Paid iBookstore Content Going Live in New Zealand and 17 Latin American Countries

[japanime]

Originally Posted by bdavidson

Can someone explain to me "paid iBookstore content". We have been able to buy books from apple for a while. I bought one for myself when iBooks came out. Maybe this is just the non us store?

Exactly. In many countries, the only books available through the iBookstore are public domain titles, primarily books that are decades old and out of copyright. The fact that current books are now being made available in some of these non-US iBookstores is what this "paid content" news is all about.

[AshDav]

Checking iTunes Connect, there are an extra 18 countries now available for authors to sell their books in.

The new countries aren't selected by default. Authors need to go through and apply all the new countries for their books. Currency for most Latin America countries is set to USD.

Titles aren't available for sale immediately. Their status is 'Not on sale' and says we need to contact iBooks Support for contract reasons - I assume during the keynote someone will press a button and the books will go live.

This is great news for authors though. iBooks now span 50 countries, a great improvement than the previous 32!

[xAgustinx]

In Mexico I already can buy books. I'm really happy.

[charlituna]

Originally Posted by nick_elt

no because they had really crap books....

got to love those publishers.

[wackymacky]

Shame the prices are mostly a couple of dollars more than on amazon for the kindle app.

[macs4nw]

Originally Posted by waloshin

For the overpriced ($329) iPad Mini!

We don't know yet what's going to be in it, so whether it's overpriced remains to be seen. However, something tells me this 'puppy' is going to sell Big Time! Also see Rocketman's take on it. It might very well catch on educationally, in a big way, depending on how quickly they can get educational textbooks in the iBooks store. I would expect a major push in that direction to accompany the "Mini's" release.

Originally Posted by Rocketman

There are always a couple of guys in every thread declaring this or that "overpriced". You have the right to offer an alternate product at a lower price. Pricing is a well thought out strategy to do more than simply sell a product. It has to account for R&D, capital recovery, dealer margins, and in the case of Apple a front fee for a nearly "free" ecosystem service. It is clearly not overpriced. It is priced. Some will be able to afford it and others will not. Too bad, so sad. However on the metric of Apple being able to barely keep up with demand at that price, one might even rightly claim it is UNDERPRICED......

[nick_elt]

Originally Posted by japanime

You need to take another look, then. The iBookstore has improved significantly since its launch. There are thousands of fantastic books available, and some excellent bargains, too. (I picked up Craig Ferguson's biography for only $3.99 during a recent iBookstore sale.)

In addition, the iBookstore offers some really nice fixed-layout books, such as cookbooks and children's books.

Give the iBookstore a second chance

I was talking about the new Zealand bookstore which up until yesterday didn't have paid content. And the free books are not like the free apps. They are not worth downloading.

[BRLawyer]

Originally Posted by 4look4rd

Why are the titles in Spanish instead of Portuguese?

Because the image above is WRONG, as it refers to Latino/hispanic countries' books - Brazil does NOT speak Spanish; only a few less-than-enlightened US citizens still think so.

Here is the correct image of the Brazilian iBookstore:



@Arn: PLEASE correct the picture on the main page.

[Rocketman]

Originally Posted by Mike Valmike

Fair to say. In fact since this isn't a two-way street, I'm surprised we don't see more up-pricing. In the hobby gaming industry, where I have some business assets, it is entirely normal for stores to up-price hot new items that are on "allocation" (limited supplies in the wholesale chain). Things normalize as supply catches up to demand.

The car business does the same thing. When I first went to look at hybrids, they were on allocation and were being sold for $5k over sticker.

Actually Apple products in grey markets are also sold at a premium.

I don't know of manufacturers that do that as a policy, but some products are released at a slightly higher retail, then when the channel has been filled and a run rate has been established, a second less pricey model is released. That actually closely approximates the iPad and iPad Mini experience.

I think it will just be called iPad. No mini. You know its mini because you know what size YOU bought, what memory capacity and what wireless scheme.

Rocketman

[brewno]

Hopefully I'll be able to buy Brazilian books from the Canadian store...