by Eric Landes First off, I want to make something clear: I have essentially nothing to do with the publishing industry. I’m a technical writer who has been in software my entire career. I’m experimenting with writing fiction, and as a prospective author, am very curious about where the industry is going during the largest [...]
Entries Tagged as 'pricing'
How Hachette Uses an Agency Agreement to Sidestep Anti-Competitive Pricing Laws in Australia
March 9th, 2011 · No Comments · ebookstore news
Sigh. I suppose it was naive of me to think that customers (little guy) could force a large company (big bully) to act fairly – in this case regarding their policy of anti-competitive ebook pricing. Yesterday I wrote that they were breaking the ACCC law that governs “Resale Price Maintenance”. I said I’d tell the ACCC [...]
Tags:agency·agreement·anticompetitive·australia·hachette·laws·pricing·sidestep
What’s wrong with Agency pricing
February 28th, 2011 · 9 Comments · opinion
As I’ve made it clear elsewhere, I hate the Agency Model. I think it’s anti-customer, and I long ago took a pledge not to buy any Agency Priced ebooks. But I’ve never really explained why I hate it. I’ve been listening to people defend the Agency Model for some time now, and most of the [...]
Agency ebook pricing now under investigation in the UK
February 2nd, 2011 · No Comments · ebookstore news
The UK Office of Fair Trading announced yesterday that they were going to look into whether publishers broke the law in adopting agency pricing for ebooks. From the announcement: Following a significant number of complaints, the OFT has opened an investigation into whether arrangements that certain publishers have put in place with some retailers for [...]
Tags:agency·ebook·investigation·pricing·uk
Kno tablets get pricing, Preorders start
November 9th, 2010 · No Comments · press release
From the press release: November 9, 2010 – Kno, Inc., a powerful, groundbreaking tablet textbook designed specifically for students and the education market, today revealed the price of its 14.1 inch single and dual-screen tablets at $599 and $899, respectively. The company also announced that it is now accepting a limited number of pre-orders for [...]
Ripping Off is Soooo Easy to Do: The Charade of Pricing
October 7th, 2010 · 3 Comments · opinion
This past week the New York Times reported that two Amazon Kindle ebooks, Ken Follett’s Fall of Giants and James Patterson’s Don’t Blink, are priced higher than their hardcover counterparts. This is the result of the Agency 5 pricing scheme for the ebooks (for some background, see Agency in eBooks: Just the Start? and The Decline [...]
Hachette pushing for Agency pricing in the UK
September 20th, 2010 · No Comments · ebookstore news
And so ends the low ebook prices in the UK. Or maybe not. Several ebookstores have responded by refusing to sell the ebooks. The Bookseller are reporting:
Amazon-Agency pricing deals now under investigation
August 2nd, 2010 · No Comments · publishing news
The WSJ are reporting that Connecticut State Attorney General is investigating the Agency 5 contracts signed by Amazon a few months ago. The attorney general said an initial review by his office found that e-book prices offered by Amazon and Apple, as well as Borders Group Inc. and Barnes & Noble Inc., for several best-sellers [...]
Smashwords is the Real Threat to Agency Pricing of eBooks
May 7th, 2010 · No Comments · opinion
Smashwords and ebooksellers like Smashwords (such as Books for a Buck) are the real threat to agency pricing and the Agency 5 (Macmillan, Hachette, Simon & Schuster, Penguin, and HarperCollins). The reason is simple: the combination of quality and low price. I find it hard to justify paying $14.99 for a fiction ebook unless I am absolutely enthralled with [...]
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