Amazon tells readers to email Hachette boss Michael Pietsch and ask for cheaper ebooks
In the latest chapter of the fight between Amazon and book publisher Hachette, the internet bookseller has urged readers to email Hachette boss Michael Pietsch asking him to lower the price of ebooks.
Currently locked in an ongoing battle over how much ebooks should sell for, a note on www.readersunited.com and signed from “The Amazon Books Team” asks readers to contact Pietsch via his apparent work email address asking the publihser to stop overcharging for books.
In the letter, Amazon likens ebooks to paperbacks, which when first introduced in the 1930s caused publishers to “circle the wagons.”
“They believed low cost paperbacks would destroy literary culture and harm the industry (not to mention their own bank accounts),” wrote Amazon.
“The fact is many established incumbents in the industry have taken the position that lower ebook prices will "devalue books" and hurt "Arts and Letters." They're wrong. Just as paperbacks did not destroy book culture despite being ten times cheaper, neither will e-books. On the contrary, paperbacks ended up rejuvenating the book industry and making it stronger. The same will happen with ebooks.”
Amazon argues that ebook sales are governed by price elasticity- the lower the price of an ebook, the more a customer will buy- saying “The pie is simply bigger” of lower prices.
The move has been criticised by many for misquoting George Orwell saying of paperbacks: "if publishers had any sense, they would combine against them and suppress them," and to which Amazon adds “Yes, George Orwell was suggesting collusion.”
However, the New York Times points to the full Orwell quote in which he calls them “splendid value for sixpence.”
The Amazon letter follows in quick response to Authors United, a group of 900 leading authors who outlined their opposition to Amazon and its desire to reduce ebook prices.
The writers, including Stephen King and Donna Tartt, urged readers to contacts Amazon boss Jeff Bezos to resolve the dispute “without further hurting authors and without blocking or otherwise delaying the sale of books to its customers.”
The group paid out for a full-page ad in this weekend’s edition of the New York Times newspaper publishing their views.