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I noticed what appears to be a couple of Black Library price increases for eBooks, at least for US $, and I am wondering whether anyone can confirm this.

First, it looks like omnibus eBooks have increased to $24. I thought they were previously (a few days ago?) around $16. Here is an example:

http://www.blacklibrary.com/warhammer-40000/honour-imperialis.html

In fact, that one is currently $12 on the iBooks store... half the price! I normally buy direct from BL to get DRM free and show my support, but I may have to make an exception.

Second, it also looks like most novellas are now $8 instead of $5. Here is an example:

http://www.blacklibrary.com/warhammer-40000/plagues-of-orath

I am pretty sure the first two books used to be $5, and indeed the third book (on the left) is still $5, at least at the time of this posting (see attached image). And indeed the price is "still" $5 at the iBooks store for these as well! I thought the iBooks and BL prices were kept in sync.

Unfortunately, I can't find any price history on Black Library books, so I can't confirm this, but the current iBooks discrepancy is telling... perhaps this is being rolled out gradually right now. Does anyone else remember?

What is bothersome about these price increases is that they have crossed a threshold for me: the original prices were OK (not great, but acceptable), but I feel these new prices really are too much for eBooks. Yes, I know they can charge whatever they want, but for me (personally) this is disappointing since I enjoy 40K fiction. I don't want to become a boiled frog, if you know the expression.

I have previously written on a similiar topic in the thread below. If you think there is a better place (in Dakkka Dakka or elsewhere) to discuss this sort of thing, let me know. Thanks!

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/600438.page

UPDATE: See further comments in the third post below.

The Gaunts Ghosts e-books were £6.50 a week ago, I can confirm this as I bought the First and Only one around that time and checking my email receipt, I was charged £6.50

I noticed something was up when I saw the page, seems all of them that used to be at that price have gone up about 49p to £6.99. In fact this trend seems to go across the BL site.

The Cypher dataslate has stayed the same price, so has Codex Inquisition. (again double-checked with email receipts) Seems to just be the novels.

An update: upon further investigation, it looks like "most" novels have experienced a significant price increase, with many of those DOUBLING in price.

A few examples:

Deathwatch: Xenos Hunters was $8 and is now $12.

Architect of Fate was $8 and is now $16, which is MORE than the physical book price of $13!

There is Only War (anthology) was $12 and is now $24, which is again more than the physical book price of $17.50!

Right now the iBooks prices have not changed, but I suspect that will happen very soon, as the direct and iBooks prices have previously been in sync.

The price increase was to keep up with the 1.5% UK inflation rate. *poker face*

I was going to ask if you were accidentally looking at Australian prices (happens from time to time with GW) but those aren't Aus prices.

 Dheneb wrote:
I was going to ask if you were accidentally looking at Australian prices (happens from time to time with GW) but those aren't Aus prices.

Good point... and I did double-check that to be sure. However, I neglected to mention that I was talking about US prices... I will update the original post. Thanks.

Yes you are right! There is indeed a price increase on July 3rd after BL asked for your e-mail and in turn gave away a HH wallpaper.

the DA 'Master of Sanitary' book I purchased at 8.99CAD 2 weeks ago now costs 11.99CAD.

That is a thing? Master of Sanitary?

The prices have seen an increase. This really does get my scruff up too, especially for ebooks. The gripe is that you have none of the over heads yet your prices increased. Ok you need to provide servers for downloads and alike but owe costs are actually in comparison very small. When they hike the price significantly it upsets people. An increase in price more than 10% isn't in my opinion even a yearly hike or inflation resolve. It's just greed.

Since imo most of BL literature is of questionable value i can only advise to cherrypick the exceptions and otherwose look for alternatives.
Being a fan of BFG and naval combat i found the Jack Aubrey series, which is cheaply availablein ebook format on amazon, to be very promising.

Ivory Tower isn't quite sufficient for the level of disconnect GW is showing in recent years- I believe a more apt term would be "Adamantium moonbase"...

A quick anecdote... I had three short stories in my Black Library cart for $8.97... I went back to place the order and it had gone up to 13.97, more than 50% more for nothing.

It looks like what has happened is this:

Short stories now cost as much as novellas, $5.

Novellas now cost as much as novels, $8.

Novels now cost $12.

... except for Horus Heresy and Space Marine Battles at $16.
(looks to be that price for novels that include pictures)

Omnibus books now cost $24.

And remember that this is for the eBooks, which in some cases now cost more than their print versions.

Because their physical book sales have gone down drastically they have little choice..
Their current market strategy to combat the disconnect causing long-term customers to cease or lesson purchases, is to raise prices by both the degree of decreased sales gap AND inflation.. Moving onto the only products that maintained sales was inevitable..
Since this tactic has FURTHER decreased sales in their physical stock..
Alas people voting with our wallets has had the opposite effect of its intentions.. Only the stock-holders can save us now (alas the main holders are KIRBY and crew I believe)

 Shandara wrote:
That is a thing? Master of Sanitary?

Someone's gotta oversee the servitors and serfs that clean the Chapter's latrines...

Call me a tinfoil hat wearing conspiracy theorist, but I bet they're increasing the ebook prices because they're going to discontinue a LOT more novels, which would then force people to either buy the ebook or pirate.

 elStrages wrote:
The gripe is that you have none of the over heads yet your prices increased. Ok you need to provide servers for downloads and alike but owe costs are actually in comparison very small.

This is a common misconception and 100% wrong. The costs of producing, transporting and storing physical copies of a book (which you are referring to as "overhead") range between 8-15% of the cover price depending on how much art is in the book and what kind of stock it is on. The actual "overhead" of the book comes from paying the author (who at GW is for hire; they don't own the IP or work on spec), the editor, the artist who draws the cover, the proofreader, the typesetter - and all of the other folks who in some way touch the book along the way before it is physically produced. Keep in mind also that every time you buy ebooks direct from some other source like iBooks or Amazon, they're getting a straight 30% off the top while also charging GW a transmission fee for the bandwidth. And that's after they pay someone to convert the original files into the various formats each platform uses as well as then check over the books for any and all errors that may have arisen in said conversion.

TL;DR eBooks cost virtually the same to produce, but because the average person mistakenly believes the physical production is where the bulk of the costs are, they demand they be sold at lower prices.

SOURCE: Professional writer and longtime journalist who actually knows a bunch of guys who write these novels (and others like it.)


Automatically Appended Next Post:
A likely culprit of this price bump might be a recent survey that's been picked up in the UK press that the average novelist makes 11k pounds (~$19K) a year which is well below the UK poverty line. There's been quite a row over it and they might have raised ebook prices to give a bump to the royalties of the writers they employ in case the question comes up at a stockholders meeting or in the press. Tie in fiction notoriously pays worse than spec gigs, but comes with dependable paychecks and the chance of some bleedover readers to your non-tie in work. But that's all speculation. This is an unnaturally large price jump for fiction in general.

Massawyrm wrote:
A likely culprit of this price bump might be a recent survey that's been picked up in the UK press that the average novelist makes 11k pounds (~$19K) a year which is well below the UK poverty line. There's been quite a row over it and they might have raised ebook prices to give a bump to the royalties of the writers they employ in case the question comes up at a stockholders meeting or in the press. Tie in fiction notoriously pays worse than spec gigs, but comes with dependable paychecks and the chance of some bleedover readers to your non-tie in work. But that's all speculation. This is an unnaturally large price jump for fiction in general.

We can hope that's the case. If not, it's yet another price hike making it harder for fans and benefiting no one (writers in this case).

The Codex:Eldar ebook, being the first of the non-ibooks, was £19.99 when I bought it.
It is now £21.99, the same as the Codex:AM, which was the one before Orks.

So, they're standardising the rulebooks, even though the Codex:SM is still £29.99, with no change.

Ah, GW logic. People buy less, so raise prices to cover the loss from people who still buy.

People will just download them from torrents, simple as that...

Yonan wrote:The price increase was to keep up with the 1.5% UK inflation rate. *poker face*

You also have to factor in the global price increase for bytes.

Limited Edition bytes are expensive, yo!

So GW's corporate insanity is spreading?

 infinite_array wrote:
So GW's corporate insanity is spreading?

It seems chronic, possibly terminal...

I thought the definition of insanity is:
"To perform the exact same action and expect a different result."

I guess they move-on to increasing Forgeworld items as well to be consistent?

Once they increased prices across all divisions they should be rolling in money in no time... right?

 Talizvar wrote:
I thought the definition of insanity is:
"To perform the exact same action and expect a different result."

I guess they move-on to increasing Forgeworld items as well to be consistent?

Once they increased prices across all divisions they should be rolling in money in no time... right?

Of course they will- same overhead with higher prices equals more money, It's simple math!

Massawyrm wrote:

 elStrages wrote:
The gripe is that you have none of the over heads yet your prices increased. Ok you need to provide servers for downloads and alike but owe costs are actually in comparison very small.

This is a common misconception and 100% wrong. The costs of producing, transporting and storing physical copies of a book (which you are referring to as "overhead") range between 8-15% of the cover price depending on how much art is in the book and what kind of stock it is on. The actual "overhead" of the book comes from paying the author (who at GW is for hire; they don't own the IP or work on spec), the editor, the artist who draws the cover, the proofreader, the typesetter - and all of the other folks who in some way touch the book along the way before it is physically produced. Keep in mind also that every time you buy ebooks direct from some other source like iBooks or Amazon, they're getting a straight 30% off the top while also charging GW a transmission fee for the bandwidth. And that's after they pay someone to convert the original files into the various formats each platform uses as well as then check over the books for any and all errors that may have arisen in said conversion.

TL;DR eBooks cost virtually the same to produce, but because the average person mistakenly believes the physical production is where the bulk of the costs are, they demand they be sold at lower prices.

Oh yeah... that's why hardcover books cost so much more than softcover because it's really difficult to space out all the words on the page so the editor had to be paid more. As a writer and publisher I can confirm that we charge a lot for that service. That's why the GW books cost so much, they are written in e-Hardcover format.

 Cryptek of Awesome wrote:

Massawyrm wrote:

 elStrages wrote:
The gripe is that you have none of the over heads yet your prices increased. Ok you need to provide servers for downloads and alike but owe costs are actually in comparison very small.

This is a common misconception and 100% wrong. The costs of producing, transporting and storing physical copies of a book (which you are referring to as "overhead") range between 8-15% of the cover price depending on how much art is in the book and what kind of stock it is on. The actual "overhead" of the book comes from paying the author (who at GW is for hire; they don't own the IP or work on spec), the editor, the artist who draws the cover, the proofreader, the typesetter - and all of the other folks who in some way touch the book along the way before it is physically produced. Keep in mind also that every time you buy ebooks direct from some other source like iBooks or Amazon, they're getting a straight 30% off the top while also charging GW a transmission fee for the bandwidth. And that's after they pay someone to convert the original files into the various formats each platform uses as well as then check over the books for any and all errors that may have arisen in said conversion.

TL;DR eBooks cost virtually the same to produce, but because the average person mistakenly believes the physical production is where the bulk of the costs are, they demand they be sold at lower prices.

Oh yeah... that's why hardcover books cost so much more than softcover because it's really difficult to space out all the words on the page so the editor had to be paid more. As a writer and publisher I can confirm that we charge a lot for that service. That's why the GW books cost so much, they are written in e-Hardcover format.

http://weknowmemes.com/2013/01/are-you-mocking-me/ The only thing I could think of after reading your comment, have an exalt.

I was looking on the FFG website recently (because those books are awesome) and noticed that the ebooks cost 50% of the hard copy price, ie. the $60 400 page Only War Core Rulebook was $30 for the ebook version. Pretty damn reasonable for such a high quality product. GW should learn from their partners.

 Cryptek of Awesome wrote:
Oh yeah... that's why hardcover books cost so much more than softcover because it's really difficult to space out all the words on the page so the editor had to be paid more. As a writer and publisher I can confirm that we charge a lot for that service. That's why the GW books cost so much, they are written in e-Hardcover format.

Which press is yours and what percentage would you put your physical production costs at, exactly?