When Amazon Attacks!!!!
Carolyn Kellog:
Amazon pulls Macmillan titles in first e-book skirmish: f you want to buy Hilary Mantel's popular, prizewinning "Wolf Hall" from Amazon.com today, you'll be getting it from some third-party vendor. Same for Orson Scott Card's "Hidden Empire" and the Hungry Girl cookbooks. In the place where the Amazon price should be, you'll find only a double dash. That's because those books are all published by Macmillan, and Amazon has pulled all Macmillan books from its cybershelves. Macmillan, one of the big six publishers, includes publishing houses Henry Holt & Co., science fiction-focused Tor/Forge and the Tiffany of fiction, Farrar, Straus and Giroux....
Up until Tuesday, a publisher like Macmillan had no real alternative if it was unhappy with Amazon's e-book prices. But when Apple announced its iPad and an upcoming iBook Store on Wednesday, the e-book landscape changed. Five publishers were announced to be working with Apple; Macmillan is one of them. The dispute between Amazon and Macmillan has bled beyond e-books, however. All formats of Macmillan books are now unavailable for purchase from Amazon. And that may be tough on the publisher...
John Scalzi:
A Quick Note On eBook Pricing and Amazon Hijinx: This asinine jockeying over electronic book prices has very little to do with what’s actually good or useful for anyone other than the manufacturer of a piece of hardware... who also happens to be a book retailer. I understand Amazon’s desire to corner the electronic book market with the Kindle, which requires publishers to bend to its will on pricing, but I’m not notably sympathetic to it.... If nothing else, this bit of a--hattery on the part of Amazon has well and truly cured me of any desire to ever get a Kindle. If Amazon is willing to play chicken with my economic well-being — and the economic well-being of many of my friends — to lock up its little corner of the ebook field, well, that’s its call to make. But, you know what, I remember people who are happy to trample my a-- into the dirt as they’re rushing to grab at cash.... All I’m saying is: I remember how I’m treated and for what reasons. And you know, I do buy a lot of books....
[D]elisting an entire publishing house as a bargaining tactic, on a weekend or no, is going to have a long-term effect on Amazon’s relationship with publishers, and not the one Amazon is likely to want, especially now that iBookstore lurks, gravid, on the horizon. But I suppose we will see...
