In a Publishers Weekly opinion essay, indie publisher John Oakes of OR Books argues that publishers can best fight Amazon by cutting them out of the equation entirely and selling books direct to their customers. Oakes argues that battling with Amazon over terms of sale,…
Just last December, it was the talk of not just the UK but New York when James Daunt, legendary London indie bookseller and currently head of chain retailer Waterstones, publicly attacked Amazon as a “ruthless, money-making devil.” As Ellie Robins reported here on MobyLives, Daunt used…
Well, strange that it took this long, I guess: Amazon is planning to add advertising to the Kindle reading experience. According to a report from — where else? — AdAge by Jason Del Rey, they won’t be cheap, either: Amazon is pitching ads on the…
Frederic Mitterand, the outgoing culture minister of France, has written a letter to the EU’s Competition Commissioner Joaquin Almunia critical of the EU lawsuit against publishers (see the earlier MobyLives report), saying it could foster “predatory pricing” by Amazon. According to a report (in French)…
Still more revelations from the amended lawsuit being brought against publishers by 31 states (see the earlier MobyLives report) have been posted, with commentary, by Jane Litte on the Dear Author website, a “romance review blog.” Among those revelations, as described and commented upon by…
A federal judge late yesterday allowed a lawsuit against Apple and five major publishers filed by a Seattle law firm that has offices in the same building as Amazon.com to proceed. While the decision was — as a Publishers Weekly report notes — “largely expected,” what…
Seventeen more states have joined the class-action lawsuit against the publishing industry over ebook pricing, and the release of the amended complaint has included some fascinating evidence previously redacted, including a detailed email from Steve Jobs about ebook pricing. In a report from PaidContent, which…
In a somewhat comedic article in the New York Times, Kyle Jarrard writes about the fate of eBooks after their owners pass away. It is a grim topic but one that is not without merit. Many of us would like to think that our books…
It’s one of the most meticulously covered stories of the moment, except for one its more particularly disturbing implications: Amazon‘s announcement that it has “licensed the right to lend digital versions of all seven volumes in J.K. Rowling’s “Harry Potter” series in the U.S.” —…
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt — the company that publishes Philip Roth, Jonathan Safran Foer, J.R.R. Tolkien, all the Curious George books, and provides a false front for books from Amazon.com, published under HMH’s “New Harvest” imprint — revealed on Friday thatit had cut a deal with…
