Amazon vs. Macmillan: Authors lose, physical books win

Amazon has pulled books from publisher Macmillan off of its virtual “shelves” because the publisher has told Amazon it wants to increase its ebook prices and split royalties 70/30. Amazon said publicly that it would (eventually) agree to Macmillan’s terms, but in the meantime they’ve yanked titles off the site and there’s no indication when the company will be selling the titles again.

Amazon may hope to strong-arm Macmillan but it’s doing a really good job of pissing off writers and writers’ groups. The Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) have removed Amazon.com links from their Web site and quite a few authors are getting increasingly pissed at Amazon for screwing with their sales. John Scalzi says it far better than I can:

Many if not most of these folks do not have the financial cushion I do, and the sales that they are getting cut out of here are going to make a real and concrete difference to them when it comes time to tally up royalties, and when they’re trying to sell that next book. I have friends who are deeply worried right now about what this thing is doing to them, and they should be worried, because it’s going to hurt them if it drags out. Amazon is not the entire sales universe, to be sure, but it’s a significant chunk, especially for genre writers who build their communities online and sell a large percentage of their work online (and thus through Amazon) because of it.

I said it snarkily yesterday but I’ll tell it to you in earnest today: Amazon was moving against Macmillan when it pulled those books, but in doing so it also moved against Macmillan’s authors. Amazon thought it was sniping at a corporation, but in fact it unloaded a shotgun into a crowd of writers. It wasn’t smart, and although I know the world isn’t built to accommodate this particular concept, neither was it fair. There’s a lot of collateral damage here.

It’s a bit ironic that the real problem here isn’t DRM, which (rightfully) has a lot of people nervous because of the potential for its abuse, but plain old corporate stupidity.

Having written or contributed to a few books (albeit nothing that’s generated any real royalties), I can sympathize with the authors being caught in the crossfire much more easily than I can sympathize with Amazon or Macmillan. Amazon is a channel between the author and their buying public. When Amazon decides to play chicken with Macmillan it isn’t just hurting Macmillan, it’s hurting the authors. Lost sales to Macmillan might hurt the company, but not as much as the lost royalties to the individual authors.

In the past, I’ve spent quite a bit through Amazon on books, Kindle eBooks, MP3s, DVDs, and so forth. I’ve had a “Prime” membership for years, which I’m giving serious thought to canceling if this little stunt doesn’t end very soon. While Amazon is the most convenient game in town, it’s not the only one.

If you are a bookish person, consider buying at least one Macmillan title from another retailer, to show support for their authors and to show Amazon that, in fact, people can buy books from other sources and all Amazon is doing is pissing off authors and their fans.