[kennyc]

Matthew Ingram response:

.....Publishers — and some authors, especially those who control the Authors Guild, which has fought every attempt by Google and others to open up the book market — have been so obsessed with piracy and locking down their products that they have allowed Amazon to take control of their fate (if that reminds you of Apple and the music industry, that’s probably not a coincidence). Instead of making it easy for readers to download their authors’ work on different platforms and share and copy it, they have only made it easier for Amazon to control them and dominate the industry.

As some authors have pointed out, even if you take advantage of Amazon’s self-publishing options to avoid having to get a traditional publishing deal, you’ve really just exchanged one corporate overlord for another. For most writers, the ideal would be an industry with multiple players — but unfortunately, their own publishers have helped make that even less of a possibility. And Amazon is the major beneficiary.

http://gigaom.com/2011/12/02/how-pub...eat-them-with/