Just last night as I finished reading a novel that I enjoyed, I was casting about for the next book. I ran to my computer to browse the choices, eventually settled on one and when I went to bed Pop! there was the book all ready to go on my Kindle.
Now, as an owner of both a Kindle and an iPad, I can attest that the Kindle has severe limitations. It is just for reading, but still, I like that sucker. It's light, easy, no frills, durable and the battery life is second to none. That being said I've made ample use of the iPad as both an e-reader and a tablet computer and have been quite thankful for having that capability, particularly when travelling.
Will e-readers become a niche product? The question is moot. They already are and have been for several years.
The non-mooted question I have is this: will the prices of books on e-readers
come back down or settle more or are we seeing the prices we are stuck with.
The prices for e-readers are phenomenally low.
The prices for books on my
kindle have never been so high. I went to buy a new book by a well known author
and found that it was going to cost almost 25 dollars for the e-book. I’ve
railed about this before, specifically in these posts and these posts, and I don’t begrudge
publishers and authors for using the free market to their advantage, but I’d
like to see someone come along and discount their older works more. Why should
I pay the same price for books of differing ages? How bout a scale that bottoms
out at 3.99 for all books over ten years old. I know I know the price is what
the market will bare, but I sure think I’d be more apt to purchase some of those
older works if they were more aggressively priced.
1 comment:
You can't blame them for having a go, but ultimately it is us who will remind them of how much we're willing to pay. The sun would never dawn on the day I'd pay $25 for an ebook.
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