I guess I might as well say something about the Macmillan/Amazon squabble. First Macmillian gives Amazon deep discounts making it hard for independents to compete on certain titles^*. After running like this a couple of years, they start to get squeezed [one of those 'we hang separately' type of deals] and start crying. I really don't feel sorry for Macmillan and their stance that e-books should be selling for $12.99 to $14.99.

Does this mean I think Amazon is right? Not by any means. Amazon is now the 800 pound gorilla in the book selling world and they are using their muscle to do what they want. I would have though that if a B&M chain had started selling something at about $10 and paying about $11 for it over a protracted period of time that some government agency would have considered that predatory pricing.

What about the price of an e-book? If you're interested you might look at Kindle book cost Analysis for a nice presentation on the cost of producing e-books. I think most of you will be surprised to find that just maybe Macmillan is (partially) right.

^*Just in case anyone is interested, let's look at an example. The steep discounts given Amazon vary but take the hardcover A People's History of the United States: 1492-Present which lists for $35.95 (a Harper Collins title). Amazon is selling this for $21.06, a 41.4% discount which is cheaper than I can by it from the publisher. BTW: This has been going on for a long time and way before the internet was a reality. When we had a B&M back in the 70's, I remember one year that FedCo sold most of the new calendars for a cheaper price than we could get them since we could only get a short discount.

Until next time - DW