http://www.pcworld.com/article/192563/apple_ipad_to_come_with_30k_free_ebooks_report_says.html?tk=nl_dnx_h_crawlNow before you get all "there's no damn free lunch" on me and argue about all of their "Free trials" they've had, just consider this. By setting your prices and clarifying your offer - which has in truth,
nothing to do with books - and then offering 30k free books as part of the deal, you're touching on the essence of Free.
Sure, we've been hearing "but don't order yet" since the dawn of Billy Mays, with some finite, cheesy "free" offering thrown in to the deal. What's different about this? The 30K free ebooks are
public domain. That is a domain that's quite large today and getting seriously larger all the time.
So the finite element of this picture is clearly the iPad. Go nuts! Sell the iPad. Charge away! Apple tapping into the infinite (or closer to) that they did not create yet can leverage to transform the value of their offering is truly an element of the economics of Free.