I have been thinking about buying the recently published Steve Jobs biography (or maybe asking for it for Christmas).
From bestselling author Walter Isaacson comes the landmark biography of Apple co-founder Steve Jobs. In Steve Jobs: The Exclusive Biography, Isaacson provides an extraordinary account of Jobs’ professional and personal life. Drawn from three years of exclusive and unprecedented interviews Isaacson has conducted with Jobs as well as extensive interviews with Jobs’ family members, key colleagues from Apple and its competitors, Steve Jobs: The Exclusive Biography is the definitive portrait of the greatest innovator of his generation.
When I started work in my current job I was interviewed for the staff magazine and was asked which three people I would have round for dinner, I think I had alongside Steve Jobs was Terry Pratchett and Captain Blackadder. Though having since then read various articles on Steve, he may have been a visionary with regard to consumer electronics, when it came down to dinner conversation, he didn’t really do that small talk thing.
One thing is which format do I go for, well if it’s for Christmas then I’ll probably go with the hardback, which has a RRP of £25 but is just £12.50 on Amazon
Now I know that the Kindle price includes VAT at 20% so the “actual” like for like price is £10.83, but even so, you would think that Amazon would price the Kindle version lower than the print version. I sometimes wonder if Amazon think that consumers see the Kindle version as a luxury version of the book and therefore deserving of a higher price. Then I think it probably is nothing to do with Amazon whatsoever and it’s all down to the publishers who want to set prices (and probably earn more from the print version than they do the Kindle version).
I will probably go with the print edition as I can either then sell it on, once I have read it, give it away to someone after I have read it, or keep it on the shelf!
the problem is that the Kindle price is set by the publisher, and they still haven’t realised that people object to paying these kinds of prices for a delivery medium that costs a fraction of a physical book to produce. Where the price can be set by Amazon, they’re normally cheaper. Amazon allow you to get a refund within 7 days. You could read it quickly, then get your money back 🙂 I haven’t tested this, but given the awful formatting of some Kindle books I have read I have been tempted.