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@fjtorres. Quite right. Author Solutions is the reason why I used the words "on a similar basis to Amazon". KDP and Author Solutions have very little in common. A KDP type operation is what the Big 5, with 20/20 hindsight (not Amazon's foresight), could and should have done to remain major players. People tend to underestimate the importance of Amazon's self-publishing platform, which gives it a supply of books and authors independent of the Big 5, offers attractive enough terms that it must over time make it very difficult for the Big 5 to compete for authors and, of course, gives Amazon leadership of this lucrative and growing segment of the market. It is the reason why Amazon's KU is effectively the last major subscription service standing and the only one with a viable business model. How ironic that they lent their prestige to what they sneeringly called vanity presses which might better have been described as scams when a more visionary look at the whole area of self-publishing might have saved them.
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