Amazon has added another tactic in its battle for better terms against Hachette Group: it is now making it impossible for customers to pre-order many forthcoming Hachette titles, in some cases just the e-book version and in other cases both print and e-editions. Until this week, in its ongoing dispute with Hachette, Amazon had only slowed down delivery of many Hachette titles.
Among titles that Amazon customers can't order, courtesy of Publishers Lunch: Silkworm by J.K. Rowling, writing as Robert Galbraith; James Patterson's forthcoming titles (too many to list!); The Girls of August by Anne Rivers Siddons; The Fever by Megan Abbott; and The Martini Shot by George Pelecanos. E-book versions of The Universal Tone by Carlos Santana and Honeydew by Edith Pearlman are also unavailable for ordering.
As noted by the Bookseller, the latest Amazon move is similar to Amazon U.K.'s removal of buy buttons against Hachette U.K. in 2008 in another dispute over terms. The tactic is also similar to Amazon's battles against Macmillan in 2010 and IPG in 2012.
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| photo: Daniel Berman/Business Journal | |
In an illustration of Amazon disconnect, Emily Parkhurst of Puget Sound Business Journal noted that at Amazon's annual shareholders' meeting on Wednesday, CEO Jeff Bezos was asked why Amazon is so much more secretive than other companies. He responded, "I never think of us as secretive. We're just quiet."
Parkhurst commented: "If that didn't make reporters who cover Amazon around the world laugh out loud, I don't know what would."
She added that as had happened at the other two Amazon shareholders' meetings she's covered, she and other reporters "were prohibited from recording, taking photos, using a laptop to type or using any kind of social media. Reporters were given handlers who sat next to them and watched them throughout the whole meeting; we could only take hand-written notes. To get inside in the first place, we all went through metal detectors and our bags were inspected."