Authors needs Amazon, and Amazon needs authors. Founded in 1994 in Bellevue, Washington – itself a highly literary city – Amazon started as a bookseller, and though it’s evolved into something much bigger than that, its foundation still lies in the sale of reading material. But in the 20 years since it opened its virtual doors, Amazon has not only been witness to, but also played a significant role in, a huge shift in how book sales work. These days, when people want to buy a book, they don’t think twice about logging onto Amazon and placing the book in an e-cart. Gone are the days of Borders and shelf browsing, unless you’re one of those purists who seeks out vintage bookstores.
But for the most part, people buy books online – and not only that, but they also circumvent the whole physical book-buying process altogether thanks to inventions like Amazon‘s Kindle. Today, according to Salon, Amazon is responsible for selling 40 percent of new books. And that’s not even counting digital books, where it rules the market by an even greater margin. But that doesn’t mean authors are happy. Indeed, there’s a growing cohort of writers who are coming out in opposition to the company’s e-book strategies, The New York Times reported. And if there’s one thing you can count on with authors, it’s that they will voice their concerns.
Authors fear Amazon is monopolizing literary sales
When a company exerts sole control over a single market, that market becomes theirs and theirs alone to regulate. According to a group of highly esteemed authors – Philip Roth and Orhan Pamuk among them – Amazon is enjoying the kind of monopoly over e-book sales that poses a significant threat to authors. The new group that’s holding Amazon to task is called Authors United, and the list of signees is a veritable who’s-who of contemporary lit (Malcolm Gladwell, John Grisham, Richard Russo and Ann Patchett are also among the names). The group’s effort stems from Amazon‘s decision to discourage its patrons from buying books released by publisher Hachette ostensibly due to a pricing disagreement.
“Amazon has every right to refuse to sell consumer goods in response to a pricing disagreement with a wholesaler,” the group’s letter states. “But books are not mere consumer goods. Books cannot be written more cheaply, nor can authors be outsourced to another country.”
