Amazon's $9.99 eBook Attacked as "Predatory Pricing"

[delphidb96]

Originally Posted by Wetdogeared

Sony's view on the $10 eBook and DRM.

Sony Ebook Boss: DRM Needs To Stay And Ebooks Should Cost More Than $10 From: techdirt

Plus an article in Tomorrow's Book: Advertising and the eBook: A future alliance?

I've *bought* electronic copies of books for $100 and more, but these were highly technical books and it was worth it for me to have them in e-book format (PDF). However, this is Sony, which is *also* stating that they plan to 'dominate' the ebook market over, say, Amazon. Yeah. Right. As IF!

There's no way I'm gonna pay more than $30 for an ebook version of a novel! (Sad to say, I *have* paid $28... )

Derek

[delphidb96]

Originally Posted by jasonkchapman

Last I heard, FW has pretty much stopped dealing with anyone who doesn't have a dozen titles or so.

At least twelve published works. They can be short stories or novels. Sad day indeed.

Derek

[PortaDiFerro]

Only thing I find disturbing with this Amazon "predatory pricing" is that because they have their own closed system, as long as they can lure in lot of people to buy kindle and get some books there, they are unlikely to move away again or at least they'd have to keep their old kindle if they want to read their books still. And at that point they can increase prices when they know their customers can't shop anywhere else.

If the playing field was open (ie. no DRM) it should be relatively easy and cheap to start new ebook store. You don't need to invest in huge piles of books and storage and logistics etc, just make contracts with the publishers. So there would always be new competition once the pricing settles to acceptable rate.

[delphidb96]

Originally Posted by PortaDiFerro

Only thing I find disturbing with this Amazon "predatory pricing" is that because they have their own closed system, as long as they can lure in lot of people to buy kindle and get some books there, they are unlikely to move away again or at least they'd have to keep their old kindle if they want to read their books still. And at that point they can increase prices when they know their customers can't shop anywhere else.

If the playing field was open (ie. no DRM) it should be relatively easy and cheap to start new ebook store. You don't need to invest in huge piles of books and storage and logistics etc, just make contracts with the publishers. So there would always be new competition once the pricing settles to acceptable rate.

Work *is* being done to allow for DRM-removal. Thus, purchasers can always move purchased titles to other devices, although this may well be illegal in many countries.

And Amazon's DTP allows for publishers/authors to choose the price for their Kindle ebooks.

And given that the Kindle has been hacked and re-hacked, if one wants to move away from the .azw/.azw1 ebook formats, one only needs to install Ubuntu and a Linux ebook reader on the device. I understand this is actually rather easy on the Kindle DX.

That means the threat of raising prices is invalidated.

Plus, given that the Kindle loves the plain .mobi as well as the .azw ebook format, there is no reason why an owner cannot buy .mobi ebooks from a third-party retailer. I routinely transfer my FictionWise .mobi ebooks to my Kindle. After all, I purchased them while I was a dedicated Bookeen Cybook Gen3 user and now that I have the Kindle, I see no reason to re-purchase them when all I have to do is strip the DRM and upload them.

Derek

[jasonkchapman]

Originally Posted by mrmikel

The small publishing houses can't compete in this competition so they drop out and many get absorbed or fail.

I don't know. The small houses just have to get better at what they do, and smarter about how they do it. The occasional Scholastic-takes-a-chance-on-Rowling deal tends to keep people on their toes.

[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by delphidb96

Tell that to Dickens and Heinlein.

Derek

And Poul Anderson.

Astrid was once in a class where an essay was assigned for "why did the author write this book?" Since her father had written the book, she asked him. She turned in a one-line response: he wrote it for the money.

Teacher gave her an F.

She returned with a note from her father: "Astrid needed braces that year; that's why I wrote that book."

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by Elfwreck

And Poul Anderson.

Astrid was once in a class where an essay was assigned for "why did the author write this book?" Since her father had written the book, she asked him. She turned in a one-line response: he wrote it for the money.

Teacher gave her an F.

She returned with a note from her father: "Astrid needed braces that year; that's why I wrote that book."

Hee-Hee!

Love it!

[jaxx6166]

Originally Posted by Elfwreck

And Poul Anderson.

Astrid was once in a class where an essay was assigned for "why did the author write this book?" Since her father had written the book, she asked him. She turned in a one-line response: he wrote it for the money.

Teacher gave her an F.

She returned with a note from her father: "Astrid needed braces that year; that's why I wrote that book."

Now THAT's a good one!

[captaingeorges]

This type of pricing by Amazon and others like Fictionwise, should make the authors and publishers very very happy instead of mad...

In the past I used to wait for a book to be in paperback to buy it (9-10 a year) and the rest of my reading was done by buying books in second hand bookstore.

I got my Cybook in March 2008. So far I have bought 180 books...

The math should not be too hard to do...


Merry Christmas to all!


Georges

[calvin-c]

Originally Posted by captaingeorges

This type of pricing by Amazon and others like Fictionwise, should make the authors and publishers very very happy instead of mad...

In the past I used to wait for a book to be in paperback to buy it (9-10 a year) and the rest of my reading was done by buying books in second hand bookstore.

I got my Cybook in March 2008. So far I have bought 180 books...

The math should not be too hard to do...

The question, IMO, isn't whether or not the price increases the number of books sold, but whether or not it increases profits. According to many reports, Amazon is losing money on each sale. If true, then the more books that are sold, the more money Amazon loses.

So, why is Amazon doing this? The only reasonable answer is to become 'the big dog' that can dictate terms. If they can corner the market (IMO, they can't-but they might think otherwise) they can then raise prices & recoup their losses. If not then, if they're big enough, they can dictate terms to the publishers, thus lowering the publishers prices. This, of course, is what the publishers fear.

Right now, I don't think anybody's losing money except Amazon-so the publishers are crying before they're hurt, as you pointed out. But the fear of being hurt is there, which is why they're not happy about the prices.

[delphidb96]

Originally Posted by captaingeorges

This type of pricing by Amazon and others like Fictionwise, should make the authors and publishers very very happy instead of mad...

In the past I used to wait for a book to be in paperback to buy it (9-10 a year) and the rest of my reading was done by buying books in second hand bookstore.

I got my Cybook in March 2008. So far I have bought 180 books...

The math should not be too hard to do...


Merry Christmas to all!


Georges

435! *PLUS* 192 from eReader.com!=. And another 150 from Baen and 30 from Amazon. Can't say that having a dedicated ebook reader has slowed my purchasing of stories.

If anything, knowing, now that I have a Kindle, that I can purchase and read an ebook just about anywhere I can get cell signals has boosted the likelihood I'll choose reading over any other "I gotta kill time while waiting" activity. Netbooks? Too bulky and awkward to hand-hold. PDAs? Too limited. Same with iPod Touch. Cell phones? I'm not rich enough to be able to afford one of those gee-whiz iPhone or Droid wonders - not with the initial price and the *MASSIVE* contracts involved. Nope, even my Kindle 2 is small enough to carry with me and light enough to use with just one hand.

Predatory pricing that sucks me in and makes me a loyal customer? Amazon, please keep on killing me with kindness! (About to become a TWO K2 household as the latest "broken" K2 I got on eBay ($47.40 w/shipping) is within warranty and Amazon's fixing it for free.)

Derek

[delphidb96]

Originally Posted by calvin-c

The question, IMO, isn't whether or not the price increases the number of books sold, but whether or not it increases profits. According to many reports, Amazon is losing money on each sale. If true, then the more books that are sold, the more money Amazon loses.

So, why is Amazon doing this? The only reasonable answer is to become 'the big dog' that can dictate terms. If they can corner the market (IMO, they can't-but they might think otherwise) they can then raise prices & recoup their losses. If not then, if they're big enough, they can dictate terms to the publishers, thus lowering the publishers prices. This, of course, is what the publishers fear.

Right now, I don't think anybody's losing money except Amazon-so the publishers are crying before they're hurt, as you pointed out. But the fear of being hurt is there, which is why they're not happy about the prices.

And I have such a problem with the idea that Amazon's losing money on each ebook sale. Amazon skims 65% of the price right into their pocket. And that's better than a retail storefront gets. The author writes the book. The publisher (or author if self-publishing) supplies the file to Amazon - along with artwork. Amazon just have to format it, store a copy on their server and electronically deliver it. Where is the money going? My bet is Sprint to cover Whispernet. Unless, of course, the publishers are negotiating better deals for themselves than what a self-publisher gets from Amazon's DTP. *THAT* I would believe.

Derek

[BearMountainBooks]

Originally Posted by delphidb96

And I have such a problem with the idea that Amazon's losing money on each ebook sale. Amazon skims 65% of the price right into their pocket. And that's better than a retail storefront gets. The author writes the book. The publisher (or author if self-publishing) supplies the file to Amazon - along with artwork. Amazon just have to format it, store a copy on their server and electronically deliver it. Where is the money going? My bet is Sprint to cover Whispernet. Unless, of course, the publishers are negotiating better deals for themselves than what a self-publisher gets from Amazon's DTP. *THAT* I would believe.

Derek

Publishers do get a better percentage than DTP. Even going through Smashwords, the percent is 42 for the author, versus 35. I'm sure the larger houses do just fine percentage-wise, which makes their whining all the more unseemly. I get that they don't want consumers to expect 9.99. I don't get why they are wasting time whining--get more of your backlist out there and you'll make more money than by whining!

[kjk]

Originally Posted by delphidb96

My bet is Sprint to cover Whispernet.

Edit: you mean paying AT&T for 3G access? I'm curious what they are paying them.

[delphidb96]

Originally Posted by kjk

Edit: you mean paying AT&T for 3G access? I'm curious what they are paying them.

AT&T? I thought Whispernet ran on Sprint? Oh well, if I'm wrong... All I really care about is that when I turn on the connection, will I get connected - and it hasn't failed me yet.

Still, when I finally get my novel(s) finished, I think I'll go straight to DTP and ClearSpace for publication. As a self-publisher, that will give me a bigger piece of the pie and I don't really need an advance if going the regular advances/royalties method is going to leave me with a miniscule advance and years before I see real royalties. No, I'm not so egotistical as to believe my current novels are going to be instant NYT bestsellers.

Derek