Quote:
Originally Posted by abookreader
Well the thing about Monopolies is that they are impossible to maintain once they increase their prices dramatically in an industry with low barriers to entry.So say Amazon runs the Publishers out of business and then increases the prices on all Amazon published books to $20 or whatever. What would happen?
Somebody would set up a website to start selling eBooks at $9.99 and their business would boom.
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See Fbone's post - Amazon has resources no other group could hope to deteat in the long run - like big supermarkets do with small shops, price them out. "Somebody" wouldn't last long.
And, Zanshin, note I said "near" monopoly - obviously, they won't worry about niche publishers, or indeed anyone they don't see as a threat.
And don't forget their attack is on two fronts as far a books are concerned - they have the market leader device, the stroke of genius they cooked up, as well as trying to get "exclusive" authors.
And cost - they'll beat any competitor if they feel they need to.
I think you'll see, over the next few years, more and more authors signing up/being poached, and - perhaps more annoying/dangerous, more and more sole rights being purchased by Amazon.
Sadly, I reckon they have a very clever strategy, which is working beautifully
Remember when it was just books we were worried about ? Well, nothing got in their way then, or when they realised just how profitable ebooks could be - and started to make people think ereader = kindle.