Another link, with important data: When Publishers Set Prices (with pictures!)Publishers have never done pricing without the safety net of retailers making adjustments to optimize consumer demand. Retailers spend a great deal of time on price analysis/optimization. ... this is going to be a new business function for most publishers and a faster decision-cycle more akin to print inventory decisions than the leisurely process of setting publication price points at the beginning of each season. Get ready. I am looking forward to publishers going into a screaming arm-waving panic in about six months, when they figure out that pre-set, fixed prices give them no data about customer interest--they don't have a way to tell the difference between "not liked" (i.e. wouldn't sell much at half the price) and "too expensive" (would sell zillions if you dropped the price 20% and you can make it up in volume), and customers who don't like their methods are going to give them all sorts of feedback that (1) makes them angry and (2) they don't know how to use.
Currently, there's a small-but-notable movement to leave one-star reviews on the books with delayed ebook release dates. I suspect this will also garnish a number of one-star reviews, and weird petitions. Oh, and lots and lots of public declarations of "it'll only inspire more piracy," which will result in publishers saying, "it's not our fault we can't make a profit at this business; it's the pirates who are destroying ebookery."
Bullshit. Baen's books are all available on the torrents. And Baen's ebooks sell more than all their non-US paper books, and their market is *growing*, even during the times when other publishers are shrinking. Baen's methods won't work for everyone, but they do work, and other publishers should be frantically reviewing their methods to find out how much of them they can apply to other types of book markets.
I am looking forward to publishers going into a screaming arm-waving panic in about six months, when they figure out that pre-set, fixed prices give them no data about customer interest--they don't have a way to tell the difference between "not liked" (i.e. wouldn't sell much at half the price) and "too expensive" (would sell zillions if you dropped the price 20% and you can make it up in volume), and customers who don't like their methods are going to give them all sorts of feedback that (1) makes them angry and (2) they don't know how to use.
Currently, there's a small-but-notable movement to leave one-star reviews on the books with delayed ebook release dates. I suspect this will also garnish a number of one-star reviews, and weird petitions. Oh, and lots and lots of public declarations of "it'll only inspire more piracy," which will result in publishers saying, "it's not our fault we can't make a profit at this business; it's the pirates who are destroying ebookery."
Bullshit. Baen's books are all available on the torrents. And Baen's ebooks sell more than all their non-US paper books, and their market is *growing*, even during the times when other publishers are shrinking. Baen's methods won't work for everyone, but they do work, and other publishers should be frantically reviewing their methods to find out how much of them they can apply to other types of book markets.
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