#What Price Should it Be?
5 messages in this thread
Jan
In general CDs are overpriced if bought at full retail price. Often the
same product can be bought in book form for a lot less. As an example
consider the OED. This is available at around the 90 pound sterling (say
$140) in the miniturized book format with the magnifying glass, yet the
asking price for the CD is 495 pounds. Thus you are not paying for
intellectual property (the 90 pound price covers that) and you are
certainly not paying media costs as these will be less than the book. The
only reason is to exploit a certain market. For the OED I would pay up to
the $150 – $170 mark. This price point would be an acceptable point for the
large encyclopeadic works.
For lesser works (say Cinemania) a $40 mark would be better. I have bought
this at $65 so this work is approaching the right price point.
The problem for me (and others like me) is that now we have our new toy its
useless without the disks so we have to stump up the asking price or the
thing becomes a high priced audio player.
Steve
Steve, out of curiousity is the 90 Pound version the OED or the OED II?
If it is the OED then the price difference doesn't seem all that out of
line to me — $140 for an old, incomplete, difficult-to-use,
nearly-impossible-to -search hard-bound version (I have it and while I love
it, I never look forward to using it!) versus about $1,000 U.S./Cdn for the
newer, complete, superbly-easy-to-use-and-search CD-ROM version.
In all honesty, though, while I cherish my Compact Edition of the OED, I'm
not sure I'd spring the extra $140 for a Compact Edition of the OED II if
that is indeed what is for sale.
I know that there was a CD-ROM version of the original OED, not Windows and
I'm told not nearly as easy to search. It would be interesting to know if
OUP is discounting that older version, or has simply discontinued them.
Cheers!
Jim
I think the miniturised book is the OED2. The point I was trying to make is
that you are buying exactly the same information but one happens to be
easier to use than the other. The publishers have already done the research
for the paper version and thus the high cost is going to recoup the cost of
developing the electronic version. In the OEDs case I think that they have
failed to see the market for their disc at the $150 price point. At that
price it would fall into the must have category. At the moment I cannot
justify the price asked.
Steve
I agree with much of what you say, Steve — if it is the OED II. I'll
probably be calling the Oxford University Press people here in Canada in
the next couple of weeks, if I remember I'll ask them. Cheers!
Steve,
The really smart markateers create a market–they just don't sell
something. One of the better examples is Kodak. They are a film company
that also happens to make camers. Their cameras consume film, so they
might be better off if they gave the cameras away. (They tried to do this
once, and everyone cried foul).
The CD-ROM manufacturers, unfortunately for them, usually do not
manufacture CD-ROM discs (Philips and the CD-I being a smart exception).
However, having the right CD-ROM titles certainly enhances the
marketability of the drives.
The drive technology exists, the disc producers exist, and there are some
very good and some very bad examples of both. We have seen what can be
done, and that is of advantage to almost everyone (information, education,
ecology, efficient, etc).
The point is that we are at a cross-road, a paradigm shift. Happily, the
consumer has the power to control technology (buy/no buy decisions). The
question is what should we suggest, price point wise, to insure that this
technology succeeds and expands?
Rgds
Jan