It’s Official: SF&F Titles From Baen Books Are Coming to the Kindle Store

This next bit of news should come as no surprise, though it still deserves notice as marking the end of an era. Baen Books has officially announced that they will be distributing their ebooks to the Kindle Store, with the first titles showing up on Saturday 15 December.

Toni Weisskopf, the Publisher at Baen, posted the news earlier today in the Baen’s Bar forum. Along with the new outlet, Baen is also going to be making a number of changes.

eBook prices are going up, both at Baen’s own ebookstore and at Amazon. Gone are the days of the $4 to $6 ebook; instead Baen will adopt a multi-tier pricing strategy which will be tied to the release schedule of the paer editions. An eBooks which is released at the same time as a hardcover  will cost $10, alongside a trade paperback it will cost $9, and finally when the mass-market paperback is released the ebook will cost $7.

Bleh. I know that Baen is merely increasing prices to cover Amazon’s cut, but the increase is likely going to make me more cautious about experimenting with new authors.

Luckily for me, Baen won’t be completely doing away with their monthly bundles, though they will change in form, and Baen will also continue to sell the eARCs to those of us who simply cannot wait to find out what happens next.

And like I reported a couple months ago, Baen is also going to be reorganizing the Baen Free Library with some titles going away and other titles being added. I’ll admit that I didn’t realize at the time that the changes to the BFL indicated that Baen was considering such a radical change as to sell their ebooks in the Kindle Store, but given the size disparity between Baen’s customer base and the Kindle Store it makes a lot of sense.

On a related note, Baen’s news does not bode well for other smaller niche ebookstores, including any hoping to copy Pottermore’s model as well as the ones which launched this year. Zola Books, for example, is expecting to draw people in to their store because they have exclusive content.

Baen, on the other hand, has decided to give up the exclusive conditions they had in order to join the party. They went to where the customers are rather than expect customers to come to them. If Bane sees exclusivity as a poor model, what hope could the new and smaller stores have?

In any case, this does mark the end of an era. Baen was the last of the early ebook pioneers, and now they have transitioned to the modern era.

If you’ll excuse me, I need to go buy up the rest of Baen’s monthly bundles. It looks like the current bundles will be going away soon (it’s not clear), so I want to buy them before it’s too late.

via Baen’s Bar

Nate Hoffelder

View posts by Nate Hoffelder
Nate Hoffelder is the founder and editor of The Digital Reader. He has been blogging about indie authors since 2010 while learning new tech skills weekly. He fixes author sites, and shares what he learns on The Digital Reader's blog. In his spare time, he fosters dogs for A Forever Home, a local rescue group.

6 Comments

  1. ElizabethN10 December, 2012

    the good news aspect of this announcement: “As part of the adjustment, we will also be raising ebook royalties to authors by 25% so that they get the benefit of both more sales (we hope) and higher prices.”

    I know people that have no problem buying & downloading books from the publisher’s site, but I also know several that won’t or can’t buy an ebook if not on amazon, barnes & noble…

    Reply
  2. Thomas10 December, 2012

    According to the publisher, the price hike goes into effect on Dec 15. After that, all bundles that include books in print will be removed. The only ones to stay will be monthly bundles of future books which will be available only before their release date, and a few bundles of older, out of print books.

    Reply
    1. Nate Hoffelder10 December, 2012

      Removed from sale but still accessible to previous buyers, I think.

      Reply
  3. […] The end of an era: It’s Official: SF Titles from Baen Books are coming to the Kindle Store […]

    Reply
  4. […] kept getting asked why its e-books weren’t “on the Kindle” yet. It finally had to resort to making sweeping changes to how its e-book store worked in order to get its titles on Amazon’s Kindle store—because that was where all the customers […]

    Reply
  5. […] kept getting asked why its e-books weren’t “on the Kindle” yet. It finally had to resort to making sweeping changes to how its e-book store worked in order to get its titles on Amazon’s Kindle store—because that was where all the customers […]

    Reply

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