E-book prices higher than p-book prices?

[Lemurion]

Originally Posted by astra

Price difference in a couple of $ is one thing, the price difference in examples I have given before is just outrageous.

I agree - those price differences are outrageous, and actively hurt the stores with higher prices. Given that I've read posts on various fora from the people running three of the larger independent e-bookstores I don't believe any of them are either stupid or trying to sabotage their own businesses.

This tells me they are only charging the higher prices because they don't have any choice.

[bgalbrecht]

Here's another one, Rissa & Tregare, by F. M. Busby. $8.46 at Fictionwise, $2.75 at Amazon on the Kindle. e-reads has an even more expensive POD paperback.

Even worse:
Stephen King at Fictionwise. Carrie, The Night Shift, The Shining, Salem's Lot and The Stand, all "regular price" over $30, with micropay rebate drops it down to $24 to $37.50! ($20-31 in their club). Kindle price $1.75 to $7.99, most were about $2.50. Mass market paperbacks, about $7-10. On the other hand, Just After Sunset is currently free after micropay rebate and most of the rest Stephen King at Fictionwise is around $6.

[ferridder]

Originally Posted by Shaggy

Keep in mind that Amazon not only sells kindle books, they also sell the kindle. That may seem like stating the obvious, but they are offering deep discounts on kindle format books in order to increase the market for kindle readers. They make up the loss they take on the content by selling more hardware.

It is rather the other way around, i.e., they sell the hardware cheap and pay every month for the EDGE radio connection. They then keep the platform closed (ever wondered why mobipocket.com books don't work on the kindle, although the format is the same?) and bully the publishers to lower their wholesale prices in order to make a profit through sales of high margin e-books.

[BlackVoid]

Originally Posted by HarryT

The fact that someone considers the price to be too high doesn't give them a "right" to take it illegally.

YES IT DOES! Most countries ALLOW downloads for private use.
Ebook prices should be 50% or less compared to the paper book price. Otherwise what is the point???
A paper book is much more valuable than a digital one.
It does not have DRM.
You can legally lend it to a friend.
It is easy to sell.
You can burn it for heat.

Pricing ebooks at the same price as paper books is self-defeating. The truth is that publishers simply do not want ebooks to succeed at all.

[Lemurion]

Originally Posted by BlackVoid

YES IT DOES! Most countries ALLOW downloads for private use.
Ebook prices should be 50% or less compared to the paper book price. Otherwise what is the point???
A paper book is much more valuable than a digital one.
It does not have DRM.
You can legally lend it to a friend.
It is easy to sell.
You can burn it for heat.

Pricing ebooks at the same price as paper books is self-defeating. The truth is that publishers simply do not want ebooks to succeed at all.

While I agree with the point that the additional limitations decrease the value of an ebook in comparison to a pbook I don't believe that in any way means it is either legal or moral to download copyrighted ebooks from illegitimate sources simply because one believes the price is too high - or for any other reason.

The idea that downloading is fine but uploading is illegal is a bit of a slippery slope - and also comes from specific cases such as music laws in Canada. Canada charges a blank media levy on recordable media such as CDs which is divided among the music industry to cover casual copying. This has been extended in many people's minds to cover downloading on the grounds that by accepting the levy the industry has agreed to the downloading.

Please note, publishers do not receive any of this money and so ebooks are not covered in this situation. These laws are not blanket permission to download anything just because it's 'for personal use.' That defense is particularly inappropriate when dealing with entertainment IP which is almost by definition 'for personal use.'

[Alfy]

Originally Posted by Lemurion

Please note, publishers do not receive any of this money and so ebooks are not covered in this situation.

That's not actually true everywhere. In France, for example, ebooks are covered by a higher VAT than paper books, because they are considered to be"digital media". I thus expect those French publishers to receive the same kind of levy you were talking about.

[Lemurion]

Originally Posted by Alfy

That's not actually true everywhere. In France, for example, ebooks are covered by a higher VAT than paper books, because they are considered to be"digital media". I thus expect those French publishers to receive the same kind of levy you were talking about.

French publishers may be different - I was only speaking to the Canadian case which is the one I'm familiar with. Having said that, it's important to note that the Canadian levy is separate from the GST (Canadian equivalent of VAT) and specifically earmarked to offset losses due to personal copying.

I'd be very chary of basing a defense on a higher tax rate unless there's a clear reference to the funds being earmarked to offset losses due to copying or downloading.

[Alfy]

Well, that "upgraded" VAT was specifically developed to provide additional revenues against copying, and at first applied mainly to blank tapes, CDs and hard drives (which made sense). Even so, I'd be surprised if mentioning this tax would get you out of trouble should you end up in a court of law because of illegal copying.

Which is where I feel I'm getting screwed twice : not only do I have to pay more for my digital books, but in addition it is still illegal for me to lend them to a friend.

In the end, I love my ereader but I would not have purchased it if I did not know I would be savvy enough to remove the DRMs, something which is still legal in France but not for long, which is crazy when you think I'm ready to spend money instead of going to torrents. Ebooks economics might make sense someday, but they certainly don't now.

[DaleDe]

Originally Posted by Alfy

Well, that "upgraded" VAT was specifically developed to provide additional revenues against copying, and at first applied mainly to blank tapes, CDs and hard drives (which made sense). Even so, I'd be surprised if mentioning this tax would get you out of trouble should you end up in a court of law because of illegal copying.

Which is where I feel I'm getting screwed twice : not only do I have to pay more for my digital books, but in addition it is still illegal for me to lend them to a friend.

In the end, I love my ereader but I would not have purchased it if I did not know I would be savvy enough to remove the DRMs, something which is still legal in France but not for long, which is crazy when you think I'm ready to spend money instead of going to torrents. Ebooks economics might make sense someday, but they certainly don't now.

It would seem they have managed to tax something that is illegal or does taxing it mean that it is now legal? Can you really have it both ways?

Dale

[tompe]

Originally Posted by DaleDe

It would seem they have managed to tax something that is illegal or does taxing it mean that it is now legal? Can you really have it both ways?

In Sweden the extra tax was as compensation for the legal sharing among friends and family. The tax is on DVD-R and other media.

[pagansoul]

I have a Kindle. One of the reasons I purchased it was because I liked the Amazon store, prices and set-up. I am also mostly a SciFi/Fantasy reader and find TOR/Baen a good place to pick up some blind buys. I simply have no space for anymore books in my home. I used to collect them and let myself get out of hand. It took years of flea markets, garage sales, library give aways before I widdled it down to a managable amount. Some of them I didn't even read. I find having them on my computer so much better that in some cases I don't mind I will never have them to resell. Heck, most of them were purchased by resellers anyway. Only my 'Coffee Table' picture books were brought new and I still have those. My paperbooks are mostly gone, except for maybe 200 or so that I like to return to and several boxes of my favorite comics and Trade paperbacks. I'm going to have to take a picture of some of what I have left.

Back to topic...ebooks is still in it's infancy. I have been told that most book readers are older woman and since not many of us are into modern technology I don't think p-books will go away completely but I know they are in decline and there is nothing anyone can do about it. Publishing firms are just trying to hold on to their revenue like everyone else. They are going to fail but that doesn't stop them from trying. Right now the economy is getting bad, watch the prices go down and when it gets better they will try to go up again but it's not going to happen but at least with e-books they don't have huge warehouses filled with books they can't sell.

[Dean]

I contacted Sony about their pricing policy. They responded that it was a free market place. Sellers can decide how they will price things.

I agree. If a seller sells a book at a higher price, and another store offers it for less, then take your business to the other store. It is not a monopoly situation.

Of more interest to me is the remuneration deal with the author. How much money does an author, the publisher, and the seller make on the sale of the book? Having a higher sticker price does not mean the author gets a bigger cheque. In fact the writer usually gets one fee per book sold, and even then the contract used to be based on first run, hardback, and paperback with future runs at a different amount. So how much does an author make on a paperless book?

[Shaggy]

Originally Posted by DaleDe

Can you really have it both ways?

Yes, if you have enough government lobbyists.