This whole Amazon-Macmillan spat

Jason
Tuesday
9:55 am

At the end of last week the books and eBooks of  the America’s largest publisher Macmillan disappeared from the pages of America’s largest online vendor, Amazon.com.

What would bring on such a happenstance?

Well it all started earlier in the week with the announcement of the iPad. See Steve Jobs promised the world that with his iBookstore the publishers would hold more control over the prices set for the book. Macmillan was one of the publishers who had signed on to provide content for the iPad.

Shortly thereafter Macmillan sat down with Amazon and outlined their view on increasing the cost of eBooks for Amazon’s Kindle, somewhere in the range of $3-5 for new releases. Amazon said no. Macmillan left. Amazon pulled their product, electronic and print.

Then came the furor from the authors of the publisher who’s livelihood was directly effected by an argument over the cost of a piece of data.

All I know through all of this is that this directly impacts the imprint I read the most, Tor Books. You know the publishers of that Wheel of Time series I like to talk about so much. And while the books are still available through third party sellers, you don’t get the comfort of purchasing direct from Amazon.

I don’t know if I can say one side is right or wrong.

Amazon claims it is trying to keep prices low for its customers when in reality they just want to try and corner the market with their Kindle product. And they have directly hit the pocketbooks of the already struggling writer market out there.

Macmillan claims it wants a dynamic, free market system which in the long run benefits themselves, Amazon and the readers. But really they just want to make more money out of the box for first run new releases. However they have indicated the price would drop over time as the book moved into paperback release.

And then there is Apple who probably has their hand in the pot as well. They want Macmillan to force the price increase so that iPad can sell for the higher price in the iBookstore without being at a major disadvantage to the Kindle and its lower prices.

Bleh. That is why I don’t read the news. All I got out of this was an increased desire to purchase an eBook reader of some kind. Where is that Nook from Barnes and Noble?