Obama becomes publishing world “divider”
U.S. presidential hopeful Barack Obama is at the center of a burgeoning publishing world brouhaha, with Barnes & Noble on one side and Amazon.com on the other. According to the Associated Press:
Chelsea Green Publishing, a small, liberal publisher based in Vermont, is releasing Robert Kuttner’s Obama’s Challenge, a call for Obama to enact a bold, progressive economic agenda. It plans to distribute copies at next week’s Democratic National Convention, where Obama is expected to get the party’s presidential nomination.
Angering both Barnes & Noble and independent sellers, the publisher also will distribute coupons that can be redeemed exclusively through Amazon.com’s BookSurge, a “print-on-demand” service that through digital technology enables books to be printed in small quantities.
[…]
The biggest response came from Barnes & Noble, which had ordered several thousand copies. It told Chelsea Green it would not stock Obama’s Challenge, but only make it available through special orders or its website.
Chelsea Green restricted the book’s availability by giving one company a two-week exclusive, Barnes & Noble spokeswoman Mary Ellen Keating said Monday.
“Our initial order was based on the book being available to all booksellers simultaneously – an even playing field,” she said.
The War of Publishing has begun, The monopoly of the old-timers is in danger and new players are emerging in the Publishing world under the newly acquired POD TECHNOLOGY.
Once this war is over, not only will the writers benefit, it will also create new powerful customers, readers the world over.
Long Live POD!
Kishore Joshi
When Chelsea Green announced they would no longer accept returns, they were already in conflict with the major part of the traditional bookselling industry. Out of the thousand-plus independent bookstores, the ones who chronically complain that they are losing business to Amazon, a whopping 42 agreed to continue to stock Chelsea Green titles.
Yet now this same group screams “foul” when Chelsea Green opts to maximize their sales by doing what other media companies have been doing for several years: offering a product via an exclusive deal with a major vendor, c.f., the Eagles and Wal-Mart. How DARE a publisher seek the most likely method of actually making money on a book by using the best means of taking advantage of a huge marketing hook?
As for Barnes & Noble, the operative question that should be asked is how many books they order of any given title…and how many of same are then shipped back after 2-3 months? In other words, when is a sale to B&N actually a sale and not, as is the case with all returnable books, a loan that benefits no one but the bookseller?
Amazon-bashing is in. Never mind that there are perfectly valid business reasons for Chelsea Green’s decision. If Amazon’s new policy of requiring POD titles be signed with Booksurge had been seen for what it was instead of buried in a tsunami of hysterical rhetoric, then it would be clear why a publisher with a hot title who needs to be able to offer it for sale in the fastest and most efficient way possible in the space of a few weeks would do exactly what Chelsea Green did.
I am curious about this statement:
“If Amazon’s new policy of requiring POD titles be signed with Booksurge had been seen for what it was instead of buried in a tsunami of hysterical rhetoric,”
How do people in general interpret “for what it was”?
As a short-run digital printer, I am concerned about Amazon’s policy. If publishers and authors are interested in getting a good product at a resonable price, this attempt to shut down competition should be of great concern. Never does one LARGE entity controlling the process - printing and distribution - lead to better prices and better product in the long run. It is a move that is good for Amazon and Booksurge but not for authors, publishers or readers.
As Kishore said “Long live POD”
Victor Judd