Larry of the Lawn Posted December 7, 2014 Share Posted December 7, 2014 Larry the,Did you see Trackerneil's post up-thread where he and his co-author decided to give their book away online and have gotten $0.00 donations for doing so, plus a complaint that the donation button makes the downloaders "fell bad because it implies they stole the book"? It seems that if there are specific examples like this the "always pirates never buys" isn't much of a strawman. Further, those who say "a $1.00 for an eBook is more than fair" and that's all they ever pay aren't much better. They completely discount the time and expense of editing, copyediting, and formating a book. Yeah, I did see that. Look, I'm not denying the existence of thieves. There are people out there that steal regular paper books off the shelves. Obviously, ebooks lend themselves more readily to being illegally copied. The person that complained about Tracker's donation button is also quite clearly a lunatic and/or a dipshit. But I think the zero in income from the donation button might also speak to the fact that maybe no one that downloaded actually read it, or maybe they bought a copy somewhere else or already had one. The "$1.00 for an ebook being more than fair" only holds up if it's qualified. If I buy the paper book, I want a free or near free copy. You keep talking about the costs of making an ebook, and while they exist, they are one time costs. We're not so much discounting the costs as understanding that they are not on the same scale as printing a paper copy. It's also not fair to suggest or imply that the costs of making an ebook are drastically cheaper than making a paper book, or the entire self publishing wave would never would have been possible. Maybe it was hyperbolic of me to claim that the ebook thief is a strawman, but I stand by the claim that your average pirate isn't downloading anything they'd have actually purchased, or they're downloading stuff that they already have purchased. The ebook is an electronic, infinitely reproducible product, and the sooner that authors and publishers start treating and marketing it as such, the sooner they'll be able to earn their full potential from it. They need to stop expecting it to be as secure as a physical book, and accept the fact that it's infinitely easier to sell 1000 copies for $4 each than to sell 400 for $10 each. I guess it just seems strange to think that your audience and consumers would treat ebooks any differently than they treat mp3's. Because that's what they are. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AncalagonTheBlack Posted December 7, 2014 Share Posted December 7, 2014 Has a survey/study ever been done do find out how many actual pirated books people read out of whatever number they download ? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TrackerNeil Posted December 7, 2014 Share Posted December 7, 2014 Has a survey/study ever been done do find out how many actual pirated books people read out of whatever number they download ? Not that I am aware of, but such a thing may not even be possible. Lots of people won't want to admit they steal books, although, there are more of those who are completely shameless about it than I ever would have believed. My co-author was once asked where our book was available, and as Dan started to answer, the guy interrupted with, "Oh, I can just get it from a torrent site." :dunno: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eponine Posted December 7, 2014 Share Posted December 7, 2014 Larry, re the statement that it's better to sell 1000 books for $4 than 400 for $10, are books and especially genre books really that price elastic? I know some people will pass on a book (or pirate it) if the price is too expensive. I've paid a lot of money for a few relatively obscure ebooks but I'd probably have pirated something like HP7 if the ebook was priced at $100 (I'm sure some people would have paid that). But are they really more inclined to buy a $4 book than an $8 book? Like they browse the Kindle shop without a real idea of what they want and pass on things until they see something cheap? I always know what I want before I know the prices. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lady Winter Rose Posted December 7, 2014 Share Posted December 7, 2014 I admitt I pirated forgotten realms collection, but it's legal in Croatia - as long as you do not share it with somebody. I nowdays, I most search smashwords for legally free books (awful quallity, but I I appreciate author's offer to me, so this is nice deal). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Callan S. Posted December 7, 2014 Share Posted December 7, 2014 I think the bargaining process has to be remembered - you don't bargain by instantly accepting the buyers first offer. It might seem smart to shift from $10 to $4, until buyer normatives treat $4 as the new $10 and then you have to drop further. What might seem difficult sales now might actually be fluid sales, compared to shifting tens of thousands of $0.50 books. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Callan S. Posted December 7, 2014 Share Posted December 7, 2014 Has a survey/study ever been done do find out how many actual pirated books people read out of whatever number they download ? You don't need to - as an author its far more flattering to assume they would have bought each and every book (including yours) if they could not download it. It's less flattering to consider that if forced to buy or go without, they might just as well have gone without (ie, the ones who don't read your downloaded book) Authors never thought they were in a patronage era - they thought they sort of arm wrestled money out of readers by sheer semantic strength. And now a dreadful patronage era is upon them, wrought by thieves. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spockydog Posted December 8, 2014 Share Posted December 8, 2014 So all y'all pirates are total amateurs. This is book piracy. Dude has totally hijacked Saladin Ahmed's Throne of the Crescent Moon, and is passing it off as his own work on Amazon. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darth Richard II Posted December 8, 2014 Share Posted December 8, 2014 Wow. I'm both appalled and impressed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Corvinus85 Posted December 8, 2014 Share Posted December 8, 2014 So all y'all pirates are total amateurs. This is book piracy. Dude has totally hijacked Saladin Ahmed's Throne of the Crescent Moon, and is passing it off as his own work on Amazon. I wonder if this guy is really a douchebag thief out to make some money, or is trying to prove a point (like Amazon allowing this to happen). It's been on Amazon since Nov. 22. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Larry of the Lawn Posted December 8, 2014 Share Posted December 8, 2014 Larry, re the statement that it's better to sell 1000 books for $4 than 400 for $10, are books and especially genre books really that price elastic? I know some people will pass on a book (or pirate it) if the price is too expensive. I've paid a lot of money for a few relatively obscure ebooks but I'd probably have pirated something like HP7 if the ebook was priced at $100 (I'm sure some people would have paid that). But are they really more inclined to buy a $4 book than an $8 book? Like they browse the Kindle shop without a real idea of what they want and pass on things until they see something cheap? I always know what I want before I know the prices.Fair point. I guess when you put it that way I'm not so sure. Probably not the best example and I'm not much of an economist, so it probably wasn't a point I have much business making. I guess I was thinking more of my own habits, where I like to have a paper and ebook copy of any book I really enjoyed. Usually I have the paper copy first (although this isn't always the case) because there is an insane amount of used books stores very close to me. I like to get the ebook too but if it's $13 or something, I don't buy it (unless it's something I can't live without). Whereas if it's $6.99 I don't even think about it and just click away. So yeah, my example was probably not very useful in that it's extremely dependent on my own spending habits. There are some other times I'll buy ebooks too though: 1) I was pretty confident that I'd enjoy Wolfe's Solar Cycle from board reveiws and goodreads, and picked up the entire thing at a used store for $15... except that it didn't have the Book of the New Sun. Which was a bummer since it's the first volume. So I bought the ebook instead for Shadow and Claw and Sword of the Lictor, even thought they were more than I'd usually pay for ebooks (think they were over $10 each) that I haven't already read. 2) If I finish a paper copy of a book in a series and I can't wait to run out and find the next one, I just buy the next ebook. When I'm that invested in a series, I always get a paper copy eventually, because I like to have the complete thing on my shelf. So its entirely possible that I'm viewing this whole 'ethics of free ebooks' thing from the angle that I already own or will own sometime in the near future, a paper copy of any ebook I buy. And it doesn't really bother me until I buy a record or go to a concert and get a free digital download copy of the show or album. Then it kind of chaps my ass, and I wonder why the book industry doesn't follow suit. I don't buy that many brand new books because I don't read a ton of contemporary stuff. So when I do go out and buy a $20 copy of a Dance with Dragons, I kind of feel a little entitled (maybe that's the whole problem) to a very cheap or free ebook copy too. So I can see why someone would want to pirate something like that. So it's tough for me to conceive of some reader out there just pirating a bunch of stuff that isn't buying the book in some other format, that also would have every bought the book in the first place. Which comes back around to the idea that pirates are actually taking money out of author's pockets. I'm not convinced they are. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Corvinus85 Posted December 8, 2014 Share Posted December 8, 2014 Larry, re the statement that it's better to sell 1000 books for $4 than 400 for $10, are books and especially genre books really that price elastic? I know some people will pass on a book (or pirate it) if the price is too expensive. I've paid a lot of money for a few relatively obscure ebooks but I'd probably have pirated something like HP7 if the ebook was priced at $100 (I'm sure some people would have paid that). But are they really more inclined to buy a $4 book than an $8 book? Like they browse the Kindle shop without a real idea of what they want and pass on things until they see something cheap? I always know what I want before I know the prices. I do that sometimes. I don't usually have a reading list, so when I finish a book, generally a book series, I often don't know what to read next so I start browsing. I also download samples from the Kindle store, and if the sample is engaging enough I will buy the book, no matter the price. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ninefingers Posted December 8, 2014 Share Posted December 8, 2014 I think the bargaining process has to be remembered - you don't bargain by instantly accepting the buyers first offer. It might seem smart to shift from $10 to $4, until buyer normatives treat $4 as the new $10 and then you have to drop further. What might seem difficult sales now might actually be fluid sales, compared to shifting tens of thousands of $0.50 books. I don't think this is true. iTunes hasn't had to drop their 99 cent songs in price, in fact they've increased. Again, I'll state for the record that I don't pirate books and am against it, but I can understand why people do it. Take Guy Kay's first book for example. It came out years and years ago, yet they want $10.99 for the eBook. It just smacks of greed and isn't a fair price. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David Selig Posted December 8, 2014 Share Posted December 8, 2014 Larry, re the statement that it's better to sell 1000 books for $4 than 400 for $10, are books and especially genre books really that price elastic?According to Amazon, yes. At least they claimed so during their recent conflict with Hatchettehttp://www.amazon.com/forum/kindle/ref=cm_cd_tfp_ef_tft_tp?_encoding=UTF8&cdForum=Fx1D7SY3BVSESG&cdThread=Tx3J0JKSSUIRCMTIt's also important to understand that e-books are highly price-elastic. This means that when the price goes up, customers buy much less. We've quantified the price elasticity of e-books from repeated measurements across many titles. For every copy an e-book would sell at $14.99, it would sell 1.74 copies if priced at $9.99. So, for example, if customers would buy 100,000 copies of a particular e-book at $14.99, then customers would buy 174,000 copies of that same e-book at $9.99. Total revenue at $14.99 would be $1,499,000. Total revenue at $9.99 is $1,738,000. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eponine Posted December 8, 2014 Share Posted December 8, 2014 According to Amazon, yes. At least they claimed so during their recent conflict with Hatchettehttp://www.amazon.com/forum/kindle/ref=cm_cd_tfp_ef_tft_tp?_encoding=UTF8&cdForum=Fx1D7SY3BVSESG&cdThread=Tx3J0JKSSUIRCMT Thanks, David. This is interesting. I wonder if customers simply buy fewer books (that is, they buy the one $15 ebook they really wanted, but then don't buy a second book that month) or if they pass on the $15 book and buy a few $10 books instead. I am very ebook price inelastic. However, having this discussion has made me more aware that I can and should use the library. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lady narcissa Posted December 8, 2014 Share Posted December 8, 2014 But are they really more inclined to buy a $4 book than an $8 book? Like they browse the Kindle shop without a real idea of what they want and pass on things until they see something cheap?For me, yes. With a few exceptions, I limit myself to $3.99 for an ebook. I look for sales and daily deals and most of the time pay $1.99 for my ebooks. I've been able to get most ebooks I want for that price by waiting for a special offer. And its not just older books that get reduced, most new best selling books have a day or week especially this time of year where they are offered at $2.99. I'm really against illegally downloading ebooks. I have never done it and would never do it. I'm fine with paying for books I want multiple copies of, multiple times. So I will pay twice for a book to own it in hardcover and then later the ebook. I have no expectations that having paid for the book in one format once, I should be entitled to it in other formats at no extra cost. If its not available legally in a format I want...I wait for it until it becomes available. Publishers look to the number of books legally sold to determine an author's numbers. Those legally sold books help determine if a publisher is going to continue with an author or not sign any new book deals with them. Maybe this isn't a big deal for long established best selling authors, but this is a huge issue for new and midlist selling authors...i.e. the majority of authors. It doesn't help them one bit if a thousand people illegally download their book and love it if only five people legally purchase it. The publisher is going to drop them. So I think its important if you enjoy reading books, as I assume most people on this board do, to pay for your books and let the publisher know which books you are enjoying and what you want to see more of. Even if this means paying for a book twice. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TrackerNeil Posted December 8, 2014 Share Posted December 8, 2014 Publishers look to the number of books legally sold to determine an author's numbers. Those legally sold books help determine if a publisher is going to continue with an author or not sign any new book deals with them. Maybe this isn't a big deal for long established best selling authors, but this is a huge issue for new and midlist selling authors...i.e. the majority of authors. It doesn't help them one bit if a thousand people illegally download their book and love it if only five people legally purchase it. The publisher is going to drop them. So I think its important if you enjoy reading books, as I assume most people on this board do, to pay for your books and let the publisher know which books you are enjoying and what you want to see more of. Even if this means paying for a book twice. An excellent point, and another reason that illegally downloading books really only sticks it to the author. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darth Richard II Posted December 8, 2014 Share Posted December 8, 2014 Man, is that Hatchette thing still going on? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
awesome possum Posted December 10, 2014 Share Posted December 10, 2014 I haven't ever paid for an ebook, nor will I. If I enjoy the book enough I'll go buy a physical copy to add to my bookshelf but otherwise nah. Before e-readers I waited until a book was available at the library and then I read it for free. Now I don't have to wait weeks/months after a book has been released to read it for free. Win/win. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Corvinus85 Posted December 10, 2014 Share Posted December 10, 2014 I haven't ever paid for an ebook, nor will I. If I enjoy the book enough I'll go buy a physical copy to add to my bookshelf but otherwise nah. Before e-readers I waited until a book was available at the library and then I read it for free. Now I don't have to wait weeks/months after a book has been released to read it for free. Win/win. And if you consider that the book is not worth the money to buy a physical copy, do you delete the ebook from your computer after reading it? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.