Amazon and Hachette Resolve Dispute

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by taustin

Given that Amazon uses flexible pricing, this could well be hilarious.

"Amazon has this for $3.99."

(Employee checks.) "I show it for $4.99"

"I have a print-out right here! It says $3.99!"

"Well, I have Amazon on my screen right here, and it says $4.99!"

Of course, if Amazon detects a Walmart IP address, it could go from $4.99 to $.01, just for Walmart to match.

Ouch.

They definitely can tweak'em but I suspect they would stick to showing higher prices since the Walmart folks will be trained to match the higher of the two Amazon prices. Better to make'em fight the customer if you're going to be nasty.

[whitearrow]

I really wanted someone to say they buried the Hachette.

(C'mon, it was *right there.*)

[pidgeon92]

I've gotten a few emails from ereaderiq today about price drops on Hachette titles on my wishlist.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by pidgeon92

I've gotten a few emails from ereaderiq today about price drops on Hachette titles on my wishlist.

I understand they're doing a blanket 30% devaluation of hachet literature.

[SteveEisenberg]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

Reasonable, considering Hachette's foot dragging and astroturfing only got them the same kind of deal as S&S got by negotiating in good faith.

This is speculation.

My speculation is that, as the smallest of the big five, Hachette was the gazelle the Amazon cheetah was trying to pick off. We do know that Amazon executives can think that way:

http://www.businessinsider.com/sadis...azelle-2013-10

So the gazelle (Hachette) had a bigger job in standing up to the cheetah than did Simon & Schuster, a larger publisher backed by a parent, CBS, having 71 percent more revenue than Hachette's Lagardère.

It's in the interests of both Amazon and Hachette to convince us that the Hachette deal is just as good as that achieved by Simon & Schuster. I hope this is true.

P.S. For a bit of perspective, here is the world-wide 2013 revenue for the three corporations mentioned above:

Lagardère €7.2 billion
CBS €12.3 billion
Amazon €59.7 billion

[DiapDealer]

Everything is speculation. Including goofy Wild Kingdom analogies. If Amazon's the cheetah and Hachette's the gazelle, who represents Marlon Perkins?

[tubemonkey]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

Everything is speculation. Including goofy Wild Kingdom analogies. If Amazon's the cheetah and Hachette's the gazelle, who represents Marlon Perkins?

[TCSimpson]

Basically discounts across the board for Hachette on Amazon now. From one Hachette author:
"Sooooooo glad to have this over. It's been a long time coming, and I won't deny that it hurt while going on. The good news all my books are now in stock AND discounted again!!
Ebooks are 35% off list and print are 25% off. Yeah!"

[Fluribus]

Originally Posted by taustin

Of course, if Amazon detects a Walmart IP address, it could go from $4.99 to $.01, just for Walmart to match.

If I were Walmart, my inclination might be to put it in the cart and increase the quantity to get the cost to at least $35. I might even buy a Prime membership and make a few million one-item orders for anything that wasn't an add-on.

[pwalker8]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

Everything is speculation. Including goofy Wild Kingdom analogies. If Amazon's the cheetah and Hachette's the gazelle, who represents Marlon Perkins?

No, not everything is speculation. We know that Hatchette got the ability to set the prices, which is the primary thing they (the booksellers) want. Now both S&S and Hatchette have gotten the ability to set prices in their contracts, so my guess is this is what all the other big publishers will get. We also know that Amazon got some sort of incentive put in the contract for publishers to set lower prices. So, from that stand point, they got something they want (potentially more lower prices).

It sounds to me like both sides got some of what they wanted, and gave up something. That's usually what's called a win/win.

[JoHunt]

As Amazon-Hachette Dispute Ends, Authors Want More (Bloomberg):

Now that the dispute between Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN) and Hachette Book Group has ended, the next disagreement may pit authors against publishers over how to share e-book revenue.

Writers who stood by Hachette through the Amazon negotiations over print and digital book sales want to be rewarded for sticking by the publisher. Now they’re asking Hachette to share more of the money it receives on e-book sales with them.

At stake is revenue from sales of digital books. Under the current structure, an e-book sold by Amazon for $9 brings in about $2.70 for the Web retailer and $6.30 for the publisher and writer. A smaller fraction of that -- about $1.58 -- then goes to the author. The writers contend that their share should be greater, because there’s no manufacturing or distribution cost associated with digital books.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-1...want-more.html

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by pwalker8

No, not everything is speculation. We know that Hatchette got the ability to set the prices, which is the primary thing they (the booksellers) want. Now both S&S and Hatchette have gotten the ability to set prices in their contracts, so my guess is this is what all the other big publishers will get. We also know that Amazon got some sort of incentive put in the contract for publishers to set lower prices. So, from that stand point, they got something they want (potentially more lower prices).

Speculation.

[Barcey]

Originally Posted by joehunt

As Amazon-Hachette Dispute Ends, Authors Want More (Bloomberg):







http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-1...want-more.html

Any bets the response will be... "We had more of a verbal thank you in mind".

It sounds like the 'Publishers Guild' comments finally hit home.

[tubemonkey]

Writers who stood by Hachette through the Amazon negotiations over print and digital book sales want to be rewarded for sticking by the publisher. Now they’re asking Hachette to share more of the money it receives on e-book sales with them.

...dream on

[fjtorres]

From publisher's weekly:

http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/b...e-reacton.html

At a practical level, Robinson said that while terms are said to be favorable to authors, the Guild has no way of knowing at the present time if that is the case. Robinson said that given the support HBG received from authors the time is right for the publisher “to revisit its standard e-book royalty rate of 25% of the publisher’s net profits."

To which the Hachette men will say; "The 25% rate was a trade off for higher pbook rates, remember? You bought the magic beans, now go plant them."

http://www.teleread.com/ebooks/autho...renegotiation/