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I'm not going to refer to any particular post here. But the idea recurs throughout this thread, at least on one side of the argument, that to limit a publishers right to sell its goods as it sees fit, including particularly the setting of prices, is not in accordance with a free market. This reached its extreme in the hysterical communism post, but even a relatively recent post stated that Hachette should be able to set its prices and consumers should decide whether to buy at that price.
What such arguments imho fail to take into account is that competition is at the very heart of a free market. A free market is distorted where there is no competition. It is competition which prevents consumers always being gouged. There is no meaningful competition amongst the BWM on price. Agency Pricing sought to and succeeded in removing price competition completely. We saw the effects. If you want to see the effects right now search in Australian stores for new releases, as I highlighted in another thread. You will see consistently high prices at every store. This is because retailers literally cannot offer discounts without the publishers approval. The publishers have literally taken over the setting of retail prices. What the US D.O.J. and Courts did was simply act to try to restore competition and the proper functioning of the free market. There is no free market with agency pricing in this industry, as the BWM is an oligopoly which has no wish to compete with each other in any meaningful fashion.
I am no expert on Australian competition law, let alone its US counterpart. However, I do know that such laws are notoriously difficult to apply to industries dominated by a duopoly or oligopoly. Australia has a history of these types of arrangements, and our ACCC is subjected to much criticism because it seems unable to do anything about what appear to be very obvious collusive conduct. Last time Apple's conduct alone was enough to sink the conspiracy. This time the BWM seem to think they will be able to get away with it. And this is a very real risk. How do Amazon deal with an argument that Apple's intervention acted as a wake-up call to them, and they have all now decided independantly and without reference to each other that they must fight to the death for agency pricing.
I am not privy to Amazon's plans but am sure they are well aware what is happening. I hope they have an excellent counter prepared. Failing this, one possibility is a repeat where Amazon is forced to capitulate to the BWM. In this case the BWM will use all of its political clout to try to prevent any action by the DOJ. If there is action by the DOJ, then victory against the BWM is of course possible but by no means certain. But there will surely be a vigorous political battle before there is ever a court battle.
Another possibility is all out war. Amazon dumps the BWM and aggressively pursues its authors. A nightmare for both sides and for the authors. Is Amazon sufficiently diversified to go down this path? Are the BWM?
We live in interesting times.
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