Steve Jobs biography – prices in different ebookstores and countries

A cover of Steve Jobs biography by Walter Isaacson

The biography of Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson is already available. Print and digital editions were launched at the same time. I thought it would be useful to check how prices of ebook version differ between ebookstores.

First, hardcover is not much more expensive than ebook (or rather: ebook is not much less expensive than hardcover). The prices at Amazon.com, for US residents, are:

Hardcover - $17.88
Kindle Edition - $16.99

The publisher, Simon & Schuster, have set up a fixed price and ebookstores don’t have much room for price changes. Only Kobo offers the book at a lower price than official – it’s $16.39.

Kindle Store US - $16.99
Barnes & Noble - $16.99
Kobo - $16.39
iBookstore US - $16.99
Sony eBookstore - $16.99

Readers living outside US have to pay more, as usual. If you would buy a book from Kindle Store US, depending on where you live, you’ll see a price:

UK - $21.14
Africa - $18.19
Asia & Pacific - $17.29
Australia - $10.39
Canada - $20.72
Europe - $19.43
India - $18.09
Latin America & Caribbean - $17.29
Middle East - $17.29

As you see, you’ll pay the lowest price if you live in Australia ($10.39). You have to pay twice as much in UK or Canada.

Amazon and Apple have local ebookstores so let’s check how much you’ll pay there (the price is given in a local currency and in dollars at today’s currency rate):

Kindle Store UK – £12.99 – $20.76
iBookstore UK – £12.99 – $20.76

Kindle Store Germany – €19.99 – $27,85
iBookstore Germany – €12.99 – $18.10

Kindle Store France – €15.99 – $22.28
iBookstore France – €12.99 – $18.10

Don’t buy the book in local Kindle Stores. For instance in German Kindle Store you’ll have to pay $8.42 more than if you’ve bought from Germany in Kindle Store US. In Europe a cheaper option is to buy in iBookstore, although the price is still higher than the official $16.99.

And, sorry folks from UK. You pay most no matter which option you choose.

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Steve Jobs

FROM THE AUTHOR OF THE BESTSELLING BIOGRAPHIES OF BENJAMIN FRANKLIN AND ALBERT EINSTEIN, THIS IS THE EXCLUSIVE BIOGRAPHY OF STEVE JOBS.

Based on more than forty interviews with Jobs conducted over two years—as well as interviews with more than a hundred family members, friends, adversaries, competitors, and colleagues—Walter Isaacson has written a riveting story of the roller-coaster life and searingly intense personality of a creative entrepreneur whose passion for perfection and ferocious drive revolutionized six industries: personal computers, animated movies, music, phones, tablet computing, and digital publishing.

At a time when America is seeking ways to sustain its innovative edge, and when societies around the world are trying to build digital-age economies, Jobs stands as the ultimate icon of inventiveness and applied imagination. He knew that the best way to create value in the twenty-first century was to connect creativity with technology. He built a company where leaps of the imagination were combined with remarkable feats of engineering.

Although Jobs cooperated with this book, he asked for no control over what was written nor even the right to read it before it was published. He put nothing off-limits. He encouraged the people he knew to speak honestly. And Jobs speaks candidly, sometimes brutally so, about the people he worked with and competed against. His friends, foes, and colleagues provide an unvarnished view of the passions, perfectionism, obsessions, artistry, devilry, and compulsion for control that shaped his approach to business and the innovative products that resulted.

Driven by demons, Jobs could drive those around him to fury and despair. But his personality and products were interrelated, just as Apple’s hardware and software tended to be, as if part of an integrated system. His tale is instructive and cautionary, filled with lessons about innovation, character, leadership, and values.