Price and delivery mechanism are an important part of the product. In fact, with digital piracy, they're arguably more important than the content: there's always demand for free stuff that can be stored indefinitely without any loss in quality or functionality, doesn't take up any physical space and doesn't require any effort to obtain. See the hundreds of posts on Reddit with screenshots of Steam sale aftermaths and the admission that they'll never be able to play most of it.

Free is magic. It's place on the supply/demand curve is far away from "one cent."

That said, I think that in general you are right. We just need more publishers to get brave and try experimenting with pennies-on-the-dollar sales and other stuff.