When will publishers wake up to the challenge of Amazon?

The books industry still underestimates the disruptive power of Jeff Bezos's awesome ambitionSo Amazon are the bad guys, again. At least according to Harper's Magazine they are. For the former Amazon employee James Marcus, Brad Stone "drops the ball" in his biography of Jeff Bezos, The Everything Store, when he accepts "what is literally the company line – that these extorted dollars 'create the foundation on which everyday low prices become possible'." Marcus tells how some publishers are being "pressured" to pay "for the privilege of presenting their lists to [Amazon] marketing team and buyers" – a story denied in a footnote by an unnamed "Amazon spokesperson" – and goes on to assemble an impressive rap sheet of sharp practice:Of course it's legal. So is Amazon's control of an estimated 65 percent of the ebook market, a near monopoly that's apparently of no concern to the supine Department of Justice. So is its bare-bones price of $9.99 for popular ebooks, a loss-leading tactic that might be classified as predatory pricing if there weren't so many legal hurdles to making such a charge stick. So is the funneling of its British revenues through a subsidiary in Luxembourg ...... and on it goes. But Amazon's aggressive style of doing business is nothing new. What astonishes me is the continuing ability of publishers to underestimate how radically Amazon has changed the industry.Mike Shatzkin is one of those who have understood Amazon's disruptive power all along. But such... Continue reading at 'The Guardian'

[ The Guardian | 2013-12-13 00:00:00 UTC ]
News tagged with: #literary culture

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Amazon's Kindle Paperwhite Kids is $50 off for today only

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[ Engadget | 2022-03-04 14:15:59 UTC ]
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PLA & Pacific Northwest Spotlight: Can Amazon's Kindle Vella Break Through with Younger Readers?

For Kindle Vella, Amazon’s reading app for serial fiction, Gen Z readers, who are consuming webtoons and web novels in large numbers, could hold the key to success. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2022-03-04 05:00:00 UTC ]
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Amazon to Close All Bookstores

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[ Publishers Weekly | 2022-03-03 05:00:00 UTC ]
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Amazon is closing its physical bookstores and 4-star shops in the Bay Area and beyond

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[ Silicon Valley Business Journal | 2022-03-02 23:22:50 UTC ]
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Denmark’s Saga Egmont Producing Audiobooks for Irish and UK Publishers

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[ Publishing Perspectives | 2022-03-02 16:19:37 UTC ]
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'Bigger and bigger': Amazon attains top spot for UK adspend in 2021

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[ Media Week | 2022-03-02 09:07:47 UTC ]
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Omar Sakr's 'epic, stunningly dirty' debut novel challenges macho heterosexual myths of Arab-Australian culture

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[ The Conversation | 2022-02-28 19:12:38 UTC ]
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Indie Publishers Start to Look Past the Pandemic

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[ Engadget | 2022-02-11 18:28:55 UTC ]
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Amazon's Kindle Paperwhite is up to $45 off, plus the rest of the week's best tech deals

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[ Engadget | 2022-02-11 16:45:29 UTC ]
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'Maus' ban makes Art Spiegelman's Holocaust graphic novel an Amazon bestseller

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