Ebook prices: where is the real deal?

Have you ever checked the ebook prices? In my opinion they should be priced less than the real books, and this for quite a number of reasons. First of all the absence of paper, ink and all the instruments needed to produce the physical book. Second, it must be clear to everyone that nowadays to print a book you need its electronic format, therefore the publishers already have them. Last but not least the distribution channel, with all its expenses, is not present for the electronic copies, if not for one or two electronic resellers. The ebooks does not eliminate every single bit of the publishing process. The electronic publishing removes everything physical.

With these introductions it should be logic that the pricing of the ebooks would be lower than the pricing of the normal books. False!

This is a trick easy to understand, but not easy to accept: for the publisher the ebook is a complete added value, no money spent on it, just revenue!

These things are slowing down the development of an ebook market. It seems to me that the lack of low-end hardware and the discouragement to buy electronic versions of the books are two of the main reason this market is not already taking off. This is a strong weakness of the market. I strongly believe that there is a strong placement for anything that would drive the publishing rules away. Don’t you think the market is ready to change a “little” bit?