Kindle law books go for a higher price

The amazing reading hardware from Amazon, Kindle, has begun to make some legal publications available to subscribers. But not for the same kind of discount that its other e-books deliver to readers. According to a July 10, 2009, story from the Wall Street Journal, while Kindle ordinarily significantly discounts an e-book from its hardcover price (e.g., discounting a popular work of fictions some 63%), its knock-down from the notoriously high prices of law books will be more in the neighborhood of 20%. WSJ quotes a source who sees "practical reasons to believe that the digital market may well be more profitable for publishers of legal, medical and educational texts." Why? Because they are already marked up so much? Because consumers of such texts (especially students) have little choice in the matter, having to purchase texts required for a course?

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