Original sentence: King and his publisher held fast to their ideal rate of return at 75 percent, and they decided to double the cost of the fourth part of the novel to two dollars.Paying readers dropped to 46 percent of downloads.The number of downloads decreased overall as well.With the third installment, the numbers surged back up to 75 percent
Edited sentence: According to King's representatives, the venture was a failure.However, fans and readers claimed the idea as a success, rather, that it was made infeasible for other reasons, particularly greedy pricing for an inconsistent product.Instead of allowing the market to determine the product's value by accepting the rate of payment people would be willing to pay, King and his publisher held fast to their ideal rate of return at 75 percent, and they decided to double the cost of the fourth part of the novel to two dollars.King and his publisher, citing dissatisfaction with the percentage of paying readers, raised the cost of each installment to an eventual high of 7 dollars.King decided to use the honor system, allowing people to download the story installments, whether they paid for it or not.Paying readers dropped severely to 46 percent of downloads.Pricing was the main readers' grievance, but also, it was the lack of satisfaction in the quality of the work, and the natural cost-to-quality comparison by the public, was further imbalanced by the raise in cost.Some even continued with claims that this represented the commercial infeasibility of web publishing in general.The number of downloads dramatically decreased overall as well.The project was ended, they claim, because of a lack of sufficient payment, and a public that could not be trusted under the honor system.Though King's core fan base was largely loyal, they could not speak for the general public, who did not react well to King's changing of terms.With the third installment and the bad publicity generated by King's complaints over the drop in reader payment, the numbers surged back up to 75 percent