ebook prices

[infael]

The Feds may sue various companies and Apple, for fixing ebook prices. I certainly hope they do!! I just paid $8 for a 77 page ebook. It was #4 in a series. The first 3 were full-sized paperbacks, costing $8 as well.

[Tm-Moore]

For my part I am surprised that someone had the audacity to charge so much for such a short ebook. On the other lens, I must protest Amazon's bad habit of forcing prices down below cost of production. My highest ebook price is currently $4.99 for what would be a $20 print book. It's the best I can ever get because of the pressure to cheapen the price by Amazon. I would rather the DOJ go after Amazon than the other biggies because they can be dropped by a retailer Amazon's size and still not get a dent in pricing on their end. I would say that it's Amazon who is price-fixing. When someone reminds Jeff Bezos what he has done to sales he may or may not sing a different tune.

[Zalen_Redlaw]

I'd have to say whoever is pricing that book is not paying much attention to the market. I had my first eBook priced at $7.99 and it did poorly. When I lowered the price to $4.99 for it, the second in the series, they have done much better. As a self-published author, I can control the price of my work, whether it is on B&N, Amazon, Lulu.com, iTunes, or wherever. Maybe the author of that book did not have control over the price. If you want a good, long sci-fi book for a decent price, try D.F. Marrs 'The Last Astronaut' (http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-last-astronaut-don-marrs/1104734439) Hazen Wardle. Author, 'The Triumph Detective' series.

[Tm-Moore]

I agree that the publishers are as much to blame for the pricing problem as market pressures.

I just lowered all the ebook prices here a dollar, and my print prices, too. I can do that because I am self-published, so I have an ear to the ground. But that does not eliminate the concern that ebooks priced at 99 cents or less command about 95% of the current ebook market. And the freebies retain the king's share of it. Unless and until readers begin to understand the relationship between the author and his work nobody is going to benefit from this pricing problem. Apparently they think the stuff grows on trees or that an ebook is available because the print book sales are doing very well. In fact it is the exact opposite. Often a printed book's sales depends heavily on the ebook sales, or the lack thereof. If nobody reads the ebook how are they going to know if the print book is any good?

With the launch of so many reading devices on the market you would think that there is a chance to be read, but more often than not our target market is doing other things with them. Magazines and games also clog the market, and they can be read/played on the same devices, and are more interactive and colorful to look at. Social networking via text or twitter also captures their attention. Therefore, the future of books in print or in e-format is less certain.