"Is Government the Only Force Able to End Amazon Dominance?"

[Fbone]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

Simak is sadly underappreciated.

Agreed. Also sadly, his books are no longer available in the US. I'm guessing an estate or contract issue.

[Lemurion]

Originally Posted by Fbone

Agreed. Also sadly, his books are no longer available in the US. I'm guessing an estate or contract issue.

Ouch, that's bad news. I'm not too worried for myself as I've already read most of his works, much of it more than once, but it's a terrible loss for those who haven't yet been exposed to him.

You can find some PD works, but none of his best.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by Lemurion

Ouch, that's bad news. I'm not too worried for myself as I've already read most of his works, much of it more than once, but it's a terrible loss for those who haven't yet been exposed to him.

You can find some PD works, but none of his best.

Indeed.
It doesn't help his legacy or estate if new readers can't find him and the readers miss out on an unusually good writer. Hopefully it'll get cleared up soon.

[HarryT]

Fortunately they are available elsewhere. What appears to be his complete output is available from SF Gateway for readers outside the US.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Fortunately they are available elsewhere. What appears to be his complete output is available from SF Gateway for readers outside the US.

...which means it's a US publisher issue.
Check.
Thanks.

[calvin-c]

Originally Posted by HaemishM

The biggest problem with Amazon's dominance of the eBook market is that they can control... everything basically. Pricing, terms with creators, availability of material, everything. Most of my sales are through the Kindle store. If suddenly Amazon decided they didn't want indie authors anymore, or they didn't want to list fiction, I'd be up a creek without paddle. As much as I appreciate Amazon, I would like B&N, Kobo or anyone else to provide as good a platform for selling and buying books.

Absolutely incorrect here. Amazon can control prices (of ebooks) only by making them lower. Most ebooks are available from multiple sources-if Amazon makes the prices of those books higher then intelligent buyers will simply buy from another source. In terms of ebooks the cost of entering the market is minimal so even the fear that Amazon will lower prices until all their competition goes out of business and then raise them isn't realistic. Yes, they might do so-but they'd need to lower them again since raising them would cause new competitors to spring up.

Unless Amazon has contracts requiring they be the exclusive seller of books. If they start doing that then they could corner the market but AFAIK they don't. (Another caveat might be if Amazon were to cut their own throat by making Kindles incapable of displaying ebooks without DRM. That might lock people into Amazon but I seriously, seriously, doubt that will happen.)

[Fbone]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

...which means it's a US publisher issue.
Check.
Thanks.

His last publisher (2004) was Old Earth Books which is a very small SF reprint publisher whose website hasn't been updated in over a year. And only Way Station and City were reprinted.

Before that he was published by Del Rey (Random House) and Collier (MacMillian) both after his death.

So I don't know who has the rights today. To go from Del Rey to OEB seems strange. I doubt Del Rey would give up such a popular author in so short a time; less than 6 years. And this doesn't explain why no other of his works were reprinted.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by calvin-c

(Another caveat might be if Amazon were to cut their own throat by making Kindles incapable of displaying ebooks without DRM. That might lock people into Amazon but I seriously, seriously, doubt that will happen.)

To do that they would have to require all Kindle books be DRM'ed, remove all their apps from the market, and be ready to go to court the next day, on antitrust.
Otherwise people would just use the apps on other companies' hardware.
Amazon makes minimal money from hardware so why would they make such a mess to force people to use their hardware? Their business is selling content and everything that gets between the content and the consumer is bad for Amazon. Including DRM.

Theoretically, there was a time back in 2007-8 when Amazon needed lock-in but that time is long gone; by now network effects and the tyranny of the installed base is all the lock-in they might need. Which is why the price fix conspiracy left them stronger than ever and their competitors weaker; it pretty much guaranteed nobody could sell ebooks cheaper and if nobody was cheaper, why would newcomers go to any other platform?

[Fbone]

Originally Posted by calvin-c

Absolutely incorrect here. Amazon can control prices (of ebooks) only by making them lower. Most ebooks are available from multiple sources-if Amazon makes the prices of those books higher then intelligent buyers will simply buy from another source. In terms of ebooks the cost of entering the market is minimal so even the fear that Amazon will lower prices until all their competition goes out of business and then raise them isn't realistic. Yes, they might do so-but they'd need to lower them again since raising them would cause new competitors to spring up.

Unless Amazon has contracts requiring they be the exclusive seller of books. If they start doing that then they could corner the market but AFAIK they don't. (Another caveat might be if Amazon were to cut their own throat by making Kindles incapable of displaying ebooks without DRM. That might lock people into Amazon but I seriously, seriously, doubt that will happen.)

A couple of points, if I may.

Amazon has Most Favored Nation clause in their contracts so they have some control in ebook prices. However, they have more control with their royalty rates. If they decide to raise or lower the 70% or the $2.99 level you will see major price movements by authors and publishers.

People with Kindles (ereaders) are most likely to buy from Amazon. If the book is DRM'd then even more so.

Amazon is the exclusive seller of books sold through their KDP select currently numbering over 450,000.

[PatNY]

I certainly hope Amazon's "dominance" doesn't end anytime soon. That dominance has allowed it to become a great one-stop shopping place with commendable customer service, generally low prices and a great website. The customer reviews alone are a valuable service to consumers, even it you end up not buying your stuff there.

By the same token, it would be nice if other sites such as Kobo and B&N can stay in business for the sake of competition.


--Pat

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by PatNY

By the same token, it would be nice if other sites such as Kobo and B&N can stay in business for the sake of competition.


--Pat

Absolutely.
But whether they do or not seems to hinge on their own efforts. Both bear so many self-inflicted wounds at times it looks like Amazon is operating in a vacuum.

[calvin-c]

Originally Posted by Fbone

A couple of points, if I may.

Amazon has Most Favored Nation clause in their contracts so they have some control in ebook prices. However, they have more control with their royalty rates. If they decide to raise or lower the 70% or the $2.99 level you will see major price movements by authors and publishers.

People with Kindles (ereaders) are most likely to buy from Amazon. If the book is DRM'd then even more so.

Amazon is the exclusive seller of books sold through their KDP select currently numbering over 450,000.

Most Favored Nation clauses, AFAIK, act to lower prices, not to raise them. (i.e. the source must sell the product to its 'most favored' retailer at the lowest price that it sells the product to any other retailer). It's true that lowering prices can lead to market dominance-but how is that sort of dominance a bad thing? The 'evil' of monopolies is that they either stifle innovation or lead to higher prices. I can't see this doing either.

I'll have to think about the effects of dominance in royalty terms. Understand that monopoly laws aren't concerned with the profits of producers (authors in this case), only with the costs to consumers. The reason competition is favored is because it generally results in the lowest costs to consumers.

I don't own a Kindle and probably never will so I don't know much about the KDP Select program. Assuming it does give Amazon exclusive rights to sell a book (which seems to be what you mean although the way it's worded is ambiguous) then why would an author sign such a contract? Higher royalties? Maybe Amazon won't carry the book if the author doesn't sign an exclusive contract? If the latter then I'm surprised the government isn't already investigating Amazon, at the least. If the former then I'm not too concerned because it's the author's choice. A non-exclusive contract will always generate more sales. Not always more royalties, but definitely more sales.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by calvin-c

I don't own a Kindle and probably never will so I don't know much about the KDP Select program. Assuming it does give Amazon exclusive rights to sell a book (which seems to be what you mean although the way it's worded is ambiguous) then why would an author sign such a contract? Higher royalties? Maybe Amazon won't carry the book if the author doesn't sign an exclusive contract? If the latter then I'm surprised the government isn't already investigating Amazon, at the least. If the former then I'm not too concerned because it's the author's choice. A non-exclusive contract will always generate more sales. Not always more royalties, but definitely more sales.

KDP Select requires 90 days of exclusivity in return for a variety of promotional services, the most attractive of which has been inclusion in the Prime lending library. Amazon does not demand exclusivity to carry a book in the kindle ebookstore. But Select titles usually get a bit of extra promotion to customers Amazon's system identifies as potential customers.

Publishers choosing to go with KDP Select seem to do it for one of two reasons: either as a timed-exclusive launch mechanism to rack up exposure (and hopefully sales) and reviews in the Amazon ecosystem before going multi-platform, or because their multi-platform sales skew so heavily to Amazon that forgoing the benefits of Select doesn't make business sense. A fair amount of the second group start out in the first: they launch under Select and then go multi-platform but find the results less than satisfactory on the competitors. Some cases I've seen, it is the alternate retailer's services that fall short; either on the visibility side or on the backend side. But the most common reason I've heard for publishers abandoning multi-platform is that for *them* multi-platform does not bring more net sales.

As I said above, Amazon's domination is not due solely to their excellence but also their competitors' deficiencies.

[calvin-c]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

KDP Select requires 90 days of exclusivity in return for a variety of promotional services, the most attractive of which has been inclusion in the Prime lending library.

Publishers choosing to go with KDP Select seem to do it for one of two reasons: either as a timed-exclusive launch mechanism to rack up exposure (and hopefully sales) and reviews in the Amazon ecosystem before going multi-platform, or because their multi-platform sales skew so heavily to Amazon that forgoing the benefits of Select doesn't make business sense. A fair amount of the second group start out in the first: they launch under Select and then go multi-platform but find the results less than satisfactory on the competitors. Some cases I've seen, it is the alternate retailer's services that fall short; either on the visibility side or on the backend side.

As I said above, Amazon's domination is not due solely to their excellence but also their competitors' deficiencies.

Ah, the short period of exclusivity explains why the government hasn't gone after them, I think. But I still say the multi-platform selling generates more sales than exclusivity. Maybe not a lot more, but more-and does it cost the producer more? I suppose it could, in legal fees (and maybe administration) but not in 'production' costs. Or maybe it does-depends on whether we're talking author/publisher and who the contract holds responsible for the costs of re-formatting/converting the book to the new platform. But now we're getting into specific situations and those are always tricky because there's so many of them. Generically speaking I don't think it costs more to go multi-platform than exclusive so every additional sale is a plus.

I definitely agree that Amazon's competitors are currently their own worst enemies but we're talking about why Amazon dominance is bad-and as long as it lowers costs I don't think the dominance is bad. If it ever raises costs for consumers then I think they'll find the competitors relatively better. But who knows? I tend to believe people 'vote' with their wallets but I've been wrong before. Could be I'm wrong again and people will pay more for convenience, an interface that lets them find what they want, recommendations that really suit them, etc. But for now I'm betting that they'll use Amazon to search for what they want then check competitors to see who has the best price. As long as Amazon does, and only that long, will people continue buying there.

[speakingtohe]

@calvin-c

I am not quite understanding the exclusivity issue. Many publishers demand exclusive rights when publishing AFAIK. I am under the impression that many venders such as department store chains have exclusive rights to sell some of the products that they carry. Not sure under the law why books would be any different?

Helen