From the Digital Reader blog:
https://the-digital-reader.com/2017/...lowest-seller/
Quote:
Publishers are furious (and The Authors Guild is livid) that the copies of books that publishers had sold off cheap are now getting preferential treatment on Amazon.com.
Starting about two months ago, Amazon changed their policy on buy button on book listings. The old policy was that Amazon controlled the button and when you clicked it you bought the book Amazon sourced from the publisher.
Under the new policy, Amazon is giving the buy button to whichever seller can offer the best combination of price, customer service, shipping, etc. (The policy was announced last November and took effect in March.)
As a result, consumers may be seeing something like in the following listing where the buy button gets you a book from a low-price third-party seller, and the copy Amazon bought from the publisher is pushed down to the "other sellers" section.
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More at the source.
It helps to understand the difference between AMAZON.COM and AMAZON.LLC. because what we have here is Amazon.com (the online mall operator) demoting their Anchor store (AMAZON.LLC) to the same status as other *new* book vendors on the site. So if another book source can undercut AMAZON.LLC (by offering up a remaindered copy, for example) they are happy to give them top listing.
Publishers, of course, are upset to see their deep discounted inventory (for which authors don't get paid) getting added visibility.
Expend lots on whining about readers getting easier access to cheap pbooks.