Barnes & Noble vs. Amazon, Round Bazillion
With PubIt!, their new self-publishing system, Barnes & Noble goes after the wee amounts of cash produced every time someone sells their unedited Vampire Elf Unicorn Romance novel via BN’s ebook system. Amazon’s version went live about three and a half years ago.
They’re selling it to readers as “an exciting world of innovative writing” (O INDEED) and to would-be authors as a way to “live your dream and sell your books with the world’s #1 bookseller.”
Here’s what makes me sad: as with every other self-publishing system, a handful of people will make actual money while the rest wear themselves out spamming bulletin boards when they could be learning to write better books. That “live the dream” business sells false hope to people who are putting hundreds or thousands of hours of their time into a dead end.
Would you like fries with that? For free? Delivered?
In the meantime, Amazon carries on doing what it does best these days, which is eating Barnes & Noble’s lunch. I ordered a book late last Friday evening with free two-day shipping through Amazon Prime.
They couriered the book to my apartment door on Saturday. For free.
Granted, I live in Manhattan, but for comparison, the only time I’ve tried to use BN’s same-day courier service in Manhattan, my books took five days to arrive, and that was after I had to call their customer service line and go through a bizarre order-adjustment process wherein some of my items were deleted. I have never, ever had to call Amazon.
Since Barnes & Noble and Amazon have, between them, killed off most indie stores, I have a reason to want BN to survive—they’re the only place in many neighborhoods and towns where you can actually leaf through books and buy them on the spot. But right now, they’re not looking so lively.
