My belief…is that this hurts publishers in the end. Look at the movie industry. 2009 was really the first year certain things blew up.

1. Netflix Streaming became really popular (not only from the Roku box, but all the other devices that now support it.)
2. RedBox, DVDPlay, etc. could be found everywhere (including some rural towns)
3. Most movies were released with Digital Downloads
4. Ease of digital renting (iTunes, Amazon, Video OnDemand, etc.)

As a result, 2009 was a turning point in the movie industry’s slagging profits, and movie piracy slowed (not mutually inclusive). Now with the industry forcing Netflix, RedBox, etc to a 28-day waiting period, I would be willing to bet that the industry slows again, and piracy increases as well.

For the book publishers, $9.99 is still in my mind a barrier of entry when it comes to eBooks. $6-$7 is where I feel comfortable in purchasing the book. Now the eBook readers are fairly prolific (ie like the iPod became), people will start going to other sources (ie piracy, etc.) to find their digital books, much like what was done before the iTunes Store. $15 for a digital book is absurd. Take Ozzy Osbourne’s Hachette published book, I Am Ozzy. It’s $14.47 for the hardcover. Printing costs money and binding costs money. $15 for a hardcover is not bad. The Kindle price is $9.99. To me that’s pushing the limits on price, and tells me that I won’t buy it. Digital (which takes little in mass-production costs) should be extremely cheap. Secondly, Take James Rollins’ The Doomsday Key. Paperback from Amazon is $9.99, Kindle edition? $9.99. That’s even more ludicrous. This is one case where book publishers are completely blind. I think new releases are able to be sold (digitally) at around $10. But after a few months time they should drastically reduce, think 1/2 current retail price (not MSRP). Then when the paperback comes out it should be reduced again to 1/2 current paperback retail price (not MSRP). Then when the Mass-Market Paperback comes out, it should go down once more.

What publishers don’t realize is that the reduction in price means more sales. That’s the point of the MM Paperbacks! Why can’t they see this in eBooks? They just don’t understand that digital sales should follow the same model, they feel if they sell it for less than the actual book it cheapens the product…which it does not. Bad writing cheapens the product. I used to by books all the time off of the “Clearance” racks at Hastings, books I would have never purchased and read otherwise. The price was the reason that sale was made, not how it was marketed and original pricing scheme.