Thursday, February 11, 2010

E-Book Buyers Balk at...and Bloviate Over...Price Hikes

Link to February 11 New York Times article, "E-Book's Price Increase May Stir Readers' Passions", compared to the bland "E-Book's Cost Is Going Up" in the print edition.

Excerpt: In the battle over the pricing of electronic books, publishers appear to have won the first round. The price of many new releases and best sellers is about to go up, to as much as $14.99 from $9.99.

But there may be an insurgency waiting to pounce: e-book buyers.

Over the last year, the most voracious readers of e-books have shown a reflexive hostility to prices higher than the $9.99 set by Amazon.com and other online retailers for popular titles
.

[snip]

This book has been on the shelves for three weeks and is already in the remainder bins,” wrote Wayne Fogel of The Villages, Fla., when he left a one-star review of Catherine Coulter’s book “KnockOut” on Amazon. “$14.82 for the Kindle version is unbelievable. Some listings Amazon should refuse when the authors are trying to rip off Amazon’s customers.”

No comments: