7 ms·

The article is short on details, but I'm not clear why Amazon is obligated to sell a publisher's books, much less at the publisher's desired prices. Wal-mart i

The article is short on details, but I'm not clear why Amazon is obligated to sell a publisher's books, much less at the publisher's desired prices. Wal-mart is famous for using its size to lean on suppliers ensuring "everyday low prices." Why is publishing different? I sympathize with authors that are hurt by this battle, but it just shows that Amazon's marketplace is becoming more important to their sales than their publisher is.

jerf 12y ago
If Amazon can significantly hurt a publisher in this manner, it is suggestive that they may have a monopoly power that they are abusing: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly#Law http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly#Law (General note: Please at least somewhat carefully read over that before arguing. First, I'm only saying that it's suggestive, not proof, and secondly, there's a lot of misconceptions about what exactly is forbidden w.r.t. monopolies.)
- btrombley 12y ago
  I think this is backwards: it was the book publishers (and Apple) that were sued for colluding to raise e-Book prices and had to settle -- which is what anti-trust laws are meant to protect consumers against. Amazon using its size and some questionable tactics just doesn't fall into that category. The book publishers have done a great job painting this as a David vs. Goliath story, but it's really two Goliaths battling over a shift in publishing and distribution.
  - cafard 12y ago
    Amazon doesn't just beat up on the big boys.
  - dragonwriter 12y ago
    Just because it was illegal for book publishers to collude with Apple to fix prices in the ebook market to their advantage doesn't make it any less illegal than it otherwise would be for Amazon to leverage any monopoly power it may have -- as that is legally defined, which doesn't require a complete absence of competition -- in the online physical book retail market to acheive market power in the ebook market.
- AnthonyMouse 12y ago
  The thing is, they don't. Amazon is like Walmart or Google. The reason everyone uses them isn't that there are no other options. There are. The reason is that they're better at it. A monopoly is, for example, Comcast, because there is no reasonable alternative provider for the same service. Talking about "hurt a publisher" is broadening the scope too far of what a monopoly is. A large retailer taking your products off of its shelves will hurt you in the sense that you'll make fewer sales, but that doesn't mean they have monopoly power. All it means is they have non-zero negotiating leverage with you. If you don't like it, go sell your books on Barnes and Noble or eBay or direct to customers on your own website. Think for a moment about why we hear all this wailing about Amazon in the book market but not in the market for e.g. AWS, even though Amazon has a large market share there as well. It's because in the book market the publishers are also Amazon's competitors and they're the ones wailing. Because Amazon wants everybody to buy eBooks, the vibrant success of which gives authors significant leverage over publishers once it becomes viable to forgo a print edition entirely unless publishers provide sufficiently attractive terms. That puts the squeeze on print publishers from both ends. Amazon is demanding lower prices from them and authors are given leverage to demand higher royalties. That's the natural state of the market when your product requires you to operate an industrial scale printing facility and have a significant unit reproduction cost for your product and competitors are providing similar customer value by copying bits. The print publishers are screwed and they're trying to figure out how not to be, but they're already dead and they just haven't hit the ground yet.
  - jerf 12y ago
    See, this is why I really strongly suggested that you read the link I provided. Monopolies are not, strictly speaking, about "not having any other options". I phrased my point carefully... the fact that Amazon can incur great pain on someone like this, combined with the fact that they have, strongly suggests something that may be actionable under monopoly law, regardless of what other definitions may or may not also be something you could choose to apply, but I did not. If customers in practice had easy and significant choices, they'd just go elsewhere easily and the publisher would feel no pain.
    - 12y ago
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
dragonwriter 12y ago
> but I'm not clear why Amazon is obligated to sell a publisher's books, much less at the publisher's desired prices. No one has said that they are. Likewise, the affected publisher, and the news media, are not obligated to fail to inform the public of Amazon's tactics so that they are aware that Amazon having smaller-than-usual discounts, "not available" notices, and long shipping times may well be a sign not of any issue with the availability of the book, but of Amazon's disputes with the publisher, and that therefore if they are encountered when looking for a particular book, a consumer would be well advised to look at other online retailers, who, while their usual discounts may be lower, may have better discounts for the book at issue or have it available when Amazon says its unavailable, or have it with a more reasonable shipping time when Amazon does not. Amazon is essentially leveraging the trust that consumers have in them as presenting a seemingly comprehensive catalog and best terms in the online book retailing business to selectively pressure publishers, and its completely fair to inform consumers that, in the particular case of these kinds of disputes, that trust may, however well earned it was previously, not be warranted -- and what the particular symptoms are that such a dispute is affecting the book you are looking for.
- a3n 12y ago
  Amazon lying to customers - there's a winning strategy.
- HNaTTY 12y ago
  I like your writing style.
Spooky23 12y ago
I think this reveals Amazon's key weakness -- they don't make any money. Amazon's big cachet was always "Earth's biggest selection". If they are going to behave like cable companies and refuse to sell books from major customers, they are really failing their customers. If I want to buy a book, I shouldn't need to know or care about who publishes it, and whether or not they are in a pissing match with Amazon. The first time I run into that situation will be the last time I use Amazon.
- bd_at_rivenhill 12y ago
  They make plenty of money, but that is then invested back into expanding the business, so it's more accurate to say that they don't make much profit at this time.
  - kenrikm 12y ago
    If that were true they would not be slowly making the service worse to try to eek out some money. "Add On Items" Removing items from being next day eligible with Prime etc.. As someone who orders from Amazon all the time (daily) I have seen a drastic downgrade in the service from what it used to be. Feels more like Walmart then Amazon these days.
    - smackfu 12y ago
      Well, Prime itself probably loses money. It's a pretty classic loss-leader.
  - mcguire 12y ago
    I haven't looked at Amazon's numbers, so I don't know the actual values involved, but "profit" includes money that is then "invested back into expanding the business".

jerf 12y ago

If Amazon can significantly hurt a publisher in this manner, it is suggestive that they may have a monopoly power that they are abusing: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly#Law http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly#Law (General note: Please at least somewhat carefully read over that before arguing. First, I'm only saying that it's suggestive, not proof, and secondly, there's a lot of misconceptions about what exactly is forbidden w.r.t. monopolies.)

btrombley 12y ago
I think this is backwards: it was the book publishers (and Apple) that were sued for colluding to raise e-Book prices and had to settle -- which is what anti-trust laws are meant to protect consumers against. Amazon using its size and some questionable tactics just doesn't fall into that category. The book publishers have done a great job painting this as a David vs. Goliath story, but it's really two Goliaths battling over a shift in publishing and distribution.
- cafard 12y ago
  Amazon doesn't just beat up on the big boys.
- dragonwriter 12y ago
  Just because it was illegal for book publishers to collude with Apple to fix prices in the ebook market to their advantage doesn't make it any less illegal than it otherwise would be for Amazon to leverage any monopoly power it may have -- as that is legally defined, which doesn't require a complete absence of competition -- in the online physical book retail market to acheive market power in the ebook market.
AnthonyMouse 12y ago
The thing is, they don't. Amazon is like Walmart or Google. The reason everyone uses them isn't that there are no other options. There are. The reason is that they're better at it. A monopoly is, for example, Comcast, because there is no reasonable alternative provider for the same service. Talking about "hurt a publisher" is broadening the scope too far of what a monopoly is. A large retailer taking your products off of its shelves will hurt you in the sense that you'll make fewer sales, but that doesn't mean they have monopoly power. All it means is they have non-zero negotiating leverage with you. If you don't like it, go sell your books on Barnes and Noble or eBay or direct to customers on your own website. Think for a moment about why we hear all this wailing about Amazon in the book market but not in the market for e.g. AWS, even though Amazon has a large market share there as well. It's because in the book market the publishers are also Amazon's competitors and they're the ones wailing. Because Amazon wants everybody to buy eBooks, the vibrant success of which gives authors significant leverage over publishers once it becomes viable to forgo a print edition entirely unless publishers provide sufficiently attractive terms. That puts the squeeze on print publishers from both ends. Amazon is demanding lower prices from them and authors are given leverage to demand higher royalties. That's the natural state of the market when your product requires you to operate an industrial scale printing facility and have a significant unit reproduction cost for your product and competitors are providing similar customer value by copying bits. The print publishers are screwed and they're trying to figure out how not to be, but they're already dead and they just haven't hit the ground yet.
- jerf 12y ago
  See, this is why I really strongly suggested that you read the link I provided. Monopolies are not, strictly speaking, about "not having any other options". I phrased my point carefully... the fact that Amazon can incur great pain on someone like this, combined with the fact that they have, strongly suggests something that may be actionable under monopoly law, regardless of what other definitions may or may not also be something you could choose to apply, but I did not. If customers in practice had easy and significant choices, they'd just go elsewhere easily and the publisher would feel no pain.
  - 12y ago

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

dragonwriter 12y ago

> but I'm not clear why Amazon is obligated to sell a publisher's books, much less at the publisher's desired prices. No one has said that they are. Likewise, the affected publisher, and the news media, are not obligated to fail to inform the public of Amazon's tactics so that they are aware that Amazon having smaller-than-usual discounts, "not available" notices, and long shipping times may well be a sign not of any issue with the availability of the book, but of Amazon's disputes with the publisher, and that therefore if they are encountered when looking for a particular book, a consumer would be well advised to look at other online retailers, who, while their usual discounts may be lower, may have better discounts for the book at issue or have it available when Amazon says its unavailable, or have it with a more reasonable shipping time when Amazon does not. Amazon is essentially leveraging the trust that consumers have in them as presenting a seemingly comprehensive catalog and best terms in the online book retailing business to selectively pressure publishers, and its completely fair to inform consumers that, in the particular case of these kinds of disputes, that trust may, however well earned it was previously, not be warranted -- and what the particular symptoms are that such a dispute is affecting the book you are looking for.

a3n 12y ago
Amazon lying to customers - there's a winning strategy.
HNaTTY 12y ago
I like your writing style.

Spooky23 12y ago

I think this reveals Amazon's key weakness -- they don't make any money. Amazon's big cachet was always "Earth's biggest selection". If they are going to behave like cable companies and refuse to sell books from major customers, they are really failing their customers. If I want to buy a book, I shouldn't need to know or care about who publishes it, and whether or not they are in a pissing match with Amazon. The first time I run into that situation will be the last time I use Amazon.

bd_at_rivenhill 12y ago
They make plenty of money, but that is then invested back into expanding the business, so it's more accurate to say that they don't make much profit at this time.
- kenrikm 12y ago
  If that were true they would not be slowly making the service worse to try to eek out some money. "Add On Items" Removing items from being next day eligible with Prime etc.. As someone who orders from Amazon all the time (daily) I have seen a drastic downgrade in the service from what it used to be. Feels more like Walmart then Amazon these days.
  - smackfu 12y ago
    Well, Prime itself probably loses money. It's a pretty classic loss-leader.
- mcguire 12y ago
  I haven't looked at Amazon's numbers, so I don't know the actual values involved, but "profit" includes money that is then "invested back into expanding the business".