Japanese Publishers Lash Out At Amazon's Policies 113
Nate the greatest writes: Amazon is in a bitter contract fight with Hachette in the U.S. and Bonnier in Germany, and now it seems the retail giant is also in conflict with publishers in Japan. Amazon has launched a new rating system in Japan which gives preference to publishers with larger ebook catalogs (and publishers that pay higher fees), leading to complaints that Amazon is using its market power to blackmail publishers. Where have we heard that complaint before?
The retailer is also being boycotted by a handful of Japanese publishers who disagree with Amazon offering a rewards program to students. The retailer gives students 10% of a book's price as points, which can be used to buy more books. This skirts Japanese fixed-price book laws, so several smaller publishers pulled their books from Amazon in protest. Businesses are out to make money and not friends, but Amazon sure is a lightning rod for conflicts, isn't it?
The retailer is also being boycotted by a handful of Japanese publishers who disagree with Amazon offering a rewards program to students. The retailer gives students 10% of a book's price as points, which can be used to buy more books. This skirts Japanese fixed-price book laws, so several smaller publishers pulled their books from Amazon in protest. Businesses are out to make money and not friends, but Amazon sure is a lightning rod for conflicts, isn't it?
First sale (Score:4, Interesting)
Once you sell something to me, it's none of your business if I choose to re-sell it. In particular, the price I charge is none of you business.
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Japan doesn't have First Sale doctrine.
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Re:First sale (Score:5, Informative)
Once you sell something to me, it's none of your business if I choose to re-sell it. In particular, the price I charge is none of you business.
First Sale Doctrine [wikipedia.org] is American law, not Japanese. Book publishing in Japan is a cozy protected racket. Even magazines can cost the equivalent of $10-15 per issue. Amazon is going against deeply entrenched special interests. I wish them luck, but it will not be easy.
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There are several such cozy protected rackets in japan. Video games is another.
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Amazon has until September 2017 (Score:2)
There is NO barrier to entry so the protectionist rackets will have to come down. The end of their era is over
Or at least it will be in three years and change. That's how much longer the 1-Click patent family (U.S. Patent 5,960,411 and foreign counterparts) has left, based on the priority date of 1997-09-12 and the common worldwide patent term of twenty years.
Difference between publisher and vanity press (Score:2)
An agile publishing start up company can do everything the old dinosaurs do thanks to digital publishing.
Including promotion? Even if its illustrators and editors work on an hourly or fee for service basis, how would a startup publisher establish a reputation of sorting worthwhile books from not-so-worthwhile ones? Otherwise, it could be seen as more of what some people might call a "vanity press".
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Including promotion?
Yes. An individual author can promote their book on social media. It is unlikely to become an instant bestseller, but if it is good, word will spread. This is especially true if the author is writing for a niche market that can be targeted in specific online forums.
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Sell that to one of the lesser known authors that the trad publisher does little or no promotion for yet retains the copyright for that particular contract.
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"Including promotion?"
Uh, this is the fucking internet. Promotion can be had for free across THOUSANDS of well-populated venues.
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All book publishers are ancient relics entrenched in business practices more than 100 years old. They used to serve a purpose when printing and book distribution was a serious undertaking. Today they're little more than entrenched middle men wielding lobbyists and lawyers and anti-competitive business practices to keep their undeserved share of the pie.
I know right?!?! I'm so tired of these mom-and-pop companies like Uber and Amazon getting hassled by all these book-store and multi-thousand dollar local cab company cartels!
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First Sale Doctrine is American law, not Japanese. Book publishing in Japan is a cozy protected racket. Even magazines can cost the equivalent of $10-15 per issue. Amazon is going against deeply entrenched special interests. I wish them luck, but it will not be easy.
Coming from Australia, I find books incredibly cheap in Japan. 750yen ($7.50) for a novel. I'm not sure where you are getting $10-$15 for magazines either. Most I've seen are about half that. For example Toyo-keizai (Japanese equiv. of the economist) is only 650yen ($6.50). The manga magazines are even cheaper than that.
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Not a customs issue. It is a copyright issue which will prevent you from reselling items you own (therefore superseding your "right to first sale").
You assume too much. For the record I worked in an airport with two major carriers (one of which is International and services Europe and Asia). If I buy a textbook in London, I can bury it in my checked bags and it will make it. If choose to not inform customs, thats on me as I am an American and both Customs and TSA have better things to do than care about my paper text book. At best they will make sure its not a bomb. Once I leave the airport, I can actually do as I please with it include selling provide
Businesses are out to make money and not friends (Score:4, Insightful)
Halve your margin and triple your sales.
>NO BREAKS TO ANYBODY, ESPECIALLY STUDENTS
It's like they're begging for piracy to happen.
--
BMO
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Or could be that they offer better pricing when dealing in bulk.
Most businesses will give a discount when ordering in large quantities. Someone needs 10 shirts, the get to pay $20 each, someone else orders 10,000 then they pay only $12 for each; is that somehow unfair to first person?
Wither larger quantities there can be less man power required, and less estimation on the part of everyone so economies of scale come into play.
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Halve your margin and triple your sales. >NO BREAKS TO ANYBODY, ESPECIALLY STUDENTS It's like they're begging for piracy to happen.
Text books in Japan aren't actually very expensive. A typical text book might be about $20~$30 and doesn't include bullshit attempts to circumvent your ability to resell it.
Comfortable, were we? (Score:2)
Time to compete.
Oh and by the way, welcome to capitalism.
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What praytell is preventing them from starting their own Amazons? It's not like they're short of a few bucks. Although to be honest I expect the ultimate fallout from this conflict to be writers circumventing publishers entirely and just working with editors and artists directly.
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What praytell is preventing them from starting their own Amazons?
Sure, because it's *so* easy to create a successful online bookseller. Gee, why didn't anyone think of that before? Those Japanese people must be idiots. Baka yaroo.
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It is if they're willing to play it smart enough.
I mean you didn't think that computer you're typing on was so cheap because the manufacturers decided to give you a winning personality discount, did you?
Also I'd advise anyone whining about monopolies to take a good long look at the standard contracts existing publishers make authors sign, as we're on the subject.
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Old individual-punishing contracts were the result of the vaunted Free Market model as well. Which suggests to me that the free market model sucks. It rewards psychopaths, results in shitty systems which punish the public and takes the creative principle for ransom.
It would be much better for everybody if we were to rationally decide what kind
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It rewards psychopaths, results in shitty systems which punish the public and takes the creative principle for ransom.
Bwahaha you slackjawed imbecile, you realise you've just described the actual outcomes of everything marxist?
and budding psychopaths who hope that they can scramble their way up the mountain of bodies
For reals, over 100 million people would like a word. And they seem a bit pissed.
Possibly just maybe your polisci 101 lecturer wasn't giving you an honest education, dipshit.
Food for thought.
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Bwa-ha-ha you slack-jawed imbecile, you realize there are more possible ways to structure an economy than capitalist so-called "free markets", and Marxism-degraded-into-Stalinism-or-Maoism, right?
On maybe, like most Americans brought up on a century of Red Scares, you don't.
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Go ahead and ask the average person in Eastern Europe what they think about marxism and they won't be long setting you very straight indeed, tms. But of course they weren't doing it right were they. Nobody seems to do it right, despite millions dying. Odd, that.
Re: Comfortable, were we? (Score:1)
Western European countries have been both Socialist and Capitalist since the second world war. Regulated capitalism is something we used to have in the US before the the Clinton administration removed most federal oversight of the capitol markets. If the laws on the books now were actually enforced we may have dodged the worst of the last recession.
The only thing pure capitalism does is make the rich more money and fleece everyone else. The markets need to be regulated. "Free Market" as a concept is an abso
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It rewards psychopaths, results in shitty systems which punish the public and takes the creative principle for ransom.
Bwahaha you slackjawed imbecile, you realize you've just described the actual outcomes of everything marxist?
And the MPAA, RIAA , IPFI and the goverment of Taiji, wakayama prefecture of Japan
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Why should it be easy? Amazon didn't have it easy.
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Well that's it, I guess once someone large exists there will be no stopping them and we should not even try. Even if we have access to capital that would rival them. Amazon is listed for around $30b net worth, while the publishing industry does billions a year, and has multiple billionaires owning publishing companies.
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Would be kinda interesting having an eBay for talent like that. The more busy or talented they were the higher the price.
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What praytell is preventing them from starting their own Amazons?.
The major publishing houses, freedom of speech and a billionaire who knows how to conduct business in the countries with the highest corporate tax on the planet.
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Compete with a company that pays virtually no taxes and whose share holders don't mind that it does not make a profit?
Marketplaces also sorta tend towards monopolies (Score:2)
Every marketer and customer gets some easy benefit from a single marketplace to go with the most customers(for marketers) or marketers(for customers), maximizing the competitiveness of their respective markets. In the physical world, this naturalmonopoly is mitigated more than a little by the utility of physical proximity.
It's a bit like how social networks are successful because that's where all your friends are, but more complex since it involves multiple kinds of participants.
Amazon has filled that role
Editorial control of the monopoly market (Score:2)
Every marketer and customer gets some easy benefit from a single marketplace
Until the single marketplace uses its market power to exclude sellers entirely from a market. This has allegedly happened in the markets for iOS apps and console games. What editorial power does Amazon exercise over its Kindle store, other than to remove obvious copyright infringements and erotica [slashdot.org]? Is the "preference to publishers with larger ebook catalogs" a way of dealing with the likes of VDM [slashdot.org] and 30 Percent Fewer Shades of Grey [yahoo.com]?
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What do you think is going to happ
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What do you think is going to happen when Amazon runs everyone else out of business?
That depends on what you think keeps other companies from going into business.
Re: Editorial control of the monopoly market (Score:2)
Right. All another company has to do is make distribution deals with all the major publishers, get people to give up their e-ink readers and make apps for every major platform....
And then Amazon starts back selling below cost just long enough to run them out of business...
That should be real easy....
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All another company has to do is make distribution deals with all the major publishers
Sorry I wasn't clear. I meant from the perspective of a publisher seeking to distribute its own works.
get people to give up their e-ink readers
How closely are e-ink readers coupled to their respective stores? Can they not read epub or mobi format?
and make apps for every major platform
Which major platform doesn't already have a reader for epub or mobi format?
Re: Editorial control of the monopoly market (Score:2)
You really think major publishers are going to give up their DRM? Even if you assume they will, are customers suppose to go to 8 different websites and know which publisher publishes which book?
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are customers suppose to go to 8 different websites and know which publisher publishes which book?
They could go to the book review site where they learned about the book in the first place and follow the link to the publisher's page for the book. Or they could find the page in a generic web search engine, such as Bing or Google.
Re: Editorial control of the monopoly market (Score:2)
So how does that help "discoverability"? Amazon is able to recommend books based on the buying habits of others with similar taste as those with my buying history. They are able to list the top sellers, etc - none of which would be available on 8 different websites.
Then that also means that you have to sign up for 8 different websites and give your payment information to 8 different websites. Do you really think this would be more convenient than going to one website, buy an ebook and then it automatically
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That's what I do, pretty much if there's something I know I can get somewhere else than Amazon, I get it there. Books, clothes (for the most part), games, computers, etc.
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http://www.gutenberg.org/ [gutenberg.org] is a good one for older books.
But the ebook thing isn't an issue for me. I buy hard copy for like 90% of my books.
Amazon riding rough over industry? One recourse. (Score:5, Insightful)
Time to sue Apple again and make sure there is zero viable competition remaining for eBooks. Make that rubble bounce.
Re:Amazon riding rough over industry? One recourse (Score:4, Interesting)
Apple was only ever competing in the eBook industry on their own devices - and they were hurting the rest of us reading eBooks on other platforms.
When I can read my Apple eBooks on anything other than an IOS device, then they are in competition, until then they are just a negative on the industry as they are treating IOS as the entire market when dealing with publishers, which affects me over here on a platform Apple will never touch.
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When I can read my Apple eBooks on anything other than an IOS device
You can also read it on any Apple computer.
The point is there was competition, without competition consumers eventually suffer. it doesn't matter if that competition is on devices from a particular company.
It's a shame you are too short sighted to understand this simple fact. You are the very definition of the phrase "those who do not understand history are condemned to repeat it".
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Oh wow, on an *Apple* computer.
That makes all the difference! There is competition in the market!
Of course it fucking matters if the competition is only within one very small segment of the market, it means a much higher cost of entry for the consumer - to read my Amazon Kindle book all I had to do was download the free Kindle reading app on any one of my Android phone, Android tablet, Apple phone, Apple tablet, Windows Phone, Windows 8 device, Apple computer, Windows 7 computer, Blackberry or a web browser
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What that does not help you with at all is that time ten years hence when no competition remains even on niche platforms, and Amazon decides the price should really be 10 what you are paying now...
Fewer and fewer people read books every year. In 10 years, the market will be much smaller than it is now.
Plus, you're trying to pretend there will somehow be a monopoly on books. Or on electronic distribution of text. Because no one could possibly figure out how to print a book or distribute text without Amazon -- so they'll pay 10x what they're paying now. It's not even the tiniest bit realistic.
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Which is why you are posting a response as AC so I won't notice and hurt you anymore... riiiiiiight.
Glad you realize when you have met your better - at least you've learned to retreat well. Next time make an argument that doesn't suck.
Hint: Multi-platform does not mean Amazon is competing against itself... what a tool.
I'll let you have the last response as idiots will go on without end or purpose.
Not a lot of phones (Score:2)
to read my Amazon Kindle book all I had to do was download the free Kindle reading app on any one of my Android phone, Android tablet, Apple phone, Apple tablet, Windows Phone, Windows 8 device, Apple computer, Windows 7 computer, Blackberry or a web browser for the web reader.
True of books but not video. The only phones that stream Amazon video are the iPhone and Fire Phone. And because the Fire Phone is exclusive to AT&T, that's reduced to one if you happen to live outside AT&T's 4G coverage.
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It doesn't matter if you personally "can't" take advantage of the competition that Apple provides; there are hundreds of millions of people who do, which is a large enough group that Amazon had to take note. (Shame on Amazon, their collaborators that inevitably included Google, and the corrupt or incompetent parts of the American legal system that have perpetuated their monopoly.)
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You can also read it on any Apple computer.
"any current" yes, "any" no. If I could drag out my IIGS (joking) or even an older Mac, that'd be one thing, but it needs to be a sufficiently recent Mac.
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"You can also read it on any Apple computer."
I can most certainly guarantee your ass my Motorola-powered OS7 Apple laptop can not and will not read those files.
Also, now days there is no such thing as "an Apple computer" because it's an x86 piece of shit like every other computer out there.
Sure about that? (Score:2)
Amazon's "monopoly/market power" doesn't hurt consumers
He who ignores history is doomed to repeat it. [nytimes.com]
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Amazon doesn't have monopoly power. No point in trying to learn from history when what you're learning is bullshit, son.
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Apple was competing? I thought they got sued for doing the opposite?
Simple. Easy. (Score:3, Insightful)
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Those got driven out of America by big chains 30 years ago. Frankly, I don't enjoy books enough to ever want to deal with a B&M store as mostly what I am buying is technical books, I'd much rather have reviews from people in the field rather then some local bookstore proprietor taking a markup for friendly service. I'd much rather deal with amazon and I'm fine with them putting the screws to the middlemen in that industry after dealing with textbooks, karma is a bitch publishers.
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Barnes and Noble (Score:2)
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I agree with you wholeheartedly about the joys of brick and mortar bookstores. I worked at Borders back during its last gasps, and I heard a lot of the same things from customers. The reason they went tits up however was largely due to failure to price things competitively. Even with a decent employee discount I still mostly bought off of Amazon, because Borders refused to acknowledge that they were basically the only company out there that sold at MSRP. If I buy a lot of books (and I do) and I can get
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Ugh. So incredibly inefficient. I will consume and process orders of magnitude more information in my lifetime than you will by not clinging to outdated methods of information exchange. Its great that you enjoy it, but keep in mind all of those things that you like will make your books cost significantly more and you will get less information overall due to the physical overhead.
Orders of magnitude more information? How is that possible? Few people have their reading rate limited by the time it takes to buy a book even if they buy it at a store, especially since prodigious readers tend to purchase more than one book per visit. But you somehow read at least 100 times more material than someone that buys books at a store?
I have a feeling that those that prefer to shop in a book store don't measure their reading effectiveness in "words consumed per unit time", but in enjoyment of the
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A pleasure no longer available in my city. The small bookstores were pushed out of the market decades ago by big conglomerates like "Chapters" and "Indigo". "Chapters" has since bought "Indigo" so now there's really only one retailer in the city that sells books, at a dozen locations... The problem is, they also sell scented candles, scented notepads, scented plushies, scented pillows, scented throws, etc... So the place is a veritable onslaught to the senses... My wife and I can endure maybe about 5 minu
a physical delight (Score:4, Insightful)
a physical delight to go, in persona, to a book store, browse
Unless you encounter bookshelves where the fantasy and vampire stories are mixed with the science fiction. I get the urge to go mix the romance shelves with the mysteries in retaliation
Why take sides? (Score:1)
Book publishers who overprice books and take a big cut for filling an increasingly valueless role vs. retailing supergiant. Meanwhile, fewer and fewer people read books.
Just Bussiness (Score:3)
Established authors depend on the publishers to limit the availability of books. In the Amazon world with no incentive to limit the number of published books, and to limit titles to those who will sell many copies, many authors are going to be working at a loss. That may explain why evidence that authors are bieng paid less matters less that the thought that Amazon may be in control.
So there are no good guys and no bad guys here. Just people trying to make money. When books are gone we the next generation is going to miss then no more than we miss leather bond, gold leafed books with each section having a faux-hand-drawn calligraphy character.
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Did you even read the article(s) ? It is Amazon who is restricting the supply of books, namely, books from publishers who won't pay up.
Of course the publishers could just move to a different provider. Except there isn't one. That's what "abusing your market dominance" means.
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As someone who is into ebooks... i see your point and unfortunately you are misting a few negatives:
- Publishers ability to remove books (amazon, 1984).
- DRM
- Inability/restrictions sharing a e-book, which is artificial and the real "paper" book doesnt have this issue.
- Many ebooks actually cost more then the paper version.
- Some publishers demand library's repurchase ebooks to account for the fact the paperback would have worn out.
The world's most protectionist economy (Score:3)
Japan is a heavily business-oriented society, but not in the free market way that we tend to assume. Most consumer markets are locked up by an oligopoly of the largest players. Competition is considered less important than tradition, and the everyday consumer considers it his patriotic duty to pay more for everything he buys so that the Japanese economy can be promoted. The only way for Americans to imagine what this system is like is to think of the US prescription drug model, extended to every market you shop in. Imagine paying pharmacy prices for computers and cabbages.
When you go there to live, you will be besieged by friends and relatives asking you to buy cameras and electronics "at Tokyo prices" for them. You need to tell them at the outset that a Nikon or a Sony product is a lot cheaper ordered through Amazon right at home than it would be in Japan. THIS is what those Japanese publishers fear from Amazon operating on their own soil.
Re:The world's most protectionist economy (Score:4, Interesting)
Sorry, but it is not "patriotic duty." I've lived in Japan for over 20 years and most markets are not locked up. There is a sense of community in Japan. Patriotism is not teary-eyed nonsense looking at a colored cloth. It's a sense of living within a society and doing things that benefit a society that's been around for over 1,200 years.
Japan is small, has no resources, half the population of the US packed into a place the size of California. Police don't kill people and a convenience store robbery (no one gets hurt) is national news.
The used book business in Japan is huge. People read in Japan; they like books and magazines. They like the touch of paper. It's the most widely read population in the world. People stand at bookstores and read and read and read. The pricing model assures that small publishers exist and a wide variety of books and authors can be published. They are not all gobbled up by conglomerates.
Japan can do business in Japan however it chooses.
How are the ratings manipulated? (Score:2)
The summary says:
"Amazon has launched a new rating system in Japan which gives preference to publishers with larger ebook catalogs (and publishers that pay higher fees)."
This is the main point of the post and yet there are not even a mention of how this rating system manipulation works in the articles linked? Online search just shows sites copying the same line from each other and again w/o explanation. Does anyone know?
User rating are not manipulated (Score:1)
Okay, I got a new hit on Google, it explains the rating system:
http://www.businessinsider.com... [businessinsider.com]
User ratings are not changed. Instead, this is a rating system internal to Amazon. Based on your internal Amazon rating, it will chose how to promote your book. I'm assuming this means advertising on other pages, items in the "featured" section, etc. In other words, Amazon is saying that they will more heavily promote books that make them more money.
To tell you the truth, I'm surprised they don't do that alre
Why do governments persist with book price-fixing? (Score:2)
Its not just Japan, France and many other countries seem to have laws that limit discounting of books or fix their prices. Why do governments continue to maintain these restrictions?