I get the whole
Amazon derangement syndrome, but the
Bezos-as-Christ polar-opposite is no better. Amazon is a huge company with way way way too much market influence. When they announced they were thinking about getting into the pharmacy business -
'thinking' about it - eight companies lost $17.5 billion in value.
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/06/28/amazon-wiped-out-billions-from-drug-stocks-and-package-carriers.htmlAnd they're not 'out-competing' anyone or being more efficient; by and large they're leveraging profitable divisions to undercut market pricing in an effort to eliminate competition - which is known as
predatory pricing - but to be fair, they're also controlling their supply chain through onerous contracts, which, like Walmart, allows them to keep prices low.
"We are at Stage Three in the publishing disruption, though, and traditional publishers are no longer the only game in town. Not even close. And they’ve got a really serious issue: their business model was built in the previous century." - KKR
Unfortunately, our business model is mostly the same business model, and the only part that's different was also built in the last century, no wait, the one before that - Montgomery Ward launched his mail order business in 1872; although, apart from Benjamin Franklin and a few others, the internet tells me that the publisher Aldus Manutius of Venice printed a catalogue of the books he was printing in 1498.
"However, Apple didn’t want to be underpriced by Amazon, so it would insist on an agreement with the publishers that Apple could match any price at which Amazon was selling an ebook." - PG
Isn't this the same pricing policy Amazon holds Indies too? It's the loop-hole that allows for perma-frees...right?