Amazon Makes Bold But Logical Move

The Hub’s authors, publishers and booksellers say the writing is on the wall, and it signals a major shift in the book business, after online retail giant Amazon.com’s entrance into the $32 billion publishing industry.

“Amazon is doing to the world of book publishing what iTunes did to major record labels,” Trelease said. “This is an alarm bell to the giant publishers, and if they fail to heed the warning, they will lose.”

Of course the industry is complaining, but this is inevitable.  While Amazon's service will likely fall somewhere between the traditional publishing houses and a vanity press, the power of competition will ultimately give readers more choices and writers more opportunity.  The publishing industry is notorious for ignoring technology and forcing writers to go through several steps, this will eliminate those while opening the door to unpublished writers.

“If anyone else said they were starting a traditional book publishing company in this era of e-books, everyone would ask, ‘Are they crazy?’ ” Smith said. “But when Amazon does it, you have to ask, ‘What do they know that the rest of us don’t?’ ”

I think that says it best of all. As a writer, I try to stay up to date on publishing methods and changes that are coming. This may change how writers are published forever. But like it or not, it's going to happen.