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Restraint of trade settlement
The reason we're seeing a change in pricing of ebooks is because of a recent suit filed by the FTC against most of the big publishers for price fixing. They claimed to have the right to set the ebook price of a book rather than letting Amazon or some other retailer set it. They were joined by the lawyers of The Author's Guild in claiming that Amazon's pricing of Kindle books is bad for the industry. The judge scoffed at that idea in a preliminary ruling, saying that lower prices are good for customers.
This is a complex legal issue, and it isn't over yet. What we're seeing is publishers scrambling to avoid the appearance of price fixing. The irony is the position The Author's Guild has taken. I used to pay dues to them, and noticed years ago that they seemed to be in the pocket of the publishing industry. It's pretty clear now which side they're on.
It's going to sort out to be the A list writers who remain under the thumb of Big Pub, and B list writers who self publish or work through small presses. We writers will probably move back and forth between those two competing industries. I would not buy stock in Random House.
Ed Baldwin
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