Quote:
Originally Posted by mgmueller
I guess, everyone here agrees.
But to my knowledge, it's not up to Amazon (or Apple or Sony or Kobo or ...) to decide. It's the publishers.
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Having to deal with geographic restrictions is a money sink. Publishers either see more benefit than cost doing it this way, or there's actual legal issues involved with selling in multiple geographic regions.
I'm inclined to believe that even the publishers are doing it more out of necessity than desire to wring money out. Since the laws vary around the world, you have to make sure you comply with the laws of a region to sell stuff there. To avoid getting into trouble, that means when moving stuff around regions, you have to spend some time doing compliance work, and it isn't cheap. And with the internet and digital goods, it's even easier to accidentally find yourself in non-compliance if you don't geo-fence your stores.
Rational, it ain't, but I see it as a consequence of the geopolitical reality.