Wednesday morning huh?

[rolanni]

Regarding Amazon (yes, yes, me, too; in spades): It would appear that the Clueless and Stupid letter from The Amazon Kindle Team IS Amazon's Official Explanation of Their Actions.

Just. . .Wow.

Macmillan books are still not available for sale on Amazon.com.

Whatever issues a shout-out for author support at bookstores that are more interested in selling books than in Galactic Dominion.

Edited to add: Indiebound takes this moment to remind you that Macmillan books are at their website and at thousands of independent bookstores across the country.

In other news, I came home from work yesterday a very sick woman, and took immediately to my bed. I'm not feverish this morning, so! Off to work I go, I go.

Sigh. [whine] This, to me, is the single, most unforgivable perversion of the day-job: I go to work sick, and come home too worn out to do the actual real work that needs doing.[/whine]

Mozart's eye is very much better, which is a relief...and I need to make coffee.

Comments

[johnhawkinson.livejournal.com]

sigh...maybe I need to post more. I too emailed Amazon customer service on Saturday and got that answer -- on Saturday. But I didn't pay it too-too much heed, since when I called them up, it was clear their customer service folks didn't know what was going on.

I also emailed Jeff Bezos and Amazon Investor Relations. that finally got a reply on Tuesday afternoon at 12:50pm Eastern from the Amazon Executive Customer Relations team with "Jeff Bezos received your e-mail and asked me to respond on his behalf," but then followed by the same text MRK posted.

Perhaps the most depressing thought was I finally meandered over to Pandemonium Books last night. I was stunned that neither of the two sales clerks were at all familiar with this issue. I still ended up dropping $70 on Tor books, but I felt a bit disillusioned.

Not to mention the time it took for the media, or at least the NYT, to admit that Amazon successfully fooled people (including the Times) with their "will have to capitulate." (I wonder how many carefully worded emails Messrs. Stone and Rich received from people other than me...)

While I'm ranting this early in the morning, what's up with Macmillan? In his Saturday release John Sargent promised to "fully brief all of our editors" who would then be available to answer questions from Macmillan author/agent community. Surely if that happened there's something for somebody to report? Ah well...

[lagilman]

Surely if that happened there's something for somebody to report?

I'm not affected by this directly, but I have noted a lot of silence from the agenting community...which probably means they're getting their information and working their way through the thickets. Agents, unlike writers, don't yowl in public. They yowl in carefully selected ears. :-)

Pandemonium... *sigh* It really is sad, but not unexpected.

[rolanni.livejournal.com]

Like suri, I'm thinking that The Boss has spoken to the Lesser Bosses, who have spoken to the editors, who are now talking to the agents. Who are possibly Soothing their affected writers. Not being an Affected Writer, I don't know that for certain, but it seems likely.

Regarding Pandemonium -- that's sad.

You'd think the Indiebound folk would be all over this; they seem a pretty savvy group, and this is (1) news, and (2) potentially profitable for their member stores.

[janni.livejournal.com]

The Indiebound folk have been tweeting a bit, but it would be an excellent time for a more concerted effort.

[nephir.livejournal.com]

So sorry you are not feeling well, but happy to see that Mozart is doing better.

I know that the printed book is becoming a dinosaur and facing extinction, and I frequently buy eBooks for traveling as my PDA which is smaller than a trade PB can hold dozens of books for reading. Thus eliminating the need to carry 5 lbs of books with me when I travel. But I like the feel of a book in my hands. The smell of that paper and ink are old friends that I don't want to see go away.

Thank you and I hope you feel better

[(Anonymous)]

Thank you from this Indiebound bookseller. I decided this morning, since Amazon is STILL witholding Macmillan authors, that I would run a 10%-off-sale on all Macmillan authors. They won't be able to retire on what I sell but it may help a little.

I hope you, like Mozart, feel better soon.
Lauretta@ConstellationBooks
PS I have one report from a customer that her sister lost a mystery off the Kindle. Yep, Macmillan author. Yep, she was right in the middle of it. She's _steamed_.

Re: Thank you and I hope you feel better

[ebartley.livejournal.com]

Ouch, sympathy to the mystery reader!

Another reason to keep my Kindle offline when I'm not specifically downloading content, and to keep spare copies of any ebooks from Amazon I'd be upset to loose on my computer. Also another reason to buy my Kindle content from sources other than Amazon, as if I needed a reason besides the fact that their content is DRM-locked to their architecture. (Unless you jailbreak it, which is doable - there's a python script - but possibly a violation of DMCA (possibly because 1201(f), an exception about interoperability, might permit this) and a definite violation of Amazon's terms of service.)

[enleve.livejournal.com]

I think it's cool that your cat is named Mozart. It reminds me of the Arrogant Worms song "William Shakespeare's in My Cat". (http://www.arrogantworms.com/music/william-shakespeares-in-my-cat/)