The other day I ran across Michael Tamblyn’s October 2014 Twitter blast against Amazon. Mr Tamblyn is the new president of Kobo. I’m very sympathetic with Mr Tamblyn’s position. After all, I’m an indie author and it takes guts to go up against the 800 pound gorilla terrorizing the block.
I tweeted the article at the above link when I discovered it because I think we Indie Authors (and really all authors) need to keep in mind publishers and book distributers and booksellers (this includes Amazon) are not our friends. They are businesses whose purpose is to make money off authors to profit the owners of the business. Which was Mr Tamblyn’s point about Amazon and Hachette and by extension how Amazon may end up treating Indie Authors.
For centuries, writers have been given short shrift by book and magazine publishers. This is well documented and a search via your favorite search engine will produce reams of virtual paper. But some examples.
- Low pay to authors
- Publishers retaining the rights to an author’s work and binding the author to the publisher via restrictive contracts.
- Remaindering books when sales are low. Often as soon as 6 months after publishing.
- No marketing of the author’s work.
- Limited print runs and even limited distribution.
For the most part, authors just put up with it because they had few to no options. Mark Twain started his own publishing company. Almost no author had those kinds of resources back in the day.
Then along came the digital age and self-publishing became a viable reality. Authors, who once upon a time may have never seen print, now had their work out before the public — letting the marketplace and not some editor determine the worthiness of the work.
At first, Amazon rode the wave and encouraged the wave. Now, however, they want to apparently control the wave. Which Indie Authors clearly saw last year in Amazon’s Kindle Unlimited and KDP Select programs. Money. It’s all about the money. No business is altruistic. Businesses exist to make a profit.
What we authors have to realize is we are a business, as well. It is about the money. If it wasn’t, we wouldn’t charge a dime for any of our books. We’d give all of them away for free. We are a business and as a business, we authors need to look to our bottom lines. We need to jealously protect our profit margins.
Linda Gillard’s post is a poignant example of an author’s treatment by traditional publishing. She was dumped by her publisher because she didn’t make the house enough money. Now she self-publishes and makes money for herself. Authors need to profit from their work. Not the middle man.
I have no personal bone to pick with Amazon. The company often offers what I need at a good price. I don’t have unlimited funds. I have to watch my wallet. And because I have to watch my wallet, as an author I have to remind myself the company is not my friend. Amazon lets me self-publish because they want their share of the money I make on selling my books. Hence Mr Tamblyn’s warning. However if Kobo was in Amazon’s place, I wonder if Mr Tamblyn would have sent out those Tweets? You see, he stands to profit by wooing Indie Authors away from Amazon. Getting Indie Authors to diversify. And fear is a great motivator.
Right now I’m exclusive with Amazon and have benefited some from the borrows. But when one puts all of one’s eggs into one basket, one is at the mercy of the basket.
I agree with Mr Tamblyn and am rethinking my current exclusivity with Amazon. Maybe it is wiser to give up the income from the borrows in order to diversify in the marketplace.
There are many other avenues one can stroll down to sell one’s books. Smashwords, Lulu, Apple’s iBooks, Barnes & Noble’s Nook, Kobo, Drive Thru Fiction, and more springing up everyday. Shoot, with all the social media channels out there one could sell direct from one’s website.
Today Amazon is the 800 pound gorilla. Tomorrow? Who knows? But we authors must remember business is about making money for the owners. And they don’t really care about us. Behind every wannabe author, there are always other wannabe authors.
Next week, in part 2, I’ll write about how I think authors need to proceed to protect and promote their interests. As always, feel free to comment and share your opinion.
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>In truth, the only way to beat Amazon is for the big publishers to stop marketing through Amazon.
I disagree. The only way is that we realise, as customers, that we can buy watherever we want, from whoever we want, and we don’t need Amazon 😉
That we need them is what Amazon wants us to believe, when in fact in today’s world we can buy directly from any seller.
>However, I’ve not heard of anyone saying the company has done so. At this point in time, it seems to be a non-issue.
I did hear of people who got their books cancelled from Amazon’s database becuase, after a change in their policy, these books were no longer considered ‘acceptable’ (I think most of them had issues with language).
And anyway, I hand’t heard of sellers kicked out of Amazon for no good reason until it happend to us. Then we discovered it happened to so many, so many other sellers.
>Nothing is perfect. Because all businesses are run by people and all interest is self-interest.
True. But monopoly is one of the worst forms of ‘business’.
Yes, as consumers, we can dent mega-business by shopping elsewhere. By choosing not to feed the greed of big business. Amazon is a store. It buys from wholesalers and sells to consumers. So there are two sides to the coin. And, I’ll blame it on not having my morning tea when I wrote, I omitted the consumer side. So, thanks, Jazzfeathers, for bringing it up.
Monopolies are bad. I witnessed first hand the destruction of a small town’s downtown district by Walmart. The mega-retailer targeted each competing business and drove them out of business and then raised their prices. Standard monopolistic practice. I am no friend of big business, because it is the antithesis of a free market economy. It is corporate control, instead of government control. But control nonetheless.
I don’t disagree with you at all. I prefer not to buy from Amazon. Just like I don’t buy from Walmart. I encourage people to buy local if they can. Unfortunately, that isn’t always possible. However, we consumers can at least be thoughtful about our purchases and favor diversity over monopoly.
I am not an Amazon author and with any luck, I’ll never be. But the bookshop I work for has been an Amazon seller and after what I’ve seen during that year we worked with Amazon, I have no wish to have any intercourse with them anymore.
After Amazon kicked us out (and as of today, we still don’t know why, since it was impossible to speak to anyone), my bosses decided to become an Amazon provider so to at least keep selling our books through them (we are publishers as well). My direct boss came to me the night she was readiging the contract (she read it from the first to the last word) to have some emotional support. I’m sure not many people working ‘with’ Amazon read their contract. Basically, they can do whatever they wont with your work, especially digital, including appropriating it and modifying it without ever asking for permission (you give your permission by signing the contratc). Which contract, by the way, also states that they can chenge the contract’s conditions any moment and don’t need to notify you. This is the reason why my bosses are still very weary of selling ebooks on Amazon and we’re not doing it at the moment.
Seriously, I recommand anyone to read their contract with Amazon head to toe, because you may find some very bad surprises on it.
Hard as the world of publishing may look to an author, if you sign with a publisher, you sign an editorial contract. If it is a lawful contract (and I know not all are, but it’s up to you to recognise the bad ones), that contract will protect you. Editorial contracts are designed to protect both publisher’s and author’s rights and find a balance between the two.
You don’t sign any such contract with Amazon. Amazon isn’t a publisher, so they don’t need to have you signing an editorial contract. This means that if you have any problem with them regarding your book, no copyright law applies, because you didn’t sign an editorial contract. You signed the Amazon ‘special’ one, and because you signed it, that contract applies.
I have a feeling that not many authors ‘publihing’ with Amazon truly realise this.
Thanks, JazzFeathers, for pointing out the dangers Amazon presents. Amazon does have a publishing arm, but primarily they are a book retailer. And yes, their distribution contract favors them and not the independent publisher — namely, authors who self-publish through Amazon. You are right: read the contract.
However all publishers are not immune to Amazon’s manipulations. Witness Amazon’s fight with Hachette. Yes, the contract an author gets is “fairer” with a publisher (although they too skin the author, just in a different way), but then the publisher has to deal with Amazon and as Hachette found out — Amazon can be nasty.
In truth, the only way to beat Amazon is for the big publishers to stop marketing through Amazon. That won’t happen, unfortunately, because bookstores are dying. Barnes and Noble is suffering. And there is no one to replace Amazon for internet sales at the moment. It takes time to build infrastructure.
In distant second place is Smashwords. So they are a possibility for self-publishers. However, Smashwords has its own issues. They tend to be censorship happy, refusing to publish or distribute that which they deem unfit to read. Lulu is perhaps better, but doesn’t have the traffic and one needs traffic on the site to sell books.
And there are other outlets, such as Drive Thru Fiction; which I like, but again I don’t think they get anywhere near the traffic even Smashwords gets on their site.
Which leaves, Amazon. Even if you go the traditional route. Because that is where your publisher is going to sell books — especially digital books. Amazon may reserve to itself the right to change an author’s book. However, I’ve not heard of anyone saying the company has done so. At this point in time, it seems to be a non-issue. Tomorrow may tell a different story.
The self-published author, has one option if Amazon does elect to exercise its contractural right to change your work — withdraw the book from the Amazon marketplace. That terminates the contract.
Nothing is perfect. Because all businesses are run by people and all interest is self-interest. There are horror stories of traditional publishers screwing over authors. And now that there are only 5 big publishing houses, the chance of a writer getting screwed is even greater because we don’t have dozens of choices anymore. Just 5. Unless we go to the small press. And that isn’t any better than self-publishing, in my opinion.
The caveat is and has always been “Let the Author beware”. We are a business. If we band together, we stand a better chance of getting more for ourselves than if we continue to exist as little islands. We don’t need Amazon. But if we don’t use Amazon, we will sell less books — whether we self-publish or have a publisher. That is the plain and simple fact of the matter. And Amazon knows it. Then again, that is today. Tomorrow? Who knows?