Amazon’s Book Monopoly : A Threat to Freedom of Expression?

[bgalbrecht]

As the editor over at TeleRead put it: Amazon: Threat or Menace?

It's probably too late now, but if the big publishing houses wanted to do something about Amazon's market share of ebooks, they need to refuse to sell any proprietary ebook formats or DRM.

[LovesMacs]

What monopoly? There are other places to buy books.

[pwalker8]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Do bookstores other than Amazon exist? Yes, therefore they are not a monopoly.

I don't think you understand the legal definition of monopoly in the United States.

We have been through all this before. As long as Amazon doesn't use the power of the state to maintain their market position, then I say good for them. If someone wants to jump into the market and challenge them, then great. On the flip side, if Amazon is working behind the scenes with the government to against new entries to the market, then that's a problem.

[Cinisajoy]

Originally Posted by pwalker8

I don't think you understand the legal definition of monopoly in the United States.

We have been through all this before. As long as Amazon doesn't use the power of the state to maintain their market position, then I say good for them. If someone wants to jump into the market and challenge them, then great. On the flip side, if Amazon is working behind the scenes with the government to against new entries to the market, then that's a problem.

As long as there is Google, Apple and Walmart, Amazon cannot in any sense of the word be a Monopoly.
Only if Amazon is the ONLY ONE that sells ebooks that would be a monopoly.


I wish the people that say that Amazon is bad would not sell on Amazon. If you cannot stand a company, why give them your money.
I refuse to buy a product from a hypocrit.
So yes, I will be keeping a watch just so I don't give money to someone that is two faced.

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by pwalker8

I don't think you understand the legal definition of monopoly in the United States.

We have been through all this before. As long as Amazon doesn't use the power of the state to maintain their market position, then I say good for them. If someone wants to jump into the market and challenge them, then great. On the flip side, if Amazon is working behind the scenes with the government to against new entries to the market, then that's a problem.

If you are going to claim that someone else doesn't understand what a monopoly is, the least you could do is tell them what you claim is the real definition.

Oh wait, we've been through all this before, too...


P.S. Standard obfuscatory tactics here -- first you convince everyone that something-is-really-true-but-it's-legal, since people are less likely to argue. Then once people accept it's true, you convince them that it's illegal.
(Obviously, this assumes you are successful, which you aren't. But as they say, it's the thought that counts. )

[cfrizz]

Whatever Amazon is, We The People are the ones that made them what they are. That is the freedom of a free market. If someone else comes out with a better option than Amazon, we would probably promptly switch over to them.

Until then, the miserable whiners can go pound sand.

[SteveEisenberg]

Originally Posted by Cinisajoy

As long as there is Google, Apple and Walmart, Amazon cannot in any sense of the word be a Monopoly.

There are two main senses of the word:

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/monopoly

exclusive control of a commodity or service in a particular market, or a control that makes possible the manipulation of prices.

In the first sense above, Amazon is not a monopoly. In the second, it is.

Originally Posted by cfrizz

Whatever Amazon is, We The People are the ones that made them what they are. That is the freedom of a free market. If someone else comes out with a better option than Amazon, we would probably promptly switch over to them.

As the apparent failure to date of the well-financed jet.com challenge shows, the cost of entry for a real Amazon competitor is enormous. It is tremendously more time-consuming, and harder, to build an amazon-like web site than many realize.

cfrizz, this isn't to argue that Amazon is a threat to freedom of expression. I just checked a bunch of presidential campaign books, and all were in stock and offered at what seemed either reasonable or set-by-publisher prices. This is in contrast to the situation four years ago.

Right now, Amazon's book monopoly is not a freedom of expression problem in the Western world. But this has little to do with the wonders of the free market. Instead, it has to do with Amazon's currently doing a good job of stocking books from an extremely wide range of viewpoints.

The one place where I think they are doing a bad job in the freedom of expression arena may be www.amazon.cn. However, Amazon does not have much market power in China.

Re the links in #1, pressure from these organizations is, IMHO, a big factor in making sure that, this election cycle, Amazon will treat all the campaign books equally. Even if some of the criticisms are over the top, their overall effect is good.

[Cinisajoy]

Steve,
I only have one small argument with your Amazon manipulates prices. As it stands right now, an author can sell their ebook for anywhere from 99 cents to $200. Google and Kobo both allow free on their ebooks.
See this example: http://www.amazon.com/Amazons-most-e...expensive+book
As to other products, I again believe the sellers set the price.
Now if we want to talk about manipulating prices I do believe that would be Walmart who at times does tell a manufacturer what they will pay for a product.

[darryl]

@Steve. Amazon is simply not a monopoly. Not in the first sense of the dictionary definition you quoted. And the second "limb" of that definition is so wide as to be meaningless without further interpretation. Any major player in an industry can be said to have "control" to the extent necessary to influence prices. Even minor players may have sufficient control by way of simple competition. But of course the word used in the definition is "manipulate", not influence. The two are not of course the same. Merriam-Webster defines the term in this sense as:

to control or play upon by artful, unfair, or insidious means especially to one's own advantage

to change by artful or unfair means so as to serve one's purpose

Amazon is not a monopoly in this sense either. It has competition. In ebooks its competitors include Kobo, Apple, Google and Barnes and Noble amongst others. It has so little influence over price that it is unable to even set its own for a large segment of the books it sells.

Apart from this I thought you were striving for balance in your post. But let's be clear. Amazon is not a monopoly! This claim is probably the worst of the Joe Konrath Zombie Memes. It's not going to die amongst the likes of the New York Times or Authors United, but perhaps we can at least preserve some semblance of logic and rationality here on Mobileread? A Haven from the Zombie Apocalypse in Publishing? A place where we can let the truly demolished memes like this rest in peace?

[Cinisajoy]

And speaking of monopoly, Joe Konrath and whatever else might be in this thread, here are the cookies as promised. Both Sugar Cookies and Chocolate chip cookies.
Plenty of milk too.

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by Cinisajoy

And speaking of monopoly, Joe Konrath and whatever else might be in this thread, here are the cookies as promised. Both Sugar Cookies and Chocolate chip cookies.
Plenty of milk too.

Where are they? I don't see them????

[Cinisajoy]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Where are they? I don't see them????

The cookies are on the island and the milk is in the refrigerator.
Help yourself. Would insert a picture of the island but don't know how.

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by Cinisajoy

The cookies are on the island and the milk is in the refrigerator.
Help yourself. Would insert a picture of the island but don't know how.

You can attach the image in the Go Advanced reply mode (default if quoting someone).

Scroll down a bit and click on Manage Attachments.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by pwalker8

I don't think you understand the legal definition of monopoly in the United States.

I am perfectly well aware of what a monopoly is, and Amazon are not one, no matter how much you try to distort the facts.

[Fbone]

Originally Posted by darryl

Amazon is not a monopoly in this sense either. It has competition. In ebooks its competitors include Kobo, Apple, Google and Barnes and Noble amongst others. It has so little influence over price that it is unable to even set its own for a large segment of the books it sells.

Keep in mind that Amazon has MFN clauses. By US contract law no other competitor can undercut Amazon's prices either directly or indirectly. This does influence how others operate their business.