Amazon pulls MacMillan?

[kjk]

Originally Posted by MerLock

I would have to agree. "The general consensus is that Baen, charging $4-6 per book for non-DRM'd ebooks in several formats, is doing it right." I would be in heaven.

I'd pay 3x that for a well formatted, well edited, non-DRM'ed book.

[cmdahler]

Originally Posted by MerLock

but ebooks is digital and probably cost less to distribute and obviously less to mass produce.

Probably cost less? Comparatively speaking, they cost nothing to produce. Anyone with half a brain and about two days' training could take the publish-ready edited text of a novel and spend a few hours with InDesign and get an ePub that's better quality than a lot of the crap that's out there in the ebook market these days.

[Pardoz]

Originally Posted by MerLock

I would have to agree. "The general consensus is that Baen, charging $4-6 per book for non-DRM'd ebooks in several formats, is doing it right." I would be in heaven.

It's worth pointing out here that Tor (which is a barnacle on Macmillan-US, which in turn is a tentacle of the great publishing kraken Holtzbrinck) had an arrangement in place with Baen's Webscriptions arm to sell Tor's books, multi-format and DRM-free (although at a slightly higher price point) in April of 2006. The deal was killed on the orders of upper-level management within days of going live, and four years later many of the books Tor publishes aren't legally or commercially available in electronic form.

[DawnFalcon]

Originally Posted by BearMountainBooks

Since I haven't even bought an ebook for 9.99 yet I'm guessing my feet were already voting...

I have. Baen eARC's. Yes, I am paying 14.99 for unproofed, non-DRM'ed books!

(...6 months before the print edition)

[MerLock]

Originally Posted by kjk

I'd pay 3x that for a well formatted, well edited, non-DRM'ed book.

The reason I'm upset with todays prices for ebooks is because it feels like I'm being charged a lot for a sub standard product. Now there is a push from the publishers about charging even more.

I guess the bottom line for me is that I feel that ebooks are not worth what they are being priced at today. If they charge more or even at the current prices, I expect more.

I know the term "more" is vague but it's all the stuff that's been heavily discussed in this forum such as better formatting, no DRM, better editing/proofing, etc.

I see mass paperbacks as having more values than the current ebooks yet a large number of the ebooks I see are priced higer than them or nearly just as much.

Also, I don't see why publishers should charge so much since you can't sell an ebook to a used bookstore (potential of not loosing sales to used books). E-stores can stock up on back titles because they don't take up any shelf space. It saves the publishers on production/distribution costs compared to paper books.

Just seems like the publishers are just very narrow minded. Seems like they can actually make a lot of money if they put some thought into making ebooks a viable business instead of insisting that ebooks will eat up hardcover sales and that's a no no. So it seems like they are dong everything possible to disuade people from purchasing ebooks instead of focusing on making the ebook business work.

[kjk]

Originally Posted by MerLock

I see mass paperbacks as having more values than the current ebooks yet a large number of the ebooks I see are priced higer than them or nearly just as much.

I totally see your reasoning on the issue...it really is a personal decision about what "value" is. My idea of value is having my entire library with me on a trip, without taking 5 suitcases full of books

[mcl]

Originally Posted by kjk

I totally see your reasoning on the issue...it really is a personal decision about what "value" is. My idea of value is having my entire library with me on a trip, without taking 5 suitcases full of books

I'd love to take my entire library with me on a trip, but I can't afford to hire someone to scan in all these out of print or otherwise unavailable books!

[MerLock]

Originally Posted by kjk

I totally see your reasoning on the issue...it really is a personal decision about what "value" is. My idea of value is having my entire library with me on a trip, without taking 5 suitcases full of books

I totally agree with that. Value and worth to me is a subjective thing. Like you, I can see why someone would be willing to pay higher prices for ebooks.