41–50 of 61 posts
http://screwpulp.com has a solution to the ebook pricing problem based on market economics. New books start out as free, then as more copies are downloaded the price goes up.
It's regrettable that some of the authors are losing sales, but I think that Amazon is basically in the right, for the following reasons: 1. Their arguments with regards to price elasticity are supported by (admittedly, Amazon's) data, and are intuitively plausible. Cheaper books sell more, yielding more revenue. The cost of production is substantially lower for ebooks, so passing on some of the savings to consumers…
Amazon is pushing their agenda with propaganda, and I'd be more critical. I liked John Scalzi's take on it: http://whatever.scalzi.com/2014/07/30/amazons-latest-volley/
As an author I support Amazon's position because as they say, books compete with the video game, TV, movie, etc. markets, and keeping consumer book prices lower helps grow the book market relative to other forms of entertainment, and I would argue that books benefit society more than video games and TV (but not necessarily movies).
This was also sent as an email to people with a KDP account
Author here. My publisher is one of the "big five" (not Hachette), and although my books are not affected by this dispute directly, it could be only a matter of time before they are. The problem, as I see it, is that Amazon has so much of the market share not only for e-books but for regular books that they can dictate terms that are highly favorable to them. While you could argue that those terms also benefit the re…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
It could just be bad writing, but Amazon's point about elasticity reads like a sleight-of-hand trick to me. They say: > So, for example, if customers would buy 100,000 copies of a particular e-book at $14.99, then customers would buy 174,000 copies of that same e-book at $9.99. So, 74,000 people choose to buy the cheaper book. Great! But without the price cut, those people might have bought other books. Maybe some ot…
I think what you're missing is that Amazon's point, that lower ebook prices are generally good for all parties, applies to all ebooks. They do use the phrase "a particular e-book" in their example, but I assumed that the real desire is for all ebooks to get a similarly proportional discount. Of course, even if we just consider a price drop on a single ebook, it's still a valid point that this helps that ebook compete…
As an author I support Amazon's position because as they say, books compete with the video game, TV, movie, etc. markets, and keeping consumer book prices lower helps grow the book market relative to other forms of entertainment, and I would argue that books benefit society more than video games and TV (but not necessarily movies).
Please look a little but further than your own self interest. Do you really want one entity having a monopoly on book distribution?
I was not making my previous comment out of self interest, BTW. In 25 years of being a published author I have only made chump change (less than $150K) on my writing. I earn my living as a software developer. I write because I enjoy it and through writing I have met some very interesting people who I would not have had a chance to meet otherwise.
It's regrettable that some of the authors are losing sales, but I think that Amazon is basically in the right, for the following reasons: 1. Their arguments with regards to price elasticity are supported by (admittedly, Amazon's) data, and are intuitively plausible. Cheaper books sell more, yielding more revenue. The cost of production is substantially lower for ebooks, so passing on some of the savings to consumers…
The publishers would like to set a price. That is their right. Amazon can pay that or not. That is their right. What's happening now is that a near monopoly on book distribution is throwing their weight around. The little players on the margins are going to get hurt.
The best source of 'cheap' books is the library. The only cost is a little bit of inconvenience. Yet library usage is dramatically down over the last few decades. This suggests to me that there is little demand for cheaper books. The biggest 'cost' to reading a book for many is not the money spent to acquire the book, it's the several hours of leisure time required to read the book, time that could be spent doing som…
If you include the value of your time, the library is a more costly option to acquire a book than Amazon for many affluent readers. And most libraries have a small fraction of the books one might want. The fact that people are choosing an efficient way to get the books they want is hardly evidence of inelastic demand.
I can borrow e-books from my library, nearly as fast as buying them from Amazon.
I can borrow physical books by hitting their site, putting a hold on it, and then next time I'm in town, I pick it up. It's not UPSd to my door, but it's not that big of an investment. (or, more likely, Wife + kids pick it up next time they bring home 40 books from the library. We sometimes have a good couple feed of the holds shelf.)