Oh I agree with you there about the ideal size of the booksellers, but I see that as a slightly different discussion. In an ideal world yes there would be many small to midsized book sellers rather than just a few big ones. In practice in my area, there aren't any great nearby small bookstores out in the suburban area. So the only ones left who had a selection of the kind of books I like were the big stores and BN is now the only one of those left. In that kind of non-optimal bookselling world, given the choice between two evils of "some Amazon competitors", or "no Amazon competitors", I'd still choose the former I guess.