In
my blog posting, Changes Afoot in the Publishing Industry, I
discussed amazon.com’s new requirement that publishers use BookSurge, an
amazon.com-owned subsidiary, for the printing of all print-on-demand books offered
directly through amazon.com.
Print-on-Demand printing, or POD for short, is a method of printing by which you print one book at a time. See Part Two of the blog series on the The Ins and Outs of Self-Publishing for more information on the business aspects of POD printing.
Many publishers are upset about amazon.com’s action.
One publisher that uses POD printing, Booklocker, has filed a lawsuit in a Maine federal court alleging that the move is an anticompetitive tying arrangement that violates antitrust laws. Booklocker hopes to have the lawsuit certified as a class action with the class consisting of all United States publishers and publishing companies that use POD printing and have offered or attempted to offer books through amazon.com.
You can read
Booklocker’s complaint against amazon online. Booklocker has also set up a blog that offers
updates on the amazon.com antitrust lawsuit.
According to Booklocker’s blog, amazon.com will try to get the lawsuit dismissed. We likely won’t know before the 4th quarter of this year whether or not the Maine federal court will allow the lawsuit to continue.
