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Writers and Editors (RSS feed)

Amazon.com and the Future of Book Publishing (part 2)

Three more alerts for authors: Confessions of a Publisher: “We’re in Amazon’s Sights and They’re Going to Kill Us” (PandoDaily)
Barnes & Noble: Taking on Amazon in a Fight for Its Life (New York Times).
Don’t Support Your Local Bookseller (Slate)

Authors: Our future is changing. Stay alert. Read these stories (highlights below):
Barnes & Noble: Taking on Amazon in a Fight for Its Life (Julie Bosman, New York Times 1-28-1 ). The Bookstore's Last Stand. "No one expects Barnes & Noble to disappear overnight. The worry is that it might slowly wither as more readers embrace e-books. What if all those store shelves vanished, and Barnes & Noble became little more than a cafe and a digital connection point?"
“Anybody who is an author, a publisher, or makes their living from distributing intellectual property in book form is badly hurt,” he said, “if Barnes & Noble does not prosper.”

Not everyone agrees:

Don’t Support Your Local Bookseller (Farhad Manjoo, Slate, 12-13-11). Buying books on Amazon is better for authors, better for the economy, and better for you. "So, sure, Amazon doesn’t host readings and it doesn’t give you a poofy couch to sit on while you peruse the latest best-sellers. But what it does do—allow people to buy books anytime they want—is hardly killing literary culture. In fact, it’s probably the only thing saving it."

Confessions of a Publisher: “We’re in Amazon’s Sights and They’re Going to Kill Us” (Sarah Lacy, PandoDaily 1-17-12). "I have no insight into whether Amazon has planned this out, or it’s just a happy accident given the success of the Kindle, the iPad and other eReaders and the general dysfunction of publishing. But I don’t have much more sympathy for publishing than Farhad Manjoo has for independent book stores. Amazon didn’t create publishing’s woes, any more than blogging created the challenges of newspapers. The company is just cleverly exploiting them."
"Someone will build the next great publishing imprint out of these ashes. And as a reader and an author, I can’t wait."

Read Part 1 here.
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