A short WSJ piece about an on-stage interview between CBS ceo Leslie Moonves and — ironically, a Fortune reporter at a Fortune forum in Aspen, CO — has traveled far and wide, and been stretched far and wide as it traveled. As we reported previously, Amazon is known to have been in discussions with other publishers besides Hachette Book Group about significantly revised selling terms, particularly for ebooks. Here is the precise discussion, in toto, between Fortune’s Adam Lashinsky and Moonves. You can watch the video, beginning at about 14:53, to confirm. Moonves: [Completing a long answer about all kinds of competitors who are […]
Agency
Kobo Continues to Press Case to Preserve Agency In Canada
Kobo continues to press their motion to rescind the ebook pricing consent agreements in Canada between the Competition Commission and the four agency publishers that we first reported on last week. In a memorandum of fact filed March 10, they reiterated their primary argument that “without a stay, Kobo will be irreparably harmed. Its contracts with four of the largest E-book publishers in Canada will be terminated or fundamentally altered. Kobo – not the Consenting Publishers – will bear the financial losses arising from these changes.” As in the US, the Commission has focused on their predictions that “the price […]
Kobo Opposes Canadian Pricing Settlements; Economists Support Apple’s Appeal
Kobo recently filed in opposition to the agency pricing publisher settlements in Canada, objecting to the rapid 40-day timeframe in which they need to renegotiate major publisher contracts, but also arguing that the newly-imposed terms will make them “suffer significant unrecoverable losses” if “Kobo accepts the amendments and shifts its operations to an Agency Lite model.” They write that “a ban on Agency, even in the short term, will have a lasting and irreversible negative impact on the market for E-books in Canada.” More broadly, Kobo argues the arrival of agency in Canada was different than in the US and not the result of […]
Agency Lite: And Then There Were Five
Just to confirm what we all knew what was coming — since no one else has formally said it out loud yet — by all indications Penguin Random House has completed the execution of new ebook contracts with major trading partners. As required by the court, Random House is complying with the terms of Penguin’s ebook pricing settlements, and ebook titles from both divisions are available for discounting by retailers now. We have no direct confirmation of when the new Random House contracts were implemented, but Amazon price-change tracking via our Publishers Marketplace Book Tracker tool shows a number of […]
Agency Lite Comes to Macmillan, and Begins in the UK As Well
Agency Lite has formally come to Macmillan titles now, after a longer-than-expected delay. Discounts on ebooks beyond what was previously allowed by the publisher can be seen on some of the company’s bestselling titles, such as Silver Linings Playbook (agency price, $9.99; discounted price $7.99); the Shred diet (agency price, $11.99; discounted price $9.99); and Killing Kennedy (agency price, $12.99; selling price $9.99). Price matching on discounts was observed across the three top ebookstores, Amazon, Nook and the iBookstore, though Google Play–often an early and aggressive discounter–seems to still be selling Macmillan ebooks at full agency prices for now. As […]
Updates On Penguin’s Negotiations and Amazon China
Two interesting updates to stories from Thursday: Following the formalization of the ebook pricing settlement between the European Commission and four publishers and Apple announced yesterday, Penguin’s own statement about their negotiations was more forthcoming that the EC’s characterization. In fact, it was one of those rare moments when a company says out loud what everyone is already thinking. Rebecca Sinclair from Penguin’s London office reiterated “our position has been—and remains—that we have done nothing wrong” but added “as a practical matter, we are settling in the interests of clearing the decks before the new company is established.” The EC […]