Once again the Internet has exploded. I’m starting to think I should chart the explosions. I’m sure there is some kind of pattern…
Anyway, as I’m sure you know Amazon and publisher Macmillan went head to head over the weekend. People on both sides (people not actually connected except loosely to either actually) have been screaming.
Now, I don’t believe either company is evil. Can’t say there are many companies I consider evil….although a few have made it on my “dead to me” list. Anyway, I’m not going into who is right, who is wrong, who is looking out for authors, who is looking out for readers, and who is looking out for the little guy, because quite honestly I think everyone involved is looking out for themselves, including many of the screamers.
But I thought it would be interesting to dig around a little into what at least in part started all of this…hardback editions.
I am not published in hardback, and quite honestly I’m not much of a hardback buyer. But some people are and being published in hardback is still a big deal to many people.
As you know, hardback books can be expensive. They are certainly (until they wind up on the remainder table) more expensive than a mass market paperback. Because they cost more and the traditional print contract for an author is based on percentage of price printed on the book (not what the book actually sells for), authors make more per book on a hardback than they do a paperback.
On paper, you can see why some authors might be against an e-Version coming out at the same time as the hardback and costing them that higher price sale.
Except I don’t think it is that simple. I think the psychology of buying hardback (never mind the complexities of what the author might earn on that eBook which is not necessarily based on cover price and far from standard) is complicated.
I think some people are hardback buyers and I don’t think it is just because the book comes out first that way. I, as I said, do not usually buy hardbacks. I have quit (and I know I shouldn’t admit this) buying many of may favorite authors at all because they went to hardback. They go to hardback; I go to the library. Now if there was a simultaneous cheaper release, I would buy it, but there isn’t so I don’t and they lose my sale all together.
That is one issue I have with the idea that offering the eBook lower at the same time as the hardback will cost authors and publishers money.
The second is I will argue that some hardback buyers are such lovers of the hardback, they might buy both. One to read and not worry about condition-wise, the other to shelve and admire.
You combine these two possibilities and without some kind of study, I don’t know how you can say with certainty that offering the book cheaper when the hardback comes out would result in fewer dollars overall.
Now, having said all of this how do I personally feel about eBook prices? I don’t like them. It is one of the reasons I don’t own an eBook reader. I won’t pay $300 or whatever and then have to pay the same I do now for the books. It doesn’t make sense to my cheap little brain.
But I do think publishers have the right to not release a cheap version when the expensive version is out. I, personally, would wait and release the eBook when they released the paperback, but hey, that’s just me! Movie companies don’t release DVDs when the movie is in the theater and while readers may want their cheaper eBook right now, we are used to waiting for the paperback…of course, I’d still be going to that library…
How about you? Do you buy hardbacks? If a cheaper version was available at the same time, would you buy it instead? Would you buy both? Or do you not buy hardbacks at all?
And just how much do you think an eBook should cost? What is your “no thanks I’ll borrow, beg, or steal” rather than buy price?
Zombie Moon
