First, let me say that I love my Kindle 2. I bought it because I only want to read books with it. I don’t have a need to use it for any other reason, thus no iPad for me.

Re: Pricing. There is one big consideration that has to be taken into account. Amazon is a “store” just like Radio Shack, Best Buy or Target, etc. My point is, since when can a manufacturer (or publisher) tell businesses how much they can sell their products for? Yes, they can dictate how much their goods will cost for Amazon (or the others) to purchase, but no way should they be able to dictate a resellers price to the public.

for paperback releases the e-book is usually $4

they’ve been doing tis for several years

I don’t understand about your comment on large print titles being more expensive.

if you are talking about in print form, they will be more expensive as they take more paper, which takes more space, costs more to ship, etc.

if you are talking about e-books, what is a ‘large print’ e-book?

Now I suppose (from reading comments here and from various forums) that I am in the minority as someone who “cannot” wait for 4 months to read new releases. I love books from my favourite authors and want to read them right away.

I also bought a Sony Reader and then a Kindle DX (for more sexy screen) because I love reading books on those devices. WHY AM I BEING PUNISHED?

I made a suggestion that people on MobileRead found so outrageous, so insane, that they wanted me committed into an asylum. I suggested that rather than delaying entirely an e-book release, release it at the same time and same cost (and same optional sale price) of the hardcover. So on release day, for the same price, you have a choice of buying the hardcover or the e-book version.

Then, in 4 months, the “for those who waited” reduced pricing (~$9.99) for the e-book starts.

I think that’s better than entirely delaying the book. If you’re so into the author/book, you can buy it at “hardcover” pricing on release day, or, you can wait 4 months for cheaper.

I buy books so I can get all the words in them into my head. I’m paying for the words, not the ink. Here’s my money, now give me the words the way I want them.

sorry, your numbers don’t compute.

if amazon selling a e-book for $9.99 is selling below cost what it costs to produce the book then every paperback for $6.99 is loosing the publisher even more money. it’s the same content, but with the added cost of physical printing, shipping, retail, etc.

So I chose to acquire the book in such a way that makes no one any money. Great. I can’t promise that all of the other seeders/leechers on the torrent site would have been happy to pay had the option been there – sometimes people download just because they can – but I know that *my* download was definitely a lost sale.

Ditto the Harry Potter books. I own the original hardbacks, did the midnight parties and everything, but J. K. Rowling has made it quite clear that her work is too precious for Kindles et al. (But not too precious for half-assed movie interpretations.) If taking a stand is the important part, it’s certainly her right. But her vision of how we must experience those texts didn’t stop me from downloading all seven books in a matter of seconds. She had the chance to sell me the book twice, but my joy as I snuggle up with my e-reader doesn’t count in her world.

Conclusion: these artificial delays from the publishers aren’t making any friends or changing any minds. In a culture where people don’t think twice about downloading music from unauthorized sites, people will do the same for books. And frankly, I’m miffed enough about the delay that I probably won’t buy the ebook when it officially comes out – I don’t want my dollars to appear to vote for that practice.

I know illegal downloads are part of what publishers are worried about… but denying me the chance to buy the book is about the LAST way to keep me from downloading it.

This is a myth. See this New York Times article, the $9.99 is a loss-leader to encourage sales of the Kindle, Amazon is selling most e-books *at a loss*. Those cheap prices can’t go on forever. Here is another article Book Cost Analysis that breaks down the real cost of publishing. “Printing accounts for just 10% of the book price.”

that’s _more_ money to the publisher, retailer, and author. how they split it between them is going to be an interesting question to watch over the next several years.

I suspect that the ‘problem’ is that various contracts have been written giving people a percentage of the final sale price, based on the costs of traditional publishing, so when the sale price goes down without adjusting these percentages some people (probably authors) are loosing a lot of money, but other people who get the same percentage of the sale price, but have _far_ lower costs are making out like a bandit

There is very defiantly a place for publishers in the world of e-books. they perform _very_ valuable services

quality control (good editors can make a huge difference to a book)
talent search (this is part of quality control)
financing (cash advances for established writers, which is risking the publishers money that the writer is good enough to sell, and gives the writer money to live on while writing)
publicity/marketing (this will be even more important in the future, but also very different)

there are probably others, but the gist of what I am saying is that this isn’t a move to eliminate publishers, but it will significantly change how they work and what they should invest in.

it’s just too easy for the publishers to sell the e-books themselves. While amazon and B&N online bookstores make it easy for people to go to one place, it’s also very easy for the publishers themselves to create such superstores, and it doesn’t even need to involve coordination between them. you can make a website where you purchase an e-book, and that website takes your payment, then logs onto another website, purchases the book and delivers it to you.

this isn’t the optimal way to do things, and I expect that publishers will work out deals where they sell the books at a discount to each other to then sell to consumers, but this is all trivial to do.

amazon selling a book in no way makes it unavalable to B&N or Joe’s Online Books

I know I’d rather pay the lion share to the actual producer of the intellectual property than some corporation that gives the artist a few pennies on the dollar.

Are these people too dumb to realize that a third and fourth option exists, both of which result in a totally lost sale? Option one: go to the library and borrow it. Option two: find an illegally shared version of the book and read it on the above mentioned ebook reader.

So they can either make a lot of money with a few customers (hard cover), or make good money with a LOT of customers (e-Books, etc). I’d personally rather have more eyeballs reading my material vs. a few; word of mouth gets spread quicker.

Hopefully they realize this; $5 should be the price of an e-Book and they would sell so much more and MAKE money if they did.