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Re: HFQ up on Amazon | |
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by Keith_w » Mon Jan 12, 2015 7:56 pm | |
Keith_w
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Thank you for that explanation RFC, it's a shame that the court misinterpreted the facts. On the other hand, S&S don't have to sell to Amazon, do they? I know that it would be unwise, market-wise, for them, but nobody can actually force them to sell to Amazon.
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A common mistake people make when trying to design something completely foolproof is to underestimate the ingenuity of complete fools. |
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Re: HFQ up on Amazon | |
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by runsforcelery » Mon Jan 12, 2015 9:00 pm | |
runsforcelery
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No one can "force" them to sell to Amazon, but Amazon's avowed purpose is to be THE source for e-books )(or anything else you might want to order online), and it has become such a huge player that refusing to list on their site is tantamount to simply writing off a [pi]large[/I] percentage of your total sales, especially with e-books. That's where customers look first, and those who look there first are overwhelmingly likely to buy there . . . or nowhere. Even Baen has been forced to accept Amazon's pricing opolicies (and dominance of the market) because they simply couldn't afford to let all of those sales go by. In the end, making a sale worth $1 is a lot better than making no sales even if $1.75 would be much closer to the fair value of the sale, if you see what I mean. It's sort of like an echo of that saying: "If you owe the bank $50,000 and can't pay, you're in trouble. But is you owe the bank $50,000,000 and can't pay, the bank is in trouble." "Oh, bother!" said Pooh, as Piglet came back from the dead. |
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Re: HFQ up on Amazon | |
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by fallsfromtrees » Mon Jan 12, 2015 10:15 pm | |
fallsfromtrees
Posts: 1960
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Of course if all of the publishers got together and agreed not to sell to Amazon, then Amazon screams collusion, and files an anti-trust suit that would end up costing publishers major amounts of money. ========================
The only problem with quotes on the internet is that you can't authenticate them -- Abraham Lincoln |
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Re: HFQ up on Amazon | |
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by Keith_w » Tue Jan 13, 2015 7:36 pm | |
Keith_w
Posts: 976
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ah well, what's a poor boy to do but buy hardbacks but not from Amazon. --
A common mistake people make when trying to design something completely foolproof is to underestimate the ingenuity of complete fools. |
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Re: HFQ up on Amazon | |
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by DennisLee » Tue Jan 13, 2015 11:57 pm | |
DennisLee
Posts: 47
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RFC, thanks for explaining that. I was under the impression that the publisher was still setting the "wholesale" price (with appropriate volume discounts) and therefore Amazon could proceed to sell the ebook at whatever the wanted, just like the hard copy books. On the other hand, I must point out that while waiting for the next Safehold book I have read several books that were free on Amazon that were the first books in a series. That forced me to purchase the remaining books because I had to see where the series went from there (so now I am waiting for three or four books in instead of just the next Safehold book ). I also read three or four others I also would not have purchased that were not worth paying for the remaining series books, so all in it has been worth it to me. |
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Re: HFQ up on Amazon | |
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by fallsfromtrees » Wed Jan 14, 2015 4:07 am | |
fallsfromtrees
Posts: 1960
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Amazon is following in the steps of Baen here - like all good dealers, the first sample is always free. Baen has been doing this for over a decade now, apparently talked into it by Eric Flint. ========================
The only problem with quotes on the internet is that you can't authenticate them -- Abraham Lincoln |
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Re: HFQ up on Amazon | |
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by Keith_w » Wed Jan 14, 2015 7:28 pm | |
Keith_w
Posts: 976
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The major difference between the way the pricing is set for paper books vs e-books, is of course that there are physical copies of a paper book, for which you can say, give me x dollars and I will turn over this paper book, for e-books, you turn over 1 copy to the reselelr, you have turned over all the copies of it that the reseller needs. --
A common mistake people make when trying to design something completely foolproof is to underestimate the ingenuity of complete fools. |
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Re: HFQ up on Amazon | |
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by fallsfromtrees » Sat Jan 17, 2015 9:26 pm | |
fallsfromtrees
Posts: 1960
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I would hope that Simon and Schuster appealed this abortion of a decision. Hopefully the appellate court will recognize the total unfairness of this decision, and reverse it. ========================
The only problem with quotes on the internet is that you can't authenticate them -- Abraham Lincoln |
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Re: HFQ up on Amazon | |
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by GregD » Mon Jan 19, 2015 2:56 pm | |
GregD
Posts: 153
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Sorry to have to disagree with you, but I believe you are entirely wrong on this.
The initial deal with Kindle books was exactly the same as the deal with regular books: publisher set a wholesale price, and Amazon paid that price for every book they sold, be it physical or Kindle. Apple and the publishers came out with the "Agency Model", where publishers would set the final retail price, the seller would get 30%, and the publisher would get 70%. After the publishers forced this on Amazon, it led to Amazon getting more per book in most cases, but also led to higher prices. So no, Amazon was not gouging authors or publishers by setting lower prices. What it was doing was creating a "mindspace" that you "shouldn't" have to pay more than $10 for an eBook, and that is what publishers were fighting. (Note that all Baen eBooks went for $6 at the time, so it's not like Amazon was setting an unreasonably low price point.) Amazon was often paying publishers more for teh eBook than readers were paying Amazon, and it's the publishers that forced Amazon to stop doing that. Things I'm less certain about: IIRC, the reason Amazon won the lawsuit was because it's considered anti-competitive for manufacturers to set up a cartel to force a retailer to sell at a certain price, which was what the publishers did. If publishers are now only getting $0.70 when Amazon sells their book as a $1 loss leader, blame the publishers, not Amazon, because it's the publishers who fought to make that so. And yes, Baen books has joined the Borg of Amazon. In order to protect the Baen authors, Baen agreed to a higher price on Amazon than they'd previously been charging, a price increase that doesn't affect eARCs or the monthly bundles, just the individual book price. In exchange for which people with Kindle's no longer have to stand on their heads in order to get Baen eBooks onto their devices. Not seeing the anti-publisher / anti-author behavior here. For the last couple of centuries, publishers have been the "gatekeepers", getting to decide what books would be allowed out. Amazon is ending that. Good.
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Re: HFQ up on Amazon | |
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by Bahzellstudent » Tue Jan 20, 2015 2:49 pm | |
Bahzellstudent
Posts: 100
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While on balance, Amazon have been good for the book-buying public, these things can be pushed too far; we see the same thing in the UK where milk prices have been used by the big supermarkets as a loss leader and as a result, most milk farmers are now losing money.
in the world of eBooks, there is a virtual monopoly by Amazon and Kindle - and whenever a market is controlled by one person (whether that be published, distributor or anyone else) problems will eventually arise |
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