Earlier today, news broke that The New York Times was raising the price on its E-Edition from $14.99 to $19.99 a month. Now, Amazon has just told customers with Kindle subscriptions to the Times that they’re getting a price hike too: they’re jumping from $13.99 to $19.99 — an increase of 43 percent. Current Kindle subscribers will continue to pay $13.99/month for the next six months.
This is almost certainly in anticipation of the iPad launch tomorrow — Amazon just announced the release of its own Kindle for iPad app, which will be competing with Apple’s iBooks. And we’ll probably see the NYT’s iPad subscription at the same $19.99 rate. For comparison’s sake, earlier today the Wall Street Journal announced that their iPad subscription fee would be $17.29 per month.
Here’s the email Amazon is sending out:
Hello from Amazon.com,
As a Kindle subscriber to New York Times, you might like to know that effective April 2, 2010, the New York Times has raised its price to $19.99/month for new subscribers.
As an existing subscriber to New York Times, you will continue to be billed at the previous rate of $13.99/month for six more months (until October 2nd, 2010) after which you will be billed at the monthly rate then in effect. We believe that the Kindle edition of New York Times continues to provide excellent value for customers with a free 14 day trial period, wireless delivery via Whispernet, no long-term commitments, and substantial savings vs. regular print subscription rates.
As always you are free to cancel your subscription at any time. If you are still in the 14 day free trial period of your subscription you will not be charged, otherwise you will receive a prorated refund for the unused portion of your subscription. To change or cancel a subscription, please visit www.amazon.com/manageyourkindle.
Sincerely, The Amazon Kindle team