It still costs money for someone to download that text into the system. The behind the scene process isn't as advanced or cut & dry as some might think.I think what Sakrysta is saying, if I am understanding correctly, is that she doesn't see why there isn't a larger difference.
As an amateur writer who hope to get published one day, I fully understand everyone wants to get paid. But with an E-Book, you don't actually have to print the book. And as far as I know (which I admit probably isn't very far at all) the actual printing of the book on paper is a large chunk of the cost that isn't there with an electronic copy.
EDIT: And I see others have already replied before me saying otherwise, so never mind
Why do e-books cost so much?
- Thread starter Sakrysta
- Start date
I expect physical book prices to increase rather than e-book prices to decrease. There will come a point in which printing prices per book will increase (as the market for such books decreases).
That being said: I usually get e-books from baen.com which charges about $4 to $6 each.
That being said: I usually get e-books from baen.com which charges about $4 to $6 each.
It still costs money for someone to download that text into the system. The behind the scene process isn't as advanced or cut & dry as some might think.I think what Sakrysta is saying, if I am understanding correctly, is that she doesn't see why there isn't a larger difference.
As an amateur writer who hope to get published one day, I fully understand everyone wants to get paid. But with an E-Book, you don't actually have to print the book. And as far as I know (which I admit probably isn't very far at all) the actual printing of the book on paper is a large chunk of the cost that isn't there with an electronic copy.
EDIT: And I see others have already replied before me saying otherwise, so never mind
It's also not as complex as some might think. Yes, a lot goes on, and the data will likely pass through a large number of different routers, etc. But the process of moving information over a network (either as small as an office, or as large as the internet) is fairly simple when you get to the basics of it. Heck, I was setting up networks in high school 7 years ago, and while I'm sure a lots changed I don't think it's a completely new animal.
I feel the same way. The idea of e-books sounds really great to me and I would love to get a Kindle, but then I look at the prices of the books and it's like, why bother? I'm not willing to pay $200 and then another $10 every time I want to download something new. I understand that some people are willing to do that, and that it's just the way the industry works right now, but it's a crazy concept to me. I guess it's also why the only songs on my MP3 player are ones ripped off CDs I already own, because I don't like the idea of having to pay for each song after I've already had to pay for the damn MP3 player. I'd rather listen to the radio (or Pandora, which I love) for free.
Anyway, I understand what you're saying and I also understand what the rest of the people in this thread are saying. It's just an annoying situation which turns me off from buying an e-reader, even though I really do want one. I don't underestimate the worth of books, but why would I ever buy one at full price when I can wait and get it later for free or very cheap at a library or used book store? Or Amazon Marketplace, which I use quite a bit for books. It's basically throwing money away, and as much as I like the idea of the e-reader I just can't justify the extra expenses that go along with it.
Now THAT makes sense. Thank you. Doesn't mean I'm going to go out and start buying e-books, but it helps preserve my few logic circuits.
And, well, until I actually read all my books - and/or until libraries no longer exist - it's not like anyone is forcing me to spend my money on books. I just like 'em. I like seeing how many I can cram onto my shelves, and I like organizing and reorganizing them. It's one of my OCD tendencies.
Either way, I don't think I'll stop buying books anytime soon. 
I get the rest of it, but typesetting? Enlighten me, why would you need that for an electronic format?
Do you think that books are published set out in the way they were in the author's manuscript? The format, paragraphs, words per page, typeface, etc. all need to be set up, whether the book will be printed or viewed online.
It's not literally setting type. These days, all "typesetting" is done electronically -- choosing the font and format, determining the look of the pages and where the page breaks are, creating headers and page numbering, etc. And it's done exactly the same way for both a paper book and an e-book. The book is an electronic file up until the point where it's either sent to be printed or saved in an e-book format.
It's the same as when you create and format a document on your word processor at home. You can choose to send that document to the printer, or you can choose to save it as a PDF, but it's the same document up until that point.
Yup. You can't just drop a document into Word and then it's good to go. In the process of preparing a book I wrote for self-publishing (a separate thread on its own, I guess) I had to learn a lot about typesetting. It is not an easy process and requires quite a bit of manual work. Even if the book isn't going to be printed you still want the flow of the text and the arrangement of chapter headings, etc. to be clean and attractive.
Ok, I think I understand. Although on the books in my kindle, it seems like some of these things change depending on how I have my settings in the Kindle. Fonts for example.
When I saw the term "typsetter" I was imagining a person physically setting type on a machine for printing. That's why it wasn't making sense to me for a book that isn't actually printed.
EDIT TO ADD: Translation. I'm old.
How does one go about getting a job doing this? Because I LOVE doing this type of stuff!
I wasn't venturing to answer the OP question, I don't have enough information. What is the percentage of the cover price for producing, warehousing, distributing &c, a paper book? Most publishers say it's around 10-12% but other industry observers say it's more like 15%.
I have no problem with publishers maintaining the same profit margins on ebooks that they do on the traditional product. I would have a problem with them padding their profits at the consumer's expense because of the competitive peculiarities of an emerging market. I am somewhat skeptical of publishers' numbers because of how opaque they are about sales figures, but from what I've been able to find out an ebook price point that is ~10% less than the trade paperback -- once it's on the market -- of the same title seems pretty fair to both sides.
Either way, I don't think I'll stop buying books anytime soon.
Books are a wonderful proven technology!
--Justin
Why shouldn't I expect a 20%+ discount? I can routinely get a 33% discount at Borders via their e-mail coupons on print titles. I don't think it's unreasonable to expect to be able to purchase an ebook for no more than I can pay for a new copy in print.
Physical books get discounted because there's actual stock that needs to be cleared. Those books take up warehouse space and if you want to get rid of them quickly you slash the price.
With ebooks there is no physical space to worry about. You can have millions of ebooks on a single server and sell unlimited copies. There's never any physical stock to get rid of so the circumstances that lead traditional booksellers to cut prices don't exist for ebooks.
Except this isn't an individual item being remaindered that I'm talking about; this is "take 33% off any item". There's no reason for ebooks to not match that.
You're still helping your local Borders get rid of physical stock, whether you use that 33% on a $7.99 paperback novel or a $60 art book. And of course, the hope is that by bringing you into the store to use your coupon, you'll not just buy one book, you'll buy several books helping them clear even more physical stock.
Borders, as with all the other players in the eBook market, probably can't offer you a coupon on eBooks anyway because of the "agency pricing" model that's been in effect since spring. Books published by five of the largest publishing houses (Hachette, HarperCollins, Macmillan, Penguin, and Simon & Schuster) have their prices controlled by the publishers themselves, and the eBook retailers are forbidden from discounting the titles.
Borders, as with all the other players in the eBook market, probably can't offer you a coupon on eBooks anyway because of the "agency pricing" model that's been in effect since spring. Books published by five of the largest publishing houses (Hachette, HarperCollins, Macmillan, Penguin, and Simon & Schuster) have their prices controlled by the publishers themselves, and the eBook retailers are forbidden from discounting the titles.
By that logic, they should never get more stock at all, and just close up shop.
I know why they can't charge less; that doesn't make my reasons for why I think they're charging too much invalid.
I would suggest too, that if the goal is to get people to try e-books and get used to reading via that format, vendors really need to make their products more attractive. Right now, the price point of transitioning - both the initial investment of an e-reader as well as the current same-as-print pricing on e-books - is a hindrance. When my only significant motivation for choosing e-books over print books is storage space &/or "nifty new gadget!", that really just isn't enough to convince me.
I hate that I can't even really buy an e-book, it's more like you buy a license to watch it on a given device. I know that's just how it is but I wish it was more permanent and open.
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