I think over the next year we'll see many more deals of this type for the amazon kindle and bn nook, and I think the big box stores (Walmart, Costco, Target) will be jumping in with their own deals for celebrity blockbuster type books--since books are loss leaders for them anyway and it's all about foot traffic for them. Maybe this will be the best thing for the big publishers as they'll realize that getting into bed with the big retailers hasn't been the best move, and that they might be better focusing on real booksellers and real books as opposed to the celebrity crud they've been pushing.
--- In rara-avis-l@yahoogroups.com, "jacquesdebierue" <jacquesdebierue@...> wrote:
>
>
>
> --- In rara-avis-l@yahoogroups.com, "davezeltserman" <Dave.Zeltserman@> wrote:
> >
> > Covey write business books, and is a mega-bestseller--sells millions of his books.
> >
> > The Stephen King thing was early on, before the Kindle. As amazon is showing now with this deal, the big retailers can structure deals that are attractive enough to get blockbuster authors to bypass traditional publishers. I think this is going to be the first of many such deals we hear about, and I won't be surprised to see Walmart and others jump into this.
> >
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> Realistically, what do you think the prospects of Walmart are? I mean in twenty or thirty years? What's worrisome is that these kinds of deals may not guarantee availability -- neither do traditional publishers, of course, but this idea of the book as simple commodity is worrisome. Are all differences being blurred into a commodity-consumer model?
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> Best,
>
> mrt
>
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