QOTD: eBook Pricing?

Posted on April 27, 2009 by Shaun

Do you think that eBooks are priced fairly? I would say that they are a little too high for my liking, particularly titles on dedicated readers.

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4 Responses to QOTD: eBook Pricing?

  1. Joel says:
    April 27, 2009 at 7:16 am

    hell no, I am in Australia and now buy all my books from http://www.bookdepository.co.uk mostly in large paperback or hardcover form, which I prefer over the small paperback or ebook.

    I did buy ebooks, but you can’t lend them, they take forever to come out – about the same time as the mass market paperback and often at the same price… so why bother?

  2. Philippa says:
    April 27, 2009 at 10:10 am

    Given the restrictive terms under which many are offered (DRM) then yes they are too expensive.

  3. Sian says:
    April 27, 2009 at 10:52 am

    I’ve been saying for quite some time that they have a tendency to be well overpriced. Especially if you can get an actual paper copy of the book for rather less.

    In the early days of ebooks I frequented the Baen website, where I was able to purchase some books for less than the (at the time) paper book price.

    I also think it’s daft to restrict an ebook to one particular format – what’s that all about? You’ve got, somewhere, the text of the book, why would you want to restrict it to certain readers/software?

    I’ve always used Mobipocket (it was one of the best free ebook readers for Palm), and I like to download books from Gutenburg and convert them for my own use.

    I have even scanned in books to create ebooks from them! Now THAT’s time consuming!

  4. david says:
    April 28, 2009 at 2:47 pm

    I can understand that something like a dictionary is around the same price as the real thing – there is added value in having that i electronic format – but fiction should be a lot cheaper.
    There has to be some reason for us to choose an electronic version over a paper version, something to counteract the disadvantages (Like not being able to lend it to someone, not being able to read it if the battery runs out, not being able to read in bright sunlight).
    I don’t know how much of the cost of a book is the paper and the physical storage, but I would expect an eBook to be around half the price of a paper one.