Why e-Textbooks Could Cost Students

Our family just spent hundreds of dollars on college textbooks for the Spring semester. Will Apple's recent attempt to break into the textbook market, and other rapidly evolving e-book distribution models, help to moderate soaring textbook prices? From what I've seen so far, it could do just the opposite.

Theoretically, e-book prices should be cheaper, since publishers don't incur the costs of printing and distributing physical books. In effect, the e-book distribution model shifts those costs from the publisher to the school or student, which must pay for a device on which to read the content.

But the e-book distribution model is shaping up to be inherently less consumer friendly. Unlike the distribution channel for paper books, publishers have been able to set the prices that channel partners charge for e-books. The implications of this model first became obvious during the 2011 holiday season, when retail discounts on some paper titles more than made up for lower list prices of e-books. In some cases e-books cost more than you would pay for the paper version inyour local bookstore.

Apple is a pioneer behind this new model. As a recent Wall Street Journal story notes, "Under Mr. Jobs's direction, Apple persuaded five of the biggest publishers to abandon the wholesale model, by which retailers were free to discount the recommended retail price. Under the new pricing arrangement, publishers set the price of e-books." And the distributor -- Apple in this case -- gets 30% off the top.

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