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Originally Posted by ProfCrash
I am sorry, but I don't think that this helped BN all that much. BN would have gained market share without the collusion.
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How? Magic fairy dust, perhaps?
B&N was already leveraging its in-store presence to push the Nook, and wasn't doing well against Amazon. Most of the hype around the Nook was not by readers who went on to buy lots of ebooks, but by tech geeks who saw a cheap tablet an hacked the device. B&N has trashed its profitability for a few years in a row now just making and marketing the Nook, and before agency pricing they did not (and presumably could not) match Amazon on price.
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Originally Posted by ProfCrash
A recent article said that Apple would pull out of the e-book market if the Agency model went away....
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I wouldn't put much stock in statements like that. Jobs infamously said "people don't read anymore," and pushed iBooks shortly thereafter. I.e. Apple is infamous for saying one thing and doing the exact opposite.
And again, it doesn't look like the agency model will disappear. The blockade on discounts, "most-favored retailer" status, guarantees of not being outpriced are gone. The publisher can still set the retail price and retailer cut, they just can't dictate all of the final prices.
I'd also be careful what you wish for. If agency pricing is killed, publishers may go back to windowing, e.g. delaying ebook releases by 3-6 months after the hardcover release, in order to protect hardcover margins.