Authors United, allies, demand government intervention

[jgaiser]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

I'm wondering if the Axis of AU is even going to follow through and ever mail that letter.

My guess is no. They want publicity. They want to whine. If they really wanted to start an investigation of Amazon, they could have just sent the letter to the DOJ instead of **another** full page ad.

[SteveEisenberg]

Originally Posted by Purple Lady

If they wanted competition against Amazon it was pretty stupid to get rid of competition.

My hypthesis is: It's not a matter of publisher IQ numbers, but of financial numbers.

How low were the wholesale prices Fictionwise demanded?

If publishers were willing to -- long term -- sell me their product at half the wholesale price Amazon pays, I'm pretty sure I could interest a reputable venture capital firm. And so long as I let them run the show, and none of us get greedy (by silicon valley standards, that is), I could make Amazon's book business, eBook and paper, toast. Of course, the publishers would really be stupid to do this, as they would have just lost their most profitable account, while further harming the small bookstores where so many readers discover their product.

And then the venture capitalist would likely turn around and sell Eisenberg Books to B&N or Amazon.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by SteveEisenberg

How low were the wholesale prices Fictionwise demanded?

I'd be very surprised if Fictionwise was "demanding" anything in the way of wholesale prices (in the pre-agency days). Fairly certain those prices were dictated TO them. I got the impression there wasn't a whole lot of variation in what retailers paid a publisher for an ebook sale (same ebook/different retailers).

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

I'd be very surprised if Fictionwise was "demanding" anything in the way of wholesale prices (in the pre-agency days). Fairly certain those prices were dictated TO them. I got the impression there wasn't a whole lot of variation in what retailers paid a publisher for an ebook sale (same ebook/different retailers).

All the small fry were begging for was a chance to play the games, even under Agency.

[fjtorres]

Barry Eisler has a pretty solid indictment of the publisher mouthpieces masquerading as "Author" advocacy groups:

https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20...-authors.shtml

[Cinisajoy]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

I know all indies aren't in KU.
Nor do the ones in KU have everything in KU. They really *shouldn't*.

But KU contains 900,000 titles.
Versus, maybe, 400,000 non-exclusive indie titles.

As revenue dries up in non-Kindle channels the economics of exclusivity are going to change.
(Think of the PS2 era of console gaming: Sony's share of the market was so big it simply made no economic sense for many developers to spend money chasing incremental sales on Nintendo or XBOX.)

And, consider what it does to the credibility of a non Kindle bookstore if authors start rotating their titles through KU every 90 days, which means they'll be taking them in and out of their stores. For series titles, KU works best with the first in the series. Which leaves the competitor stores trying to sell "headless" series.

The whole subscription model is too new to tell how big KU can get or what the second or third order effects will be like. But the synergies are already making waves. There is no reason not to expect them to grow.

Where are you getting this 400,000 figure? The reason I ask is there are 3.5 million ebooks on Amazon. Only 1 million are in KU.
So are you saying 2 million of those books are by the BPH?

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by Cinisajoy

Where are you getting this 400,000 figure? The reason I ask is there are 3.5 million ebooks on Amazon. Only 1 million are in KU.
So are you saying 2 million of those books are by the BPH?

Indies.
The topic is indies. Which make up 30-35% of the Kindle catalog. Subtract the ones in KU and what remains is non-exclusive indies.

The rest are tradpub.
Tradpub is not the same as BPHs; there are plenty of honorable non-predatory tradpubs that haven't been scooped up by the multinationals. Yet.

About a third of the Kindle catalog is BPH. The rest is small and medium tradpub and 1% are from Amazon Publishing Imprints.

That is listings, btw, not unit sales.

[fjtorres]

Another week, another screed:
http://www.bookweb.org/news/authors-...trust-scrutiny


It'll be interesting what comes first, the feds telling them to shut up or them running out of friendly venues willing to host their rants.

[darryl]

I must be getting very blase about this sort of thing. Even the last lot my first reaction was "Great. I can't wait for Joe Konrath to fisk it." And Joe exceeded my expectations. Two fisks in two days, a record. I must remember to buy his next book.

This time, I can't even be bothered skimming the rubbish, let alone reading it. And even with Joe's talent for fisking, there must be limits to how entertaining a fisk can be when it is simply addressing the same tired, illogical statements which do not deserve the dignity of being called arguments. I say this without even skimming it, and reached my conclusion that it is the same old rubbish on the basis of Nate's blog post. I also had a brief look at the Passive Voice post, expecting at least a couple of sentences from PG, but it appears he sees nothing worth commenting on.

This rubbish simply confirms that the Cartel is living in fantasy land and shows no signs of coming to terms with the new reality. As Barry Eisler indirectly points out, authors should run a mile from any organisation with Author in the title which purports to represent their interests.

[DiapDealer]

Amazon has artificially driven down the price of books and, because of its market dominance, it has been able to force publishers of all sizes, as well as independently published authors, to accept its terms on a “take it or leave it” basis.

That's hilarious.

"Amazon should be looked into because they WANT to sell BPH books cheaper, but can't because many big publishers NEGOTIATED a return to agency pricing in their new contacts with Amazon. Contracts that they had no choice but to 'take or leave'."

Do they hear how stupid they sound!? I guarantee that if Amazon had enough market dominance to force publishers "of all sizes" to take their terms or leave, there would be no agency pricing whatsoever. Their success in renegotiating contracts with agency terms is proof positive that Amazon can't dictate whatever terms it wants.

When it boils right down to it; the only thing Amazon is truly guilty of is, is not bending over and letting an incestuous cabal dictate every single aspect of the book market any more.

[DuckieTigger]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

Their success in renegotiating contracts with agency terms is proof positive that Amazon can't dictate whatever terms it wants.

Actually, it wouldn't and didn't hurt Amazon if they get forced to agency pricing. It was a slick way for Amazon to use their market dominance to push indies into the void left by agency in 2010. Same now. They have to pretend to fight so they don't look like they want a monopoly, which they may get with agency after a while if they keep swallowing the indies up.

[Cinisajoy]

I grabbed a book last night. Guy Fieri and on the pricing it says "price set by the publisher. "
Note: I am cheap so the book was on sale for $1.99.
Also last week I picked up "Gray" by E L James for 99 cents. It had the same note on it.

Also: thanks for the explanation fjtorres.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

That's hilarious.

"Amazon should be looked into because they WANT to sell BPH books cheaper, but can't because many big publishers NEGOTIATED a return to agency pricing in their new contacts with Amazon. Contracts that they had no choice but to 'take or leave'."

And then, when this happens, it's all evil 'Zon's fault:

http://www.thepassivevoice.com/07/20...n-at-hachette/

(Two quarters in a row, BTW.)

[Barcey]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

And then, when this happens, it's all evil 'Zon's fault:

http://www.thepassivevoice.com/07/20...n-at-hachette/

(Two quarters in a row, BTW.)

Of course. Amazon was trying to 'artificially' lower prices below the level the cartel was trying to artificially raise prices to. If Amazon hadn't grown the ebook market it wouldn't be shrinking now.

[fjtorres]

Battery Eisler sets the stage, Konrath fisks...

First, though the answers Rasenberger provides are entirely predictable (and indeed, have been debunked so many times they’re not worth addressing with anything more than a link or two), the questions themselves are revealing. Here’s a sample:

·How has Amazon’s abuse of its dominance in the book industry directly affected authors?

·How have Amazon’s punitive actions against publishers, such as Hachette during their 2014 contract dispute, impacted authors?

·According to some news reports, self-published authors who once thought of Amazon as their ally are now feeling victimized. Why is that?

·As Amazon continues to sell huge numbers of titles below cost and uses them as loss leaders to entice sales on other segments of its website, what will be the long-term effect on a thriving and robust literary marketplace?

Holy “When did you stop beating your wife,” Batman!

http://jakonrath.blogspot.com/2015/0...ors-guild.html