Cost of Core Books PDFs

[Zaister]

This simple fact does more to entice me to 4E than anything else I have seen.

Because you couldn't do that with 3E's SRD?

 

[Fifth Element]

So? That just means too many people are willing to pay too much for PDF's.

"More than you would pay" is not the same as "too much". How are you able to determine how much these other people value PDFs? You have explained that you don't see the value in PDFs, while others have explained that they find great value in them. Are you surprised that people with different tastes make different buying decisions?

 

[ZombieButch]

Oh, and finally, because I do not have Acrobat Professional, I cannot make notes or comments or highlights in a pdf like I can in my physical book. Notes, tabs, and highlights make a book more useful to me, so not being able to do that to a pdf makes it much less useful.

My expectation of changing your mind about PDF's is pretty much nil, but I'll still put this out there for other folks who might be interested...

Check out Foxit Reader. It's much faster and lighter than Acrobat, and has a full set of markup tools like highlighting, underlining, and notes. Plus, if you're using a PDF with fillable forms, it allows you to save a duplicate copy of the PDF you're using with those forms filled, which the basic Acrobat Reader does not. And it's free.

http://www.foxitsoftware.com/pdf/rd_intro.php

 

[JoeGKushner]

Yeah. This is also the thread where the RoUS puts 3catcircus on his ignore list.

http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?t=210324

Well, wait a minute.

In this thread, the last thing said by the Rouse

"I am quite sure this has been said before in other posts/threads. If you just want to buy the PDF that will be available for full MSRP. I am not sure how many will take advantage of this as the book/e-book is such a better value."

?

When did it go from "We'll be selling through third parties and it the book/e-book deal is dead."

Where's the "such a better value"?

If I consider the PDF to have value, I could just get another set of hardcovers at Amazon cheaper and scan 'em myself and while the labor costs are higher, I don't have to have a "persaonlized" version or give another person/entity credit card information, etc...

 

[Nightchilde-2]

Here's part of the deal with why charging as much (or even close to) for .pdfs as print products is nutzoid. With a traditionally published, printed and distributed book, the publisher doesn't make very much money at all on an individual unit (unit here, of course, equals "one book" just to be clear).

A FLGS buys books at wholesale, generally 30%-50% off of the retail price of the book (actual number based off of my own wholesale discounts, not a number pulled from my nether regions, BTW). From that remaining 70-50%, you can be sure the distributor takes THEIR cut. I don't know how much that is. In the end, after printing costs and such, a publisher probably ends up making, let's say, $5-7 off of a $30 book (and I'm fairly sure that might be generous). (How do they make a profit, you ask? Well, assume a relatively moderate print run of 10,000 x $5-$7 per unit...)

So, if a publisher gives even a 50% discount for .pdf products over a print version, said publisher is still making quite a bit more money off of the .pdf vs. a traditionally printed and distributed product. And while a system like RPGNow might charge a percentage to sell a book (I looked into it once, but I forget how much it is, exactly) it's nowhere near the amount the publisher loses in the traditional dead-tree distribution model.

 

[Obryn]

Yeah, how DARE WotC set a price for a non-essential product at a level they think reasonable, thereby seeking to make a profit?!

I am completely nerd-outraged! Or is that out-nerd-raged?! EITHER ONE, THAT'S ME!

-O

 

[Nightchilde-2]

Yeah, how DARE WotC set a price for a non-essential product at a level they think reasonable, thereby seeking to make a profit?!

I am completely nerd-outraged! Or is that out-nerd-raged?! EITHER ONE, THAT'S ME!

-O

I'm not saying that they shouldn't make a profit, just that they should set a more reasonable level of profit for a virtual (as in "can't hold it in my hands, and doesn't really physically exist") product produced with much less overhead.

At least if every computer on the planet suddenly became utterly useless, or there was an apocalypse and we could no longer generate electricity, or I was stranded on a desert island with my game collection or some such, I could still game with my physical books.

 

[portermj]

Yeah, how DARE WotC set a price for a non-essential product at a level they think reasonable, thereby seeking to make a profit?!

I am completely nerd-outraged! Or is that out-nerd-raged?! EITHER ONE, THAT'S ME!

-O

Here's the thing, I don't think they are setting it at what is reasonable. I think they are setting it at a price that won't have impacts on their distributors or game stores.

Right now they are setting the costs of the PDF at a higher rate than what distributors charge retailers. Assuming there is no middleman between WOTC and DriveThru we should at least expect about the same price as other people at this step in the chain (Publisher-Distributor-Retailer(PDF buyer)-FLGS Patron). Furthermore, as someone pointed out, printing and shipping is about 10% of the MSRP, which means it is abot 50% of WOTC's cost.

Even at 50% off WOTC should be making more selling a pdf than a book. I just think management is too beholding to the B&M's to allow a free market when it comes to electronics. Just another example of how they don't understand the time and world we live in.

 

[Darkwolf71]

Yeah, how DARE WotC set a price for a non-essential product at a level they think reasonable, thereby seeking to make a profit?!

I am completely nerd-outraged! Or is that out-nerd-raged?! EITHER ONE, THAT'S ME!

-O

Ya know, having a different opinion is one thing. Being a total jerk about it is something else entirely. Comments like that are just begging to be called a WotC fanboy. Which would probobaly upset you, as it should, but you really are setting yourself up for it.

 

[Fifth Element]

Here's the thing, I don't think they are setting it at what is reasonable. I think they are setting it at a price that won't have impacts on their distributors or game stores.

Which is probably their definition of reasonable. It's clearly a business decision, not a pure cost/profit decision. They're probably wary of PDF sales eating into their core business. Maybe they'll change their tune in the future, who knows.