I've always thought they should be cheaper. Sure we're paying for the convenience but the cost involved in getting an ebook into the reader's hands is SO much lower than getting a physical copy there.
But publishers don't really like ebooks because they don't control the digital supply chain - which is owned by Amazon, and to a lesser extent Apple and a few also-rans do.
Paper pub - B&N, small indies, and the like - has a symbiotic and deferential relationship with the publishers. Amazon is a gorilla the size of New Jersey and would happily eat them all for lunch.
So publishing execs are notorious for overpricing ebooks. They don't really care if the ebook market shrivels as long as it doesn't die completely or take paper with it.
Result: ebooks are vastly overpriced, and fewer people are buying.
Meanwhile the self-pub gold rush of a few years ago has ended. There's not nearly as much 99c "product" being shovelled onto Amazon, and the only writers who are making it are career writers who understand PR and reader retention. The no-talent wannabes saw their sales peak then crash, and they've gone elsewhere.
That gives trad pub a little more leverage over content than it had when the gold rush was its peak, and for a while it looked as if it was going to roll over trad pub altogether.
I think it's a temporary equilibrium. It's only working for trad pub because it has such good historical PR, which means too many naive writers still believe being published is a path to cultural glory. As the current generation of naifs dies out the next generation is going to be more realistic about publishing, and they'll realise trad pub has less to offer.
There will still be the occasional million-seller, but the backlist and mid-list writers will all go direct to digital and manage their own paper print runs if they need to - and they'll earn more doing it, even though prices will be lower.
I refuse to buy an ebook if the price is more than the cheapest new, paperback price. I'll either buy the paperback or just not buy it. Usually the latter.
But publishers don't really like ebooks because they don't control the digital supply chain - which is owned by Amazon, and to a lesser extent Apple and a few also-rans do.
Paper pub - B&N, small indies, and the like - has a symbiotic and deferential relationship with the publishers. Amazon is a gorilla the size of New Jersey and would happily eat them all for lunch.
So publishing execs are notorious for overpricing ebooks. They don't really care if the ebook market shrivels as long as it doesn't die completely or take paper with it.
Result: ebooks are vastly overpriced, and fewer people are buying.
Meanwhile the self-pub gold rush of a few years ago has ended. There's not nearly as much 99c "product" being shovelled onto Amazon, and the only writers who are making it are career writers who understand PR and reader retention. The no-talent wannabes saw their sales peak then crash, and they've gone elsewhere.
That gives trad pub a little more leverage over content than it had when the gold rush was its peak, and for a while it looked as if it was going to roll over trad pub altogether.
I think it's a temporary equilibrium. It's only working for trad pub because it has such good historical PR, which means too many naive writers still believe being published is a path to cultural glory. As the current generation of naifs dies out the next generation is going to be more realistic about publishing, and they'll realise trad pub has less to offer.
There will still be the occasional million-seller, but the backlist and mid-list writers will all go direct to digital and manage their own paper print runs if they need to - and they'll earn more doing it, even though prices will be lower.