Results 1 to 7 of 7

Thread: News - Amazon vows to fight agency pricing

  1. #1
    HEXUS.admin
    Join Date
    Apr 2005
    Posts
    31,709
    Thanks
    0
    Thanked
    2,060 times in 719 posts

    News - Amazon vows to fight agency pricing

    Website wants to keep e-books cheap and cheerful.
    Read more.

  2. #2
    jim
    jim is offline
    HEXUS.clueless jim's Avatar
    Join Date
    Sep 2008
    Location
    Location: Location:
    Posts
    11,435
    Thanks
    612
    Thanked
    1,639 times in 1,304 posts
    • jim's system
      • Motherboard:
      • Asus Maximus IV Gene-Z
      • CPU:
      • i5 2500K @ 4.5GHz
      • Memory:
      • 8GB Corsair Vengeance LP
      • Storage:
      • 1TB Sandisk SSD
      • Graphics card(s):
      • ASUS GTX 970
      • PSU:
      • Corsair AX650
      • Case:
      • Silverstone Fortress FT03
      • Operating System:
      • 8.1 Pro
      • Monitor(s):
      • Dell S2716DG
      • Internet:
      • 10 Mbps ADSL

    Re: News - Amazon vows to fight agency pricing

    I'm fairly disappointed with the ebook situation in general really. I was desperately tempted to buy a Kindle, but as a history student it's absolutely no use to me.

    Of the texts I've needed to buy, only one has been available on Kindle. And that single book was a whole 20p cheaper than the paperback (brand new). Are they honestly trying to tell me that raw materials, machinery, labour, factory space, multiple deliveries comes to a total of 20p? It's ridiculous.

    If I wanted to read the Times every morning, and download every Dan Brown book to my e-reader within 8 seconds of it being released, then yeah, I'd have bought one buy now. But there are so many situations where it doesn't match up to expectations it's untrue.

    There's a lot of money out there, I believe, for publishers if they take the right attitude to digital sales. The music industry is almost certainly benefitting, so why are they so backwards? If they start going down routes like this, things can only get worse.

  3. #3
    Cul-de-Sachian sybrows's Avatar
    Join Date
    Apr 2004
    Location
    Brighthelm
    Posts
    841
    Thanks
    11
    Thanked
    7 times in 7 posts
    • sybrows's system
      • Motherboard:
      • MSI P55-GD65
      • CPU:
      • Intel Core i5 750 @ 3.8+Corsair H50
      • Memory:
      • 8 gig Crucial XMS 3 DDR3 1600
      • Storage:
      • 1X2tb WD Green
      • Graphics card(s):
      • EVGA 670 FTW edition
      • PSU:
      • Akasa 500 Watt
      • Case:
      • Coolermaster Stacker 8100
      • Operating System:
      • Win 8.1 Pro 64bit
      • Monitor(s):
      • 24" Iiyama LED LCD
      • Internet:
      • Virgin 75MB

    Re: News - Amazon vows to fight agency pricing

    I have so far read 2 books on kindle for android and while I enjoyed the books thoroughly there were a lot of typos and formatting problems.

    Charging the same amount as you would pay for a hardcopy which, as stated previously must cost a lot more to produce and supply seems really daft to me.

  4. #4
    Registered User
    Join Date
    Dec 2009
    Posts
    2
    Thanks
    0
    Thanked
    0 times in 0 posts

    Re: News - Amazon vows to fight agency pricing

    Quote Originally Posted by snootyjim View Post
    I'm fairly disappointed with the ebook situation in general really. I was desperately tempted to buy a Kindle, but as a history student it's absolutely no use to me.

    Of the texts I've needed to buy, only one has been available on Kindle. And that single book was a whole 20p cheaper than the paperback (brand new). Are they honestly trying to tell me that raw materials, machinery, labour, factory space, multiple deliveries comes to a total of 20p? It's ridiculous.
    Raw materials and the like are a fairly small component of the cost of a book. Most of the others are components paid for pretty solely by the retailer, and in the case of a warehouse retailer like Amazon, most of that is significantly diminished as well.

    Strippable paperbacks are a rather interesting contrast, those small flappy books, poor binding that fun stuff. If the retailer in question doesn't sell those book in their release window, they don't get shipped back to the distributor or publisher. They just send back the cover, and destroy the rest. And get the full wholesale refund for it.

    Now for history books, you are simply paying primarily for the interpretation, the same as other textbooks. So when you remove the physical component of the book, it doesn't really reduce the cost that much.

  5. #5
    jim
    jim is offline
    HEXUS.clueless jim's Avatar
    Join Date
    Sep 2008
    Location
    Location: Location:
    Posts
    11,435
    Thanks
    612
    Thanked
    1,639 times in 1,304 posts
    • jim's system
      • Motherboard:
      • Asus Maximus IV Gene-Z
      • CPU:
      • i5 2500K @ 4.5GHz
      • Memory:
      • 8GB Corsair Vengeance LP
      • Storage:
      • 1TB Sandisk SSD
      • Graphics card(s):
      • ASUS GTX 970
      • PSU:
      • Corsair AX650
      • Case:
      • Silverstone Fortress FT03
      • Operating System:
      • 8.1 Pro
      • Monitor(s):
      • Dell S2716DG
      • Internet:
      • 10 Mbps ADSL

    Re: News - Amazon vows to fight agency pricing

    You honestly believe that all of that costs 20p?

  6. #6
    Member
    Join Date
    Jul 2007
    Location
    The Future
    Posts
    105
    Thanks
    2
    Thanked
    4 times in 3 posts
    • Crazytom's system
      • Motherboard:
      • Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3R
      • CPU:
      • Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 OC @3.8GHz
      • Memory:
      • Kingston 4gb DDR2 1066Mhz
      • Storage:
      • Crucial M4 128GB SSD, Assorted HDDs
      • Graphics card(s):
      • ATI Radeon 4870
      • PSU:
      • Corsair VX450W
      • Case:
      • Antec P183
      • Operating System:
      • Windows 7
      • Monitor(s):
      • LG Flatron 22"

    Re: News - Amazon vows to fight agency pricing

    Quote Originally Posted by snootyjim View Post
    You honestly believe that all of that costs 20p?
    It could do, especially if its produced and shipped in bulk. The majority of the value of the book is still in the content though. Plus if the retailer can get away with making more money off ebook sales, they'll do it; who wouldn't?

  7. #7
    jim
    jim is offline
    HEXUS.clueless jim's Avatar
    Join Date
    Sep 2008
    Location
    Location: Location:
    Posts
    11,435
    Thanks
    612
    Thanked
    1,639 times in 1,304 posts
    • jim's system
      • Motherboard:
      • Asus Maximus IV Gene-Z
      • CPU:
      • i5 2500K @ 4.5GHz
      • Memory:
      • 8GB Corsair Vengeance LP
      • Storage:
      • 1TB Sandisk SSD
      • Graphics card(s):
      • ASUS GTX 970
      • PSU:
      • Corsair AX650
      • Case:
      • Silverstone Fortress FT03
      • Operating System:
      • 8.1 Pro
      • Monitor(s):
      • Dell S2716DG
      • Internet:
      • 10 Mbps ADSL

    Re: News - Amazon vows to fight agency pricing

    Even Amazon posting it to the customer is likely to cost around that much, I suspect. And no matter how much bulk you do, all of that automation costs money.

    I think you've hit the nail on the head there really - they think they can charge the same amount, and get away with it. I would put it to them that very few people are going to buy ebooks if they cost the same amount as a standard book, because it's not an easy concept to understand. By all accounts, you're getting less for your money (the only benefit is the speed of the transmission method, but that's got sod all to do with the publisher), so why doesn't it cost less? If I could get a 20% discount on books, and more of them were available, I would have bought an e-reader and a stack of books by now.

    As things stand, I'm spending a lot of time in the library, and buying a load of second-hand, scribbled on books. Who loses?

Thread Information

Users Browsing this Thread

There are currently 1 users browsing this thread. (0 members and 1 guests)

Similar Threads

  1. Replies: 0
    Last Post: 15-06-2010, 08:51 PM
  2. Replies: 4
    Last Post: 03-04-2010, 01:16 PM
  3. Replies: 32
    Last Post: 21-03-2010, 10:15 PM
  4. News - Amazon ?capitulates? to Macmillan
    By HEXUS in forum HEXUS News
    Replies: 2
    Last Post: 02-02-2010, 10:08 AM
  5. Replies: 5
    Last Post: 21-02-2007, 11:53 PM

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •