Amazon: Dangers and Benefits

I feel that publishers probably have a very love/hate relationship with Amazon. They must feel threatened by the dominance Amazon has in the industry, especially as they grow and expand their list of services. There are many dangers, but I think there are also benefits that publishers would have a hard time being without.

One of the greatest dangers is demonstrated by the recent feud Amazon had with Macmillan. Amazon and Macmillan could not agree on prices, and it is ultimately up to the publisher to set the prices of the books they sell. Amazon doesn’t really have a way around this, except to refuse to do business with them by not selling any of their products. It seems that this time Amazon backed down, but who can say this will always be the case in the future? It could get to a point where the publisher will have to back down because not having any of their products on Amazon would be such a blow to their sales.

Perhaps a greater danger is that Amazon will eventually try to take the place of a traditional book publisher. They already offer many services, such as POD. I don’t think there is really anything stopping them from eventually publishing new books themselves. It seems like a bit of a stretch at the current time, but they have advanced so much and offered so many new services over the past few years that I wouldn’t rule the idea out. I’m not sure where this would put the traditional publisher, but I’m pretty sure it would not be in a better situation.

Of course, Amazon does benefit publishers in some ways. I really don’t remember buying books online before Amazon. The website gives publishers a great deal of exposure (free reviews, Amazon recommendations, etc.) that they probably could not have hoped for otherwise. Amazon also accounts for a great deal of sales that may not happen for publishers without the website’s help.

I’m not really sure how I feel about the situation overall. Pulling Macmillan’s books off the website just seemed like a bully doing something out of spite because someone made a decision they didn’t like and saying, “haha, I have more power.” On the other hand, I’m not sure where publishers would be without Amazon. It will be interesting to watch as the situation continues to unfold.