Amazon the giant

I know how I feel about Amazon - I'm going to embrace it and all of the opportunities it provides for self publishing. However, it's important to gain a balanced perspective on this giant, so we can make informed decisions how best to use our time, energy and money when it comes to putting a self published book out there.

We know Amazon holds the lion's share of the eBook market, but is this good or bad for authors?

There are views that suggest Amazon is short changing us and here's why:

They have the monopoly so whether we like their policies or not, we don't have the audience or the financing to go elsewhere.

Under Amazon's various imprints, they've priced eBooks significantly lower than Traditionals ever could, thus securing their position as the eBook's gatekeeper.

In light of the above, have we gone from stuffy publishing houses telling us what is good to read, to Amazon allowing the market to be swamped with the good, the bad and the ugly - even spam - book covers with no content?

99p for a book is a ridiculously low price and has been described as Amazon's fast-food pricing model - a pound for a burger at Maccy Ds that takes five to ten minutes to make verses a pound for a book which took years...! Is that price point doing us, as authors, a massive disservice?

Just throwing these thoughts out there. What is important to remember, is that at any time you can change the price of your book (higher or lower), remove your book from sale and even sell it elsewhere without any contractual obligations to Amazon. So in that respect, it's a very flexible platform to work with. As with most things in life, you get too involved in the politics and soon the enjoyment is sucked right out of you. I'm keeping an open mind for now.

And Amazon still struggles in print publishing - not that they care as digi is their "thing" - but swings and roundabouts people. At the moment, there appears to be room for everybody.