Re:Why the Seattle Mystery Bookshop Must Close
by tptacek on Sunday October 22, 2017 @12:01PM
(#15527393)
How does one start to address this mentality?
* The fixed costs of publishing a book dwarf the marginal price of each printed book. Those fixed costs are dominated by the salaries (or 1099s) of human experts.
* Like most products, books aren't priced from their (minimal!) marginal cost basis. They're priced based on utility and market substitutes.
* If ebooks were priced "too high", nobody would buy them. But in fact, so many people buy ebooks that they're putting bookstores out of business.
The "resentment" you're referring to is I think maybe mostly a creature of message boards.
* The fixed costs of publishing a book dwarf the marginal price of each printed book. Those fixed costs are dominated by the salaries (or 1099s) of human experts.
* Like most products, books aren't priced from their (minimal!) marginal cost basis. They're priced based on utility and market substitutes.
* If ebooks were priced "too high", nobody would buy them. But in fact, so many people buy ebooks that they're putting bookstores out of business.
The "resentment" you're referring to is I think maybe mostly a creature of message boards.