In Monday’s issue of Time’s Corner, I asked my readers this question: What are ebooks worth to you? What are your ebook reading practices? The replies not only included a broad spectrum of reading practices, they also contained a variety of opinions on the value of ebooks. I decided to focus on the former category in today’s Thursday Thread. The latter is included here.
In my mind, ebooks should always be cheaper than a new hard copy — there is no iterative cost to an ebook, and they have the drawback of being not only a non-transferrable purchase but also being technically only licensed to me and not owned by me. In practice, I’m usually willing to pay about 10% of the print price for an ebook. I started to say I would pay up to $5, but if the book is only $10 in print, I wouldn’t pay more than maybe $1 or $2 before I just bit the bullet and bought a new or used copy. But if I see an ebook listed for more than $5, I almost immediately dismiss it; it would have to be a very expensive book, like Frisardi’s translation of the Convivio which cannot be had for less than $125, before I would consider paying a double-digit price for the ebook.
Melissa
Regarding value: publishers are going to charge whatever is the most they can get without losing significant sales numbers, not listen to this logic, but [ebooks] should cost the hard cover price, minus whatever percent of that price represents the physical production of the book.
Daniel
ebooks are worth a lot, depending on the content. ebooks are products, just like books. they’re digital, which is (i think) the crux of this discussion, and people are still deciding if they like paying for digital things. however, placing worth on something because you can touch it is the wrong way to think about worth.
worth has to do with output compared to input. you pay for spotify because the enjoyment you get from listening to music is worth $10/mo to you; you pay for a car because the usefulness of a car is worth $10K or $200/mo. cost ultimately comes down to how much people will pay for the product, so the question of worth comes down to whether or not the output justifies the (cost and time) input.
books (e- or not) have two potential outputs: enjoyment and ideas. if you’ll get $500 worth of ideas out of a book, then it should be worth up to $499. if you get 8 hours of enjoyment out of a book, the amount you’re willing to pay for it should depend on how much you value your leisure time. it’s important to keep in mind that a book’s output isn’t binary: you’ll get ideas and enjoyment, and you should factor in both.
i suppose this stance begs a few questions, so i’ll try to address some counter-arguments at a high level:
1. yes, there are counter examples. some books shouldn’t be ebooks, and i suppose some people shouldn’t buy ebooks.
2. maybe different people should pay different amounts for the same book. maybe there should be a variable cost, or a pay-what-you-want model for books. some people will get more value out of a book than others, and maybe those people should be able to recognize the value and compensate the author for it.
3. no, i probably wouldn’t pay $500 for a book, but i have paid that much for what is essentially an ebook because i believe i will get at least that much value out of it over the next several years.
Sheffield
To me, one of the main reasons why ebooks are worth less is because they tend to have copy-protection software, so there’s no guarantee that they’ll even work in 5 or 10 years. My physical books will be good for the rest of my life, and in some cases probably my kids’ lives.
The “they don’t use paper” argument doesn’t make much sense to me. My willingness to pay for a book is determined by how much value I get out of it, not how much it cost to produce. If you printed Pride and Prejudice with one word per page, I wouldn’t suddenly be willing to pay $500 for it because it used so much paper. Conversely, I am sometimes willing to pay more for an audio book than a physical book, because I have much more time in my day for listening than for reading. An audiobook download also doesn’t require paper, but since it’s more useful to me, I’m willing to pay more for it (though if I can get it for free via Hoopla or Libby, I will definitely take that!).
David
Christian Leithart 