Also remember that Amazon either takes a loss or is barely above breakeven for the Kindle hardware including the Fire. It is like the game console model. Go independent and make money on the PC, but if you want access to the millions of willing buyers and predictable hardware requirements, you either charge your customers more or make it up in volume.
But isn't that factored into the 30% cut they take before the delivery charges?
I love my Kindle and I really like Amazon, but this is the first I've heard of the delivery charge part. Considering that it's around 25% of the price of the book... it really does seem like a rip off on their part.
I think you're right, and that actually worries me more. Amazon likes to sell books for under $10, many ebooks I've bought are $5 or $7.
Maybe it has something to do with the book it's self (i.e. they charge $0.07 per image), but do they mention how this is calculated anywhere?
If I sell an ebook for $2, they take $0.60 in general, and then they decide that it costs $0.80 to deliver... that means they're taking 70% of the cost of the book. So if I'm successful and have to pay taxes, I may be making like $0.12 per book.
I don't remember every seeing this cost mentioned before in the few articles I've seen about selling Kindle books. I'd love to know how it's calculated.
