[Kali Yuga]

Originally Posted by flyblown

Well, I guess we'll see how well author's rights are being protected when either one of two things happen : 1. readers switch off from buying and start freeloading (i.e. what happened when the music industry disrespected their fan base for too long)

Yeah, well. That's just going to happen no matter what. Availability doesn't necessarily reduce piracy, and "the publishers disrespect me" is usually just a thin veneer of a rationalization for piracy.

Originally Posted by flyblown

2. the publishers find themselves locked into one dominant distributor (i.e. Amazon) with little capability of negotiating decent distribution deals.

That may be a valid concern, but I'm fairly confident that most of the rights issues will be resolved long before that becomes a real issue. Plus, as the market grows, I suspect companies like Waterstones will see a bigger market for foreign sales and may decide it's worth it after all to support that market.

It also doesn't hurt that Amazon, at a high point in terms of power and influence, just lost a major game of chicken over agency pricing. These types of monopolies are much more fluid than we often assume.

Originally Posted by flyblown

I support an author's rights... but I support my consumer rights and I expect distributors to sort out their problems with authors instead of just schlepping the problem off on me.

H'm. So do your rights as a consumer mean that you are entitled to whatever you want, whenever you want it, no matter where you are, and in whatever form you like? If Scholastic and Bloomsbury can't talk JK Rowling into releasing ebooks in any form, what are they supposed to do about it? And do my rights as a customer mean I get to run my Wii games on a PS3?

Granted, there are legit reasons to be upset about availability issues. They will get resolved -- it simply can't happen like flipping a switch without violating tens of thousands of contracts. Meanwhile, at least some people today are overwhelmed with their own sense of entitlement, a lack of patience, and a failure to comprehend the complexities of running a business (large or small).

It may suck to be on the outs, but perhaps polite feedback combined with a little patience might actually work better than expressions of hostility and demands for instant gratification....