Comments on: Don’t be surprised if Amazon has to raise the price of Kindle books

By: La Feuille » Archive du blog » Le modèle économique du Kindle en question…

Tue, 23 Jun 2009 17:16:47 +0000

[...] l’Institut d’analyse Bernstein Research (rapportent eBouquin, CrunchGear, PaidContent et MediaMemo), le prix moyen des livres électroniques pour le Kindle ne devrait pas [...]

By: Louise H

Louise H — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 12:41:20 +0000

Aren’t they already sidelined by the fact that they don’t uise the epub standard even before they try putting on the price of books for the Kindle?
Here’s another question – in the world of digital publishing, who would you most like to hear from today?

By: Steve Miller

Steve Miller — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 01:08:38 +0000

Absolutely agree with you. Also note that the $9.99 is only a few select books. Paperbacks are generally about 10% cheaper than the physical version, so throwing in the real-costs argument, they’re making a lot on those.

The $9.99 is only the teaser taste to get people to read ebooks.

By: eBouquin - Le prix d’Amazon ne seront pas éternellement bas

eBouquin - Le prix d’Amazon ne seront pas éternellement bas — Sun, 21 Jun 2009 17:47:53 +0000

[...] Source : CrunchGear [...]

By: Screen Sleuth

Screen Sleuth — Sun, 21 Jun 2009 17:39:07 +0000

$12.50? I almost guarantee digital book sales will instantly go down on Amazon if they make that change (enough to negate any extra profit they could realize).

By: weatherman

weatherman — Sun, 21 Jun 2009 14:20:27 +0000

That has to be one of the stupidest bits of analysis I’ve seen in quite some time. It’s the kind of thing that is done more for headlines and ego than for any actual use in forecasting or strategy.

The report completely ignores the fact that the price of selling, storing, and shipping physical books continues to go up, and while the costs per unit may decrease with scales of efficiency, the overall costs still go up. Costs for selling, storing and shipping electronic books, on the other hand, continue to go down both on a per-unit and overall level. So while the margin may be less on an electronic book than it is on a hardcover, they are able to sell many more copies of an electronic book without increasing costs at all.

The fact that they can sell more without increasing costs leads to a second, more important conclusion; selling at a lower price means more volume which can lead to more revenue. If a book sells 10 times as many copies in paperback as it does in hard cover, there can be a 10 fold increase in the profit. And that’s the long tail of it.

Are prices going to go up? Probably at some point. That seems obvious. But this hype about Amazon jacking the prices soon seems to be more about promoting “the Bernstein duo” and Peter Kafka than anything else.

By: Paramendra Kumar Bhagat

Sun, 21 Jun 2009 02:04:22 +0000

9.99 sounds like a magic number. That is whey they are sticking to it.

By: mmbb_c

mmbb_c — Sun, 21 Jun 2009 01:24:43 +0000

If I pay $24.95 for a hardcover, or 16.95 for a paperback, or between $12 and $6 for a used copy, I own the rights to read it for as long as I own the book (in perpetuity); it’s called physical possession DRM.
E-book downloaders are screwing the pooch and getting screwed by the big dogs.

By: Ankit Gupta

Ankit Gupta — Sat, 20 Jun 2009 19:40:27 +0000

This Kindle stuff is much more than just the short term economics – they have obstacles like getting publishers to allow the content to be distributed over this network in a digital form and out of their control. They also have to get customers to use the Kindle device. They also have to make sure that Sprint continues to work with them for the wireless connections, among other things.

My point is that I think this is just the first step – getting publishers to agree to use the service. Once they do that, they can flex some muscles on the publishers and get them to lower pricing, giving Amazon their profit margins.

By: serena

serena — Sat, 20 Jun 2009 19:04:59 +0000

I love the kindle books and the classics you can often find so cheap, its worth it even if it does get a little more pricey for the new ones, but they come down quickly in some catagories.

By: kevin

kevin — Sat, 20 Jun 2009 18:55:15 +0000

So what about the books for $1.99 and the odd freebee?

I don’t think they’ll raise prices. I think that Amazon knows basic economics and that as the price of luxury goods fall, the profit increases.