending on where I shop for ebooks. There is value added in ebooks, but there is also value taken away IMO, so to me, the difference in format doesn't justify a regular 20-25% increase in real costs to me.

Well, I think the point may be that $5-6 for an immersive reading experience of 8-10 hours may be too low to to sustain a corps of professional writers. How much would you be willing to pay for a movie, an album, a concert, a play, a sporting event? Seems to me if you are willing a kick out $10 or more for a movie or album and maybe $50 or more for a play, then $10-15 for a well written fiction book isn't really out of the ballpark.
A look at Amazon's page for well received novel " The Night Circus" reveals this:

Print List Price: $26.95
Kindle Price: $12.99 includes free wireless delivery via Amazon Whispernet
You Save: $13.96 (52%)
Sold by: Random House Digital, Inc.
This price was set by the publisher


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Length: 401 pages
X-Ray: Enabled
Don't have a Kindle? Get your Kindle here.


Formats Amazon Price New from Used from
Expand Collapse Kindle Edition -- $12.99 --
Expand Collapse Hardcover $14.95 $10.95 $10.95
See # more hardcovers
Show fewer hardcovers
Expand Collapse Paperback -- $12.62 $16.83
See # more paperbacks
Show fewer paperbacks
Expand Collapse Audio, CD, Audiobook, Unabridged $29.70 $24.97 $26.68
See # more audio books
Show fewer audio books
Expand Collapse Audible Audio Edition, Unabridged $26.95 or Free with Audible 30-day free trial

Its a bit unclear from the quote but the hardcover, paperback, ebook and audiobook versions all have different prices. Note that the heavily discounted hardcover price is HIGHER than the Kindle price and that the audiobook price is much higher than the Kindle price, although both come in digital form . There's never been a situation where the versions of a book all have the same price.
Speaking for myself, I've found the ebooks I buy are consistently cheaper than the hardcover versions and usually the paperback versions.
Again, this is not to say that the publishers price ebooks perfectly in all circumstances. They don't. What I am saying, though, is that people here seem to consistently assume that because something comes in ebook form it must be priced than even used book prices, regardless of who wrote it or even it came out.

[stonetools]

Originally Posted by Elfwreck

I wasn't talking about the ones who want recognition more than money, just pointing out that recognition and a readership is part of why most writers write--there are easier ways to make money. There are easier ways to make money writing, doing work-for-hire freelance pieces. (Nonfiction opportunities are everywhere. For fiction writers, there are plenty of game companies looking for people to write story pieces.)

I'm not focusing on the authors who want to be read so much they'll give away their works for free. I mean the ones who consider writing their business, their craft, and want to get paid for it--but also want their work to be enjoyed, and are aware that those are two different forms of support.

For the publisher, every reader who doesn't pay is a lost sale. For ebooks, that includes spouses and children of paying readers. For the writer, the reader who doesn't pay can be an entertaining and supportive fan.

Writers don't want their readers to just buy the books--they want them to read, discuss, share passages from the books. (They'll often settle for "just buy." But if they just wanted to sell their labor for enough to live on, they'd be plumbers instead.) And that means that non-paying readers become part of the support network that increases future sales, because the more people who know the work, the more who can discuss it and get interested in the next book.

They can also encourage other people, who don't have direct contact with someone who's bought it, to buy it, which is the publisher's only reason to tolerate non-paying readers. Authors have always relied on non-paying readers to support their careers in other ways--showing up at book signings, writing fanmail, encouraging other sales, supporting their local library, voting for awards, and so on. (If the Hugo awards voting were limited to people who'd bought the novels or stories, we'd see a *drastically* different set of winners.)

Novelists who want nothing but money for their labor should find another career; writing fiction's a terrible way to make money. There's nothing wrong with wanting money *and* the kind of acclaim that's only available to authors, and that's why many authors write. It's just that that's not why publishers publish--and ebook dynamics and internet commerce are making it easy for authors to find other ways to reach their goals.

I'm always amused at those who say that writers should not be interested in making money at writing. Well, why the hell not if its their only marketable skill, and if it's what they love to do? So far as I know, neither Steven King or GRRM ever made money, or even wanted to make money, at anything else but writing fiction.
EW seems to buying into a popular myth: that writing (and indeed all creative pursuits ) constitute a higher calling, like the priesthood, and that creative folks shouldn't be really interested in making money, but should be starving in a garret somewhere creating art for us and for posterity. Van Gogh is the patron saint of those whose buy into this myth.

Dr. Samuel Johnson had a different view. He said " Nobody but a blockhead ever wrote, except for money". This may be a bit extreme, but it provides a bracing dose of reality to thoser who think that a "true writer" should be uninterested in "filthy lucre".
Let's face it, "recognition" ain't gonna put food on a writer's table or shoes on their children's feet. The surest way to ensure that we have lots of quality professional writers around to write good fiction and good nonfiction to is to PAY them: to buy their books and to respect their property rights. That's what professional writers want above all.
When asked "how can readers who wish to support authors' rights best do so?", Ursula K. Leguin responded:

By not supporting textual piracy — violation of copyright — on the Net or anywhere else.

By being aware that huge corporations, such as Google and Amazon, are taking increasing control over what gets published, on paper or electronically, and therefore controlling what we read.

By not buying your books from Amazon, but from a local independent bookstore selling online, or a big indie such as Powells — it's just as easy and the selection is much better!

Many of the people on this forum do the polar opposite of every one of her suggestions, while paying lip service to author's rights. Funny that.

[Ankh]

Originally Posted by stonetools

Its a bit unclear from the quote but the hardcover, paperback, ebook and audiobook versions all have different prices. Note that the heavily discounted hardcover price is HIGHER than the Kindle price and that the audiobook price is much higher than the Kindle price, although both come in digital form . There's never been a situation where the versions of a book all have the same price.
Speaking for myself, I've found the ebooks I buy are consistently cheaper than the hardcover versions and usually the paperback versions.
Again, this is not to say that the publishers price ebooks perfectly in all circumstances. They don't. What I am saying, though, is that people here seem to consistentlyb assume that because something comes in ebook form it must be priced than ev en used book prices, regardless of who wrote it or even it came out.

When it comes to pricing, I personally think that it is "normal" (TM) that all of the following is true, at any moment in time:
1. If the audio book is available, its price is greater than the price of hardcover, paperback or eBook edition.
2. If the hardcover edition is available, its price is greater than the price of paperback or ebook.
3. If the paperback edition is available, its price is greater than the price of ebook.

Most of the complains about pricing that I've seen on MR are violations of these rules. Now, my expectations might be (easily) based on flawed assumptions, but I somehow doubt that whether I am right or wrong is of any significance to the publishers. However, if my (potentially flawed) perceptions are shared by most of the customers, that becomes an issue for both publishers and retailers.

After everything is said and done, the customer must be right, right? He better.

Originally Posted by stonetools

Well, I think the point may be that $5-6 for an immersive reading experience of 8-10 hours may be too low to to sustain a corps of professional writers.

I've played video games with much higher production costs, and it ran less than $0.20/hour. It kinda makes me wonder why authors and publishers think that they are so much more valuable.

how much would you be willing to pay for ... a concert, a play, a sporting event?

$0, $0, $0

These forms of entertainment are extraordinarily high cost and once you have experienced them, all of these things have zero monetary value. Quite frankly, they are also canned productions that have very little value beyond what an album, movie, or TV broadcast could offer. In a lot of respects rented books, er, electronic books, are quite similar.

My apologies if you adamantly disagree with how I value things, but some of us never had an opportunity to experience the high life. And while I was lucky and grew up in a house surrounded by books, it was of no thanks to publishers. It was thanks to a second hand market where books may sell at $0.20 each (about $0.30, inflation adjusted). Now publishers are savagely trying to rip even that away in the emerging ebook markets. And I have no doubts that ebooks are eventually going to replace the bulk of pbooks, so it is a very real threat.

[stonetools]

Originally Posted by Ankh

When it comes to pricing, I personally think that it is "normal" (TM) that all of the following is true, at any moment in time:
1. If the audio book is available, its price is greater than the price of hardcover, paperback or eBook edition.
2. If the hardcover edition is available, its price is greater than the price of paperback or ebook.
3. If the paperback edition is available, its price is greater than the price of ebook.

Most of the complains about pricing that I've seen on MR are violations of these rules. Now, my expectations might be (easily) based on flawed assumptions, but I somehow doubt that whether I am right or wrong is of any significance to the publishers. However, if my (potentially flawed) perceptions are shared by most of the customers, that becomes an issue for both publishers and retailers.

After everything is said and done, the customer must be right, right? He better.

Well, LOTS of customers are buying those 12.99 and 14.99 ebooks, but they are just as "right" as you.
Your assumption is flawed, because it doesn't taken into account the two biggest factors in book pricing: how long the book is out and who is the author.

[stonetools]

Originally Posted by BWinmill

I've played video games with much higher production costs, and it ran less than $0.20/hour. It kinda makes me wonder why authors and publishers think that they are so much more valuable.



$0, $0, $0

These forms of entertainment are extraordinarily high cost and once you have experienced them, all of these things have zero monetary value. Quite frankly, they are also canned productions that have very little value beyond what an album, movie, or TV broadcast could offer. In a lot of respects rented books, er, electronic books, are quite similar.

My apologies if you adamantly disagree with how I value things, but some of us never had an opportunity to experience the high life. And while I was lucky and grew up in a house surrounded by books, it was of no thanks to publishers. It was thanks to a second hand market where books may sell at $0.20 each (about $0.30, inflation adjusted). Now publishers are savagely trying to rip even that away in the emerging ebook markets. And I have no doubts that ebooks are eventually going to replace the bulk of pbooks, so it is a very real threat.

Well interesting as all this is, you should understand that the second hand market would not exist without the "first hand" market. If the book isn't written, because its not worth it for the author to write it, the publisher to publish it, or the bookseller to sell it, then you can't buy it second hand. Creativity ain't free and ultimately the worst form of saving is a world where it isn't worth it to create new art.

[Ankh]

Originally Posted by stonetools

Well, LOTS of customers are buying those 12.99 and 14.99 ebooks, but they are just as "right" as you.
Your assumption is flawed, because it doesn't taken into account the two biggest factors in book pricing: how long the book is out and who is the author.

You did notice that I did not mention ANY dollar amounts? These are relative comparisons between different editions of the SAME title.

Originally Posted by stonetools

Well interesting as all this is, you should understand that the second hand market would not exist without the "first hand" market. If the book isn't written, because its not worth it for the author to write it, the publisher to publish it, or the bookseller to sell it, then you can't buy it second hand. Creativity ain't free and ultimately the worst form of saving is a world where it isn't worth it to create new art.

If you read what I said, you would have realized that I'm far more concerned about the implications on agency pricing and violating the doctrine of first sale than I am about the price of first hand books.

If you want to pay $20 for a book, go for it! If you want to pay $10,000 for a book, who am I to argue? I don't even care if I have to wait a year or two for the price to approach affordable. What I am concerned about is a world where retailers or publishers cannot discount unsold merchandise because there is no such thing as unsold merchandise. I am even more horrified of a world where there is no second hand market to keep book prices under control.

[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by rhadin

I think he is right about the long-term. I look at the change in my own book-buying habits and do not see good things for the publishing world, i.e., both authors and publishers.

Until I received my first ereading device (Sony 505) 4 years ago, I spent $5,000 and more each year on books, nearly all hardcovers.
...
This past year, my first year with my upgrade to a Sony 950 and the giving of my 505 to my wife, hardcover purchases have declined dramatically. I spent about $1,500 on hardcovers and I visited the local bookstore on average once a month.

But an even steeper decline occurred in ebooks. In 2011, I spent less than $200 buying ebooks, yet I increased my ebook library by more than 650 ebooks.

On the flip side: It's very likely that before I got my ebook reader, I hadn't spent $5000 on new books in my entire life. I've never liked hardcovers for leisure reading (too heavy; rather carry two paperbacks with me). I looked for secondhand books and borrowed books, except for RPG manuals which are a lot harder to find used.

Since I got my ereader, I buy a few dozen dollars every month of new ebooks. That's not a whole lot--but it's up from effectively zero that I used to spend on novels that payed royalties.

Not entirely zero... I'd buy the new Terry Pratchett in paperback, sometimes the new Mercedes Lackey, and so on. And for nonfic, the occasional religious book, and I haven't stopped buying RPG manuals. But for novels, my annual new book budget was under $20; it's now over $200.

There's a lot more readers like me--people who either read seconhand, or weren't avid readers at all, who'd be happy to throw a few dollars a week at literary entertainment; some, on less strict budgets, will happily spend double what I would. But publishers aren't reaching out to us--we've never been on their radar, so they have no idea how to advertise to us. They don't know what we value in books or how that shifts to ebooks, because we were never their direct customers.

Publishers and authors who've figured out what I'm willing to buy are getting money from me that wasn't on the table at all ten years ago. *That's* what the agency publishers are missing--they're under the assumption that they know who "the book-buying public" is, and what they want & will put up with, instead of realizing that new media = new audience; they could have a flood of customers who've never cared about paper books.

[stonetools]

Publishers and authors who've figured out what I'm willing to buy are getting money from me that wasn't on the table at all ten years ago. *That's* what the agency publishers are missing--they're under the assumption that they know who "the book-buying public" is, and what they want & will put up with, instead of realizing that new media = new audience; they could have a flood of customers who've never cared about paper books.
__________________

Well, they know that the book buying public will pay agency prices for premium talent. They were right about that.
You should also understand that it takes a LOT of money to do the R&D and to build out the infrastructure for the new money and that investment money comes out of current sales. When people talk about new media, you get the impression that its all unicorns and rainbows that don't have to be paid for because the Internet changed everything. However, servers and programmers and bandwidth and developers all have to be paid for. Shatzkin says it this way:

The old publishing sales-and-distribution ecosystem is disappearing but the new one is not built out yet. Publishers are, to greater and lesser degrees, converting to digital workflows, developing their metadata chops, collecting names, building vertical communities by genre and topic, collecting and analyzing ebook pricing data, building new models to work with authors and even self-publishers, and they’re still signing the books they want with royalty rates for ebooks of 25% of revenue.

These efforts have been financed by the margins being earned on sales of print and sales of digital that publishers were able to acquire because of their power to distribute print. In Esposito’s words, this cash provides “venture capital for the new all-digital businesses that all publishers are contemplating”. These annual step-increments of digital growth and brick store decline have so far been tolerable to most of the big players we’ve known for decades. (Borders was an exception, but we know Borders was not done in by digital change alone.)

The pace of the digital switchover is quickening. That will reduce the cash available to invest in building a new ecosystem at the same time the urgency of coming up with new answers is rising. It’s enough to make a sober executive, even at a very large, successful, smart, and innovative company, admit to serious concern for the industry’s future.

LINK

[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by stonetools

Well, they know that the book buying public will pay agency prices for premium talent. They were right about that.

No, the "book-buying public" they had in the past will pay agency prices. I am part of the ebook-buying public, and I won't. "Premium talent" is a slippery term, and I certainly don't trust Macmillan to know what I'm willing to pay extra for.

You should also understand that it takes a LOT of money to do the R&D and to build out the infrastructure for the new money and that investment money comes out of current sales.

R&D should be built into the overhead operating costs. It's not like "changes in communications and media technology" is a new concept that just sprang up a couple of years ago, and publishers didn't have to deal with it before that. I'm not buying "prices have to go up so we can afford to do the internet properly." *My* income didn't go up so I could adapt to the internet. Publishers will have to deal with my discretionary income limits.

When people talk about new media, you get the impression that its all unicorns and rainbows that don't have to be paid for because the Internet changed everything. However, servers and programmers and bandwidth and developers all have to be paid for.

What indication do we have that (agency-pricing) publishers are trying to acquire new customers instead of selling new products to their previous customers and trying to maintain their income that way?

Their actions make them seem pretty fixed on the idea that their pool of potential customers hasn't changed, and every dollar spent on .epub instead of hardcover is lost profit, instead of recognizing the huge pool of potential .epub buyers who were never potential hardcover buyers.

Noticing those readers doesn't take an R&D budget. Figuring out how to market to them will take research--but they have marketing departments, and they can just shift the staff from whatever areas they believe are no longer profitable. Like, whoever was designing Borders ads & catalogs.

[Greg Anos]

Originally Posted by stonetools

Well, they know that the book buying public will pay agency prices for premium talent. They were right about that.
You should also understand that it takes a LOT of money to do the R&D and to build out the infrastructure for the new money and that investment money comes out of current sales. When people talk about new media, you get the impression that its all unicorns and rainbows that don't have to be paid for because the Internet changed everything. However, servers and programmers and bandwidth and developers all have to be paid for. Shatzkin says it this way:



LINK

I don't worry about the big 6's future...They don't have one.

The issue you dance around is as follows. I have a choice of a $2.99 indie ebook or a $12-14.99 Agency ebook.

Will I get 4-5 time more entertainment out of the Agency ebook, on average? Only if I do, is it "worth the money". Otherwise, I'll spend the $2.99.

This is nothing new, the entire history of the pulp magazine industry was premised on it. Doc Savage sold consistenly more than 200,000 copies a month. It cost 15 cents. The "best seller" of the era ran $1-2 a book in hardback. People voted with their dollars for pulps. More pulps were written and sold than all the best sellers combined, for the period of 1900-1950. Just like people eat fast food instead of a fine restaruants. Costs matter.

What is new is the fact that an author who wants to, can have complete control of his/her business, and cut out the middle men who are currently eating up 90% of the revenue. But to do that, they have to be businesspeople, not just artists.

Read Robert A. Heinlein's Grumbles From the Grave. Look at how concerned he was about the business of writing. That's why he was such an economic success...