What is the your opinion of Amazon.coms recent Print On Demand “competitive tactics”?
Some of you may or may not be aware of this. Last year Amazon.com purchased a small Print On Demand printing company. Not a big deal, just wanting to expand their services. However, sometime in the last week or so (it’s probably been about 2 weeks now), they sent out emails to all the independent publishing houses that sell / market books through their site that the publisher would be receiving a phone call from Amazon, and “please take the call.” As it was explained to me, on this call, Amazon representatives informed each publisher that from this point forward, any books sold through Amazon.com that were print on demand (a huge market in the publishing industry) were now to be printed through Amazon’s printer, the publisher had 24 hours to sign a contract to that effect, and if they didn’t every single “Buy” button for that publisher would immediately be turned off. You could still view the book, you could read about the book, you just can’t BUY the book through amazon.com. NOTE: Thi
