Quote:
Originally Posted by pwalker8
I suspect what he means is that the publishers can discount all they want. All agency means is that the publishers set the price, not Amazon. No more, no less. Price fixing is simply the posters personal prejudice. Agency does not equate to price fixing.
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No, agency does not equate to price fixing. However, in practice, giving control of retail prices to publishers has served to eliminate any competition at the retail level on Big 5 books. There is no mystery on the thinking of the Big 5 in this regard. Their executives views were exposed in the Apple litigation. There is no reason to believe that these views have changed since, and in fact ample reason to believe otherwise. And if this is not enough the increase in prices speaks to this very eloquently.
It saddens me that large publishers obsession with preserving the declining but profitable print book business by attempting to slow ebook adoption is being pursued at the expense of not only readers but of their authors.