Publisher – Being the Curator, Polishing, Manufacturing, Marketing. 45-55% (includes Author’s Royalties). Note that Printing accounts for just 10% of the book price.
Distributor – 10%.
Retailers – 40%. ..
So including Apple's supposed 30% take, minus printing, minus distibutor and retailer (brick & mortar) gives a discount of 30% from a paper book.
Of course the problem is the Publishers (now evil greedy cocaine using cousins of the heads of music labels) are next to fall to get lower prices for e-books.
Also this is kinda funny in regards to this statement from Steve Jobs: ?It doesn?t matter how good or bad the product is, the fact is that people don?t read anymore,? he said. ?Forty percent of the people in the U.S. read one book or less last year. The whole conception is flawed at the top because people don?t read anymore.? -http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2008/01/steve-jobs-peop/#ixzz0dm2jKoeY
Not to mention all the Apple fanboys who stopped reading after Jobs said that!
I'm picturing this as a great Magazine and Newspaper device... I'm picturing turning the page to a fully interactive Ad or commerical... then flipping to the next page to read the rest of US WEEKLY or SPORTS ILLUSTRATED...
This should be the most significant form of publishing for a tablet in my mind. I'm hoping for a quick change for many publications to electronic forms. Like many I don't see a huge attraction for a replacement of hardcover books magazines are a different story.
First; magazine articles are often shorter, so reading them isn't an issue. Further magazines are already integrating with the web space so this simplifies the evolution. Third; many magazines could vastly enhance thier content delivery with modern media.
By the way modern media is more than would and video. The ability to display drawings and graphics could add to many articles.
Quote:
This is going to be futuristic in how your interact with a digital magazine...
Yes absolutely huge. The trick is to get the right unencumbered standards in place and to get those standards quickly adopted. The key here though is that the publishers and Apple need to avoid screwing the customers with excessive pricing on electronic magazines.
That's the thing, you can resell packaged media (CD, DVD, books). The electronic versions of each broke that model. And it required a more expensive player device. It always felt like a cost-shift, the way I figure it, the media industry seems to makes a bigger net profit and the user has to buy more expensive equipment to use it.
At least we got something in return for losing the ability to (legally) re-sell packaged CD music, namely the "ala carte" music buying which saves CONSIDERABLE amount of money vs a $20 cd with only two or three good songs on it.
Question is what sort of incentive are we going to get to switch from the resale value of a paper book to a e-book?
Question is what sort of incentive are we going to get to switch from the resale value of a paper book to a e-book?
Precisely the same incentive we get for buying a $9.99 movie from iTunes when it can be found in a 7/11 DVD bin for $4.99.....none whatsoever...except digital posterity and portability.
i can't wait to pay apple a thousand bucks so i can pay verizon fifty bucks a month for the honor of paying only 15 bucks for a book i can get at the store for 12 bucks (with the 30% off coupons i get e-mailed to me weekly).
I know you meant that as a joke, but this is a long established standard of right of first sale, and I bet you'll see the difficult in doing this as the primary reason all the publishers are jumping on the bandwagon.
No more libraries, no more resale. I love Apple, but I'm sad to see this happening.
Don't be sad, soon you'll be getting all the content free off the torrents and not paying a thing!
The answer to this loss of right of first sale is blatant piracy!
i can't wait to pay apple a thousand bucks so i can pay verizon fifty bucks a month for the honor of paying only 15 bucks for a book i can get at the store for 12 bucks (with the 30% off coupons i get e-mailed to me weekly).
But you paid a car company tens of thousands of dollars for the mechanism that gets you to the book store, did you not? Plus well over 50 bucks a month to the oil companies.
What's that you say? Your car also does other things? So it does.
I'm picturing this as a great Magazine and Newspaper device... I'm picturing turning the page to a fully interactive Ad or commerical... then flipping to the next page to read the rest of US WEEKLY or SPORTS ILLUSTRATED...
This is going to be futuristic in how your interact with a digital magazine...
The love of ads has already started.
What is it about a fully interactive Ad that makes it a more appealing than any other Ad? It's all noise you have to suffer to get to the content. Interactive ads appear on the website of my daily rag from time to time. It's an irritant. You may like the latest Bud Lite ad but I'm far more interested in RTFA.
But you paid a car company tens of thousands of dollars for the mechanism that gets you to the book store, did you not? Plus well over 50 bucks a month to the oil companies.
What's that you say? Your car also does other things? So it does.
i don't own a car. i can walk to about five bookstores in less than ten minutes, and BN.com will deliver to me same day if i feel lazy.
my laptop and my phone do all the things i could possibly want an iGrand to do. true i watch movies and listen to music on my electronic devices - that's the only place you can do so. not true with a book... and i won't need to recharge a book to finish reading it.
Addabox: do you own a little tiny car for when you just want to go somewhere quick [maybe we'll call that car an iPhone] and a big old SUV for when you have a lot to do [maybe we'll call that a laptop], but still feel like you need another car [maybe we'll call that an iPad], not as tiny, in case you want to read a book while driving? nahh, nobody needs three cars, right?
I will buy very few digital books at $14.99, knowing that I can get a hard copy for less than half that price, and also knowing that the book publisher is making an absolute killing, because once the book is digital, there is virtually no production cost. Their margins would be massive. It would be sickening how much money they would make. I think they would be better served selling the digital books for much less...say $4.99 max. They will sell many more books (higher volume), because any book is at your fingertips 24 hours per day. I may be wrong, but I just can't stomach these companies making soooooooooo much money when the only thing they need to do is have a single digital file that is available to millions of people world wide.
But you paid a car company tens of thousands of dollars for the mechanism that gets you to the book store, did you not? Plus well over 50 bucks a month to the oil companies.
What's that you say? Your car also does other things? So it does.
Seriously? There isn't any way you can compare this to a car. People use these things for a myriad of other reasons as needing to get to their job. People use cars because there is no suitable alternative.
If you need to get email, do spreadsheets, watch videos, etc. then you have your cellphone and computer. This device is replacing nothing excepts books, newspapers and magazines. These are businesses that are already falling apart because people can get that information for free. Unless you are a voracious reader there is no way you are going to make your money back on this tablet.
What is it about a fully interactive Ad that makes it a more appealing than any other Ad? It's all noise you have to suffer to get to the content. Interactive ads appear on the website of my daily rag from time to time. It's an irritant. You may like the latest Bud Lite ad but I'm far more interested in RTFA.
One thing I didn't like about a lot of web sites is the ad media type doesn't match the content media type. If the site's content is mainly text and photos, I don't see why the ads should be animated, have audio or video. Magazines are mostly ads already, I hope they find a balance pretty quickly, because it sounds like it could get annoying very quickly.
What? Higher prices for content? You've got to be kidding me! If Apple does that I don't think I'll buy... and many millions will continue to buy books elsewhere. No doubt Amazon would be putting its Kindle Store on the tablet, so if Apple does that, I believe they're toast when competing with Amazon.
I doubt it. Why? How many of us got money burning our pockets to buy a Amazon Kindle. The name sounds dumb. Whether it be called Apple iSlate or iPad I'm sold!
Amazon is selling e-books at a loss because they want to expand and dominate the e-book market. There were e-readers before the Kindle but few people had heard of them. The Kindle ignited interest in e-books. Once the market expands Amazon will put up prices and/or force publishers to take a smaller cut allowing Amazon to profit.
BTW - I remember reading that Apple sold movies on the iTunes Store at a loss (I don't know if it is still true).
Ha. If you think the price of content is too high, wait until you find out how much the tablet will cost. Anyone still think it will be six hundred bucks? Nine hundred?
$1800 at least or greater. No way it will go cheap with all the research and development they must have in this thing.
I doubt it. Why? How many of us got money burning our pockets to buy a Amazon Kindle. The name sounds dumb. Whether it be called Apple iSlate or iPad I'm sold!
The Kindle is no more a dumb name than the iPod originally was. Amazon has also done a great job of raising people's awareness of the Kindle.
Also remember, the Kindle is likely to be significantly cheaper than the Apple Tablet with a much longer battery life. E-ink displays are also easier to read than LCDs especially outdoors. If you can afford an Apple Tablet you should be able to afford a $259 Kindle and if all you want to do is read e-books the Kindle is probably the better device.
Long term, dedicated e-book readers will probably disappear and be replaced with e-book apps running on tablets. But in the meantime there is still a market for the dedicated e-book readers, just like there is still a market for the traditional mp3 players (eg iPod Nano) despite the availability of the iPhone / iPod touch which can play music and so much more.
it's really not that high. actual hardcovers are 3 times that retail with discounts for perhaps the first two weeks.
the publishers have an investment in prepayment to the author and then often share the remaining profit with the author once that recovery is made. So it's not like it's all just money in the bank.
Once a solid market exists we'll likely get down to something like $10 for a 'new release' and $5 for 'backlist' with perhaps free first chapters being offered by publishers for some titles, especially newer authors.
It is a high price for something that you probably won't be able to re-sell or pass along to friends and family.
Comments
Here's the breakdown:
Author – Creation. 8-15% Royalties.
Publisher – Being the Curator, Polishing, Manufacturing, Marketing. 45-55% (includes Author’s Royalties). Note that Printing accounts for just 10% of the book price.
Distributor – 10%.
Retailers – 40%. ..
So including Apple's supposed 30% take, minus printing, minus distibutor and retailer (brick & mortar) gives a discount of 30% from a paper book.
Of course the problem is the Publishers (now evil greedy cocaine using cousins of the heads of music labels) are next to fall to get lower prices for e-books.
Steve, you old dog you.
Also this is kinda funny in regards to this statement from Steve Jobs: ?It doesn?t matter how good or bad the product is, the fact is that people don?t read anymore,? he said. ?Forty percent of the people in the U.S. read one book or less last year. The whole conception is flawed at the top because people don?t read anymore.? -http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2008/01/steve-jobs-peop/#ixzz0dm2jKoeY
Not to mention all the Apple fanboys who stopped reading after Jobs said that!
I'm picturing this as a great Magazine and Newspaper device... I'm picturing turning the page to a fully interactive Ad or commerical... then flipping to the next page to read the rest of US WEEKLY or SPORTS ILLUSTRATED...
This should be the most significant form of publishing for a tablet in my mind. I'm hoping for a quick change for many publications to electronic forms. Like many I don't see a huge attraction for a replacement of hardcover books magazines are a different story.
First; magazine articles are often shorter, so reading them isn't an issue. Further magazines are already integrating with the web space so this simplifies the evolution. Third; many magazines could vastly enhance thier content delivery with modern media.
By the way modern media is more than would and video. The ability to display drawings and graphics could add to many articles.
This is going to be futuristic in how your interact with a digital magazine...
Yes absolutely huge. The trick is to get the right unencumbered standards in place and to get those standards quickly adopted. The key here though is that the publishers and Apple need to avoid screwing the customers with excessive pricing on electronic magazines.
Dave
That's the thing, you can resell packaged media (CD, DVD, books). The electronic versions of each broke that model. And it required a more expensive player device. It always felt like a cost-shift, the way I figure it, the media industry seems to makes a bigger net profit and the user has to buy more expensive equipment to use it.
At least we got something in return for losing the ability to (legally) re-sell packaged CD music, namely the "ala carte" music buying which saves CONSIDERABLE amount of money vs a $20 cd with only two or three good songs on it.
Question is what sort of incentive are we going to get to switch from the resale value of a paper book to a e-book?
Question is what sort of incentive are we going to get to switch from the resale value of a paper book to a e-book?
Precisely the same incentive we get for buying a $9.99 movie from iTunes when it can be found in a 7/11 DVD bin for $4.99.....none whatsoever...except digital posterity and portability.
I know you meant that as a joke, but this is a long established standard of right of first sale, and I bet you'll see the difficult in doing this as the primary reason all the publishers are jumping on the bandwagon.
No more libraries, no more resale. I love Apple, but I'm sad to see this happening.
Don't be sad, soon you'll be getting all the content free off the torrents and not paying a thing!
The answer to this loss of right of first sale is blatant piracy!
Send up the skull and crossbones!
i can't wait to pay apple a thousand bucks so i can pay verizon fifty bucks a month for the honor of paying only 15 bucks for a book i can get at the store for 12 bucks (with the 30% off coupons i get e-mailed to me weekly).
But you paid a car company tens of thousands of dollars for the mechanism that gets you to the book store, did you not? Plus well over 50 bucks a month to the oil companies.
What's that you say? Your car also does other things? So it does.
I'm picturing this as a great Magazine and Newspaper device... I'm picturing turning the page to a fully interactive Ad or commerical... then flipping to the next page to read the rest of US WEEKLY or SPORTS ILLUSTRATED...
This is going to be futuristic in how your interact with a digital magazine...
The love of ads has already started.
What is it about a fully interactive Ad that makes it a more appealing than any other Ad? It's all noise you have to suffer to get to the content. Interactive ads appear on the website of my daily rag from time to time. It's an irritant. You may like the latest Bud Lite ad but I'm far more interested in RTFA.
But you paid a car company tens of thousands of dollars for the mechanism that gets you to the book store, did you not? Plus well over 50 bucks a month to the oil companies.
What's that you say? Your car also does other things? So it does.
i don't own a car. i can walk to about five bookstores in less than ten minutes, and BN.com will deliver to me same day if i feel lazy.
my laptop and my phone do all the things i could possibly want an iGrand to do. true i watch movies and listen to music on my electronic devices - that's the only place you can do so. not true with a book... and i won't need to recharge a book to finish reading it.
Addabox: do you own a little tiny car for when you just want to go somewhere quick [maybe we'll call that car an iPhone] and a big old SUV for when you have a lot to do [maybe we'll call that a laptop], but still feel like you need another car [maybe we'll call that an iPad], not as tiny, in case you want to read a book while driving? nahh, nobody needs three cars, right?
Don't be sad, soon you'll be getting all the content free off the torrents and not paying a thing!
The answer to this loss of right of first sale is blatant piracy!
Send up the skull and crossbones!
Argh!! Shiver me timbers!!
But you paid a car company tens of thousands of dollars for the mechanism that gets you to the book store, did you not? Plus well over 50 bucks a month to the oil companies.
What's that you say? Your car also does other things? So it does.
Seriously? There isn't any way you can compare this to a car. People use these things for a myriad of other reasons as needing to get to their job. People use cars because there is no suitable alternative.
If you need to get email, do spreadsheets, watch videos, etc. then you have your cellphone and computer. This device is replacing nothing excepts books, newspapers and magazines. These are businesses that are already falling apart because people can get that information for free. Unless you are a voracious reader there is no way you are going to make your money back on this tablet.
The love of ads has already started.
What is it about a fully interactive Ad that makes it a more appealing than any other Ad? It's all noise you have to suffer to get to the content. Interactive ads appear on the website of my daily rag from time to time. It's an irritant. You may like the latest Bud Lite ad but I'm far more interested in RTFA.
One thing I didn't like about a lot of web sites is the ad media type doesn't match the content media type. If the site's content is mainly text and photos, I don't see why the ads should be animated, have audio or video. Magazines are mostly ads already, I hope they find a balance pretty quickly, because it sounds like it could get annoying very quickly.
What? Higher prices for content? You've got to be kidding me! If Apple does that I don't think I'll buy... and many millions will continue to buy books elsewhere. No doubt Amazon would be putting its Kindle Store on the tablet, so if Apple does that, I believe they're toast when competing with Amazon.
I doubt it. Why? How many of us got money burning our pockets to buy a Amazon Kindle. The name sounds dumb. Whether it be called Apple iSlate or iPad I'm sold!
BTW - I remember reading that Apple sold movies on the iTunes Store at a loss (I don't know if it is still true).
Why the ".99" bs?? What is this, 1990?
Are we still all really so stupid that "12.99" seems closer to $12, not $13?
I thought it was closer to $12.10
$1800 at least or greater. No way it will go cheap with all the research and development they must have in this thing.
I doubt it. Why? How many of us got money burning our pockets to buy a Amazon Kindle. The name sounds dumb. Whether it be called Apple iSlate or iPad I'm sold!
The Kindle is no more a dumb name than the iPod originally was. Amazon has also done a great job of raising people's awareness of the Kindle.
Also remember, the Kindle is likely to be significantly cheaper than the Apple Tablet with a much longer battery life. E-ink displays are also easier to read than LCDs especially outdoors. If you can afford an Apple Tablet you should be able to afford a $259 Kindle and if all you want to do is read e-books the Kindle is probably the better device.
Long term, dedicated e-book readers will probably disappear and be replaced with e-book apps running on tablets. But in the meantime there is still a market for the dedicated e-book readers, just like there is still a market for the traditional mp3 players (eg iPod Nano) despite the availability of the iPhone / iPod touch which can play music and so much more.
it's really not that high. actual hardcovers are 3 times that retail with discounts for perhaps the first two weeks.
the publishers have an investment in prepayment to the author and then often share the remaining profit with the author once that recovery is made. So it's not like it's all just money in the bank.
Once a solid market exists we'll likely get down to something like $10 for a 'new release' and $5 for 'backlist' with perhaps free first chapters being offered by publishers for some titles, especially newer authors.
It is a high price for something that you probably won't be able to re-sell or pass along to friends and family.