Amazon Defends Itself
April 9, 2008 by Anne Wayman
Filed under Jobs
On March 31, Amazon posted a letter to “all interested parties” on its website to explain why they were changing their rules re Print On Demand.
As I read this, I think Amazon is saying “yes, we’re requiring in-house printing of POD because it will allow us to give faster service to our customers.” They then go on to say publishers and authors can still use the system of shipping a couple of dozen books to Amazon in advance.
Frankly, this statement seems weak to me and like so many I suspect it’s really a misguided effort to control more profits.
What do you think?
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Authors Guild Inc. had a great statement about Amazon’s proposed action. I was going to post it on my Performancing blog tomorrow. Btw, love your blog. I linked my Sling Words blog to you today. Sincerely, Joan Reeves
I think publishing in general is suffering the effects of POD and Internet publishing. It’s easier to get your product out there and bypass the big guns, and I suspect Amazon, capitalizing on that, is somehow seeing a decrease in profits from traditional publishers due to the decrease in their own business thanks to Amazon.
Holding hands with the Devil often gets one burned.
Joan, thanks for the kind words… I’ll be doing the author’s guild thing today too.
Lori, traditional publishing needs to change imo… ever since it sold itself to the oil cos and other large corporations that are only concerned with profit it’s been a mess. POD is helping move things forward… Amazon is just wrong imo… and I’ve loved them so much since they started!
Good one, Anne. Like I said in my performancing blog today, a company never changes its business model unless there’s a big reward in it for them. Amazon’s been crunching the numbers.