Apple Reportedly Looking to Offer More Flexible iBookstore Pricing Than Previously Thought

[MacRumors]

The New York Times reports that recent shifts in the eBook publishing industry, spurred by Apple's entrance into the market, to allow for higher prices and greater publisher control over their content may offer more flexibility in pricing than previously thought. The "agency model" being promoted by Apple and pushed by many book publishers has been looking to break Amazon's stranglehold on the eBook market with its $9.99 pricing for best-sellers by allowing publishers to set retail prices on such releases, rumored to be targeted to sell at $12.99 to $14.99.

But according to at least three people with knowledge of the discussions, who spoke anonymously because of the confidentiality of the talks, Apple inserted provisions requiring publishers to discount e-book prices on best sellers -- so that $12.99-to-$14.99 range was merely a ceiling; prices for some titles could be lower, even as low as Amazon's $9.99. Essentially, Apple wants the flexibility to offer lower prices for the hottest books, those on one of the New York Times best-seller lists, which are heavily discounted in bookstores and on rival retail sites. So, for example, a book that started at $14.99 would drop to $12.99 or less once it hit the best-seller lists.

Moreover, for books where publishers offer comparable hardcover editions at a price below the typical $26, Apple wanted e-book prices to reflect the cheaper hardcover prices. These books might be priced much lower than $12.99, even if they did not hit the best-seller list.

The switch to an agency model is seen by publishers as a means to create a more sustainable eBook industry as a whole, countering Amazon's strategy of selling eBooks at a loss in order to build market share and spur sales of its Kindle devices. Earlier this week, The Wall Street Journal reported on research from Credit Suisse analyst Spencer Wang, who expects that Amazon's share of the eBook market will fall from its current 90% to only 35% by 2015 as Apple and others enter the industry.

Article Link: Apple Reportedly Looking to Offer More Flexible iBookstore Pricing Than Previously Thought

 

[ILikeTurtles]

This is better news.....I can deal with those prices.

 

[*LTD*]

No worries. Apple's got this entire industry figured out for the next ten years. They're pulling another iTunes with this. It's got success written all over it.

 

[talkingfuture]

This is good news, books in real bookshops are always reduced so why not have the electronic bookshops competing in the same manner?

 

[Nepenthe]

Funny how iTunes music tracks are marked *up* when they sell well.

 

[trip1ex]

Apple understands.

Look at Lost Symbol by Dan Brown. $12 hardcover. Ebooks prices should reflect this.

Most hardcovers I see are $14 or so. Ebooks should be quite a bit less.

I don't buy that the publishers only save paper, printing, distribution, shelf space, etc

They also need to take into consideration you can't resell the book. And exchanging them is limited.

Of course I suppose piracy washes that out. But piracy will only be worse the higher the price of the ebook.

 

[Romanesq]

Apple Kindle app

So can I get an updated kindle app on the iPad and when?

Honestly, I read to read and on some books the better standards by Apple with graphics and pictures may come into play but in the end, I'm happier with $9.99 on most books, or less. 😎

 

[Cameront9]

If you look carefully in the Keynote video, most of the book prices are about $4.99, including bestseller "Twilight."

New "bestsellers" hardcovers will likely be 12-14.99, whilst backcatologs will be substantially less.

 

[cmaier]

So can I get an updated kindle app on the iPad and when?

Honestly, I read to read and on some books the better standards by Apple with graphics and pictures may come into play but in the end, I'm happier with $9.99 on most books, or less. 😎

In case you missed the point, apple's prices will be the same as or lower than amazon's. The publishers are no longer going to allow amazon to sell books at 9.99 or less, and are forcing an agency model where they get to set the prices. Apple got an exception from this new policy for best sellers.

 

[Bonte]

Amazon already sells most e-books for the iPhone, the Kindle as a device is already dead. Does Amazon pay Apple for every book downloaded on there iPhone or is there an alternative way?
If its free i can see newspapers use there own free app and sell content online but deliver it free to the iPhone of the subscriber, i think that is how Amazon does it now.

 

[Hattig]

Hardcover eBook. Really?

Give me pulp anyday.

 

[Roy Hobbs]

Amazon already sells most e-books for the iPhone, the Kindle as a device is already dead. Does Amazon pay Apple for every book downloaded on there iPhone or is there an alternative way?
If its free i can see newspapers use there own free app and sell content online but deliver it free to the iPhone of the subscriber, i think that is how Amazon does it now.

When you click BUY BOOKS in the Kindle App is launches Safari and you buy directly from Amazon. This way Amazon doesnt have to pay Apple.

 

[uraniumwilly]

I suspect the reason I could download a 0.99 classic history book to my ipod Touch Kindle reader is because of Apple's iPad marketing and the threat to Amazon. Thanks, Apple!

 

[Bonte]

I suspect the reason I could download a 0.99 classic history book to my ipod Touch Kindle reader is because of Apple's iPad marketing and the threat to Amazon. Thanks, Apple!

I hope you are being sarcastic, classic books should be free in the first place. I hope Apple integrates Gutenberg in there bookstore.

 

[Westside guy]

If selling bestsellers as ebooks for $9.99 is selling "at a loss", then it seems obvious that the publishers are simply greedy and taking too big of a cut themselves (yeah, and the sky is still blue - I get it).

Anyone know what the per-unit printing and binding costs of a moderately successful book are?

 

[uraniumwilly]

I hope you are being sarcastic, classic books should be free in the first place. I hope Apple integrates Gutenberg in there bookstore.

No sarcasm. You're right about many classic works that are now free. Others aren't available electronically for free and those are what I'm referring to.

 

[NickFalk]

Is this really news? I could have sworn this was mentioned the same day they revealed the iPad? That the publishers got to set the price, I mean? (Or did I just have a dream come true again?)

 

[fidelityrevo]

E-books a Rip Off

The ebook industry charges too much and you get very little. A real book can be loaned, sold, or given as a gift. You can pay cash and buy it anonymously. An e-book is tied to the device. I don't like e-books because of these downsides. They should be like a real book. There should be a central server that allows you to loan the book to your friends. It disappears from your device and appears on theirs for 2 weeks, then it disappears from their book and reappears in yours. That would be a partial replacement. There should also be away that this could be done anonymously so no one other than the two parties knows. This could be done by beaming the book via blue tooth to another device. There also should be a way of plugging in a USB key to the device.

Too many people get wowwed by the technology and don't think about the rights they are giving away when they purchase the technology. We need to be demanding that the new technologies don't take away rights we've had for centuries. Once these technologies are fully adopted, the old technologies likely will wither away. Witness record players, VCRs. After a time using those technologies becomes more expensive than the newer ones.

Another downside to ebooks as they exist now on Kindle and soon the apple devices, there will be data bases indicating what you read, that's probably fine if you don't read banned books or controversial books, but given the recent experience with the Bush Regime, real books have advantages.

The publishing industry is not making more differnent kinds of books availabile, they make many copies of the same few books available. They want profit, more and more. Apple is making it easier for them to make more and more.

The New York Times reports that recent shifts in the eBook publishing industry, spurred by Apple's entrance into the market, to allow for higher prices and greater publisher control over their content may offer more flexibility in pricing than previously thought. The "agency model" being promoted by Apple and pushed by many book publishers has been looking to break Amazon's stranglehold on the eBook market with its $9.99 pricing for best-sellers by allowing publishers to set retail prices on such releases, rumored to be targeted to sell at $12.99 to $14.99.The switch to an agency model is seen by publishers as a means to create a more sustainable eBook industry as a whole, countering Amazon's strategy of selling eBooks at a loss in order to build market share and spur sales of its Kindle devices. Earlier this week, The Wall Street Journal reported on research from Credit Suisse analyst Spencer Wang, who expects that Amazon's share of the eBook market will fall from its current 90% to only 35% by 2015 as Apple and others enter the industry.

Article Link: Apple Reportedly Looking to Offer More Flexible iBookstore Pricing Than Previously Thought

 

[JGowan]

What I want to know about is the Free public domain section?! Will there be one? I've got a lot of freebies from the iPhone's "Classics" app and of course, I downloaded a lot of books for "Stanza", but I really read a whole lot due to the size of the iPhone screen.

I hope Apple fills the free section to the digital rafters with classic books of yore!

 

[ozarkchoir]

Importing our own...

So I'm not sure if this has been discussed in any of the forums... I've searched but haven't had any luck finding the answer...

I have several of my own epubs that I would like to import to iBooks when the iPad arrives... what is the likelihood of being able to import our own epubs just like we can import our own CD's/our own movies/tv shows into iTunes?

On another note... I very much consider myself a digital packrat... (have all my dvds ripped to mp4 for my Apple TV, iPhone, and soon to purchase iPad, of course all my music and the many songs/tv shows/etc I've purchased from iTunes) so for me the iPad is a device that is definitely going to fill a spot in my gadget lineup between my home computer and my iPhone. The idea of having all my books with me in one device along with my movies, music, photos, a web browser (I don't really visit flash websites all that much anyway), email, a productivity suite of apps in iWork, not to mention all the many new apps developers are working on right now for the iPad... yeah it's safe to say I'm actually pretty excited.

 

[dave1812dave]

If e-books are too pricey, I simply will stop purchasing them. The powers that be can set whatever price they want--it's not like I NEED to buy their e-books. Consumers can be pushed only so far.

 

[cmaier]

So I'm not sure if this has been discussed in any of the forums... I've searched but haven't had any luck finding the answer...

I have several of my own epubs that I would like to import to iBooks when the iPad arrives... what is the likelihood of being able to import our own epubs just like we can import our own CD's/our own movies/tv shows into iTunes?

Likelihood is high. iPad SDK adds a way to side-load content by mounting the device as a hard drive. Further, there would be no point in announcing that the device uses ePub unless Apple intended to allow other ePubs on the device (since Apple's own ePubs will be drm'd and not able to be read on other devices, the point of saying it's ePub could not have been to inform the public that books bought from Apple will work on other ePub readers).

 

[Consultant]

I guess the following article beat the New York Times, by 2 weeks:

Possibility of iPad ebooks from $7.99 and up:
https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/859883/

What I want to know about is the Free public domain section?! Will there be one? I've got a lot of freebies from the iPhone's "Classics" app and of course, I downloaded a lot of books for "Stanza", but I really read a whole lot due to the size of the iPhone screen.

I hope Apple fills the free section to the digital rafters with classic books of yore!

I think, similar to iTunes for music and media contents, you will be able to use free contents such as ebooks.

 

[Garion]

Funny how iTunes music tracks are marked *up* when they sell well.

If you're thinking of the tracks costing $1,29 it's worth remembering that Apple was opposed to this right from the beginning. They wanted all songs to be 99 cents a piece. Allowing the record labels to up the prices to 1,29 for popular tracks was the compromise Apple had to agree to in order to have the record labels ditch DRM on their iTunes content.

 

[cmaier]

If you're thinking of the tracks costing $1,29 it's worth remembering that Apple was opposed to this right from the beginning. They wanted all songs to be 99 cents a piece. Allowing the record labels to up the prices to 1,29 for popular tracks was the compromise Apple had to agree to in order to have the record labels ditch DRM on their iTunes content.

IIRC they also doubled the bit rate. Seems fair to me.