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Et tu, Amazon?

EDIT:  Looks like someone started an online petition.  You can find it here.  And no, you don’t have to donate money.  Just close the tab/browser when you get to that point.  Thanks, folks.

First of all, it looks like the site’s back up and responding a bit more quickly.  That’s great and all, but I’m still not renewing with these guys.

Second of all, I just got back from the grocery store, logged on to my favorite news site Fark and found a nifty little gem.  It’s an article by Angela Hoy, the publisher of WritersWeekly and Booklocker.  It’s a bit lengthy, and I know internet attention spans are short these days (including my own) so I’ll cut it down to this:

Amazon.com purchased BookSurge, a small POD publisher/printer back in 2005. Amazon also lists and sells titles for the largest POD printer, Lightning Source, which is owned by Ingram (the large book distributor). According to their website, Lightning Source serves more than 4,300 publisher clients and has more than 400,000 titles in their system.

You’d think Amazon’s purchase of BookSurge might have made things a bit uncomfortable between the two companies. However, they continued to work together, getting books on demand to Amazon.com’s loyal customers. Things appeared to be cruising along just fine, but perhaps not anymore.

Reports have been trickling in from the POD underground that Amazon/BookSurge representatives have been approaching some Lightning Source customers, first by email introduction and then by phone (nobody at BookSurge seems to want to put anything in writing). When Lightning Source customers speak with the BookSurge representative, the reports say, they are basically told they can either have BookSurge start printing their books or the “buy” button on their Amazon.com book pages will be “turned off.”

The book information would remain on Amazon, and people could still order the book from resellers (companies that list new and used books in Amazon’s Marketplace section), but customers would not be able to buy the book from Amazon directly, nor qualify for the coveted “free shipping” that Amazon offers.

As you can imagine, this is a rather big problem for most, if not all, independent publishers that happen to deal in print-on-demand technology.  Still, I do admit I was a bit skeptical about the whole thing, so I took a trip around the tubes to see if anyone else is talking about this.  First I checked out Lulu which is also a print-on-demand publisher, and also happens to be the POD publisher of my own novel.  A quick Googling of terms brought up this forum thread.  Thankfully I’m not the only one a little concerned.  I was under the impression that all books not purchased directly from Lulu (which are printed via Lulu’s own printers) are printed through LightningSource.  However, after reading through some of the posts, it’s clear that no one really knows who Lulu uses for distribution publishing.  Here are some highlights:

As a Lulu author I know that my books can be sold through lots of different stores but honestly Amazon is the big one and without them I’d realistically only have sales in the double digits. But being the popular online distributor does not give Amazon the right to establish themselves as a monopoly.

And:

Lulu books are still available (at least the top 20 all were), but the article’s correct about many other POD titles losing the big golden button. It’s not unexpected - Amazon has been throwing their weight about for a few months now, and seems hellbent on making Booksurge the only route into their listings. People will complain but Amazon isn’t exactly known for listening to what customers want!

The problem of course is that the trims and page counts offered by Booksurge aren’t compatible with the LSI/Lulu system (for example a color book can only have 100 pages), so simply porting a copy across isn’t an option. A suspicious person could think they were making it as difficult as possible to port documents so people will buy their design and layout packages instead of using the direct-PDF route (even though that’s still several hundred bucks).

And here’s a quote from the Wall Street Journal, thus eradicating any hopes I had that this was a big, bad conspiracy theory:

Amazon.com Inc., flexing its muscles as a major book retailer, notified publishers who print books on demand that they will have to use its on-demand printing facilities if they want their books directly sold on Amazon’s Web site.

The move signals that Amazon is intent on using its position as the premier online bookseller to strengthen its presence in other phases of bookselling and manufacturing. Amazon is one of the biggest booksellers in the U.S., with a market share publishing experts estimate to be about 15%. Amazon doesn’t comment on sales.

Lulu’s Bob Young had this to say:

Publishers will “have to abide by Amazon’s pricing,” said Bob Young, CEO of Lulu Inc, a print-on-demand publisher based in Raleigh, N.C. Mr. Young said he believed BookSurge’s prices to be “slightly higher” than other printers. An Amazon spokesman declined to comment on that issue.

“A significant number of our authors do request for their books to be available on Amazon,” said Mr. Young, who hasn’t yet decided whether he will agree to Amazon’s terms.

What’s this mean, kids?  It means that your dear friend Todd’s book might not be available on Amazon for much longer, pending Lulu’s agreement to Amazon’s terms.  It means that nice, shiny “distribution package” might be little less useful now, since part of its allure was the ability to market it through Amazon.  After all, average folks have no idea who or what Lulu is, but they’ve all heard of Amazon.  They’ve all purchased from Amazon.  They’re a trusted online entity.  Right?  And who would think to go to Barnes and Noble’s website when they can hit up Amazon?

So let’s back up a moment and look at this.  I’m seeing a pattern here.  First Borders announces its Face Out policy, thereby reducing the number of books it can have on its shelves and igniting fears of an eventual bidding war by publishers all vying for those all-important Face Out spots, thereby leaving the smaller, less wealthy publishers to rot on the sidelines because, after all, who can compete with the likes of Oprah’s Book Club branding?

Now Amazon is, in essence, shutting its doors to all independent publishers that won’t comply with their own rules – namely to use their own proprietary printer.  Seeing as how LightningSource is owned by Ingram and does all of their printing (I’m willing to bet every book you have was printed by LightningSource), this means that any publisher choosing to side with Amazon will only be listed on Amazon, and not available anywhere else, thereby requiring anyone serious about actually getting their work out there to set up two separate distribution agreements – one for Amazon and one for the rest of the world, which is absolutely fucking retarded.

Allow me a moment to put on my tin foil hat and say that this seems like an effort to put the underdogs out of business – or at least streamline their options and abilities within the marketplace.  Maybe, just maybe, it’s a big conspiracy put forth by a secret underground organization hellbent on controlling the world’s entire print market and, in doing so, have complete autonomy over what makes it into print and what doesn’t.  And hell, for shits and giggles, let’s link it to a dead artist.

Oh wait.  That’s been done already.

Anyway, despite all the speculation and fears, it really comes to whether or not Lulu decides to comply with Amazon’s terms.  Since it’s a weekend, there won’t be any news until Monday, but rest assured that I’ll be on top of this.  In the meantime, I’d love to hear your thoughts on the matter, whether you have any interest in publishing or not, because it will still affect you.  In the end, we are all still readers.

TK

P.S. Digg this, while you’re at it.

tags: Amazon   print-on-demand   publishing   the Are You Fucking Kidding Me? department  

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