France will never stop, until it regulates the hell out of the internet.
Always the same story: screw one group of people (French customers here), to protect another group (local incompetent shops).
The outcome of such market distortions has been a nation losing its relative standing in the world since 1980s (following three golden decades).
It’s amazing how expensive these local shops are, how bad the products are, how bad (and rude) the customer service is, how much scam there is etc. Every time I shop in Paris, I wish there were alternatives.
What innovations are we losing from unique pricing?
I think it's abundantly clear that Amazon is using its size to make shipping be basically free. It's just about scale, it's not about offering particularly better service. It's the price of books. Of shipping!
If the internet will be destroyed by asking people to pay for shipping, it's honestly not that great.
I always feel a bit weird about these kind of piecemeal efforts, rather than a larger coherent movement with more well-defined goals around having values beyond shareholder value and.... cheapness. But Amazon charging 1 cent for shipping of books is blatlantly disregarding the spirit, intent, and I believe letter of the law on fixed pricing for books in France.
Amazon making out like bandits in France because they don't have to pay any taxes thanks to our European « friends » isn't market distortion ? Dumping isn't market distortion ?
Most French people, including myself, would agree that :
- Books aren't a mere commodity.
- Bookstores have cultural and social value, beyond their commercial nature.
- Amazon is using every possible trick in the bag to distort the market to its advantage, regardless of the damage it's causing. It's almost a caricature of a scummy company.
As a long time and recurring French book buyer, the supposed group being screwed over : Amazon can fuck off and shouldn't be able to be cheaper than state-subsidized postage rates regular book sellers use.
If regulating those clowns causes gnashing of teeth abroad, what of it ?
We have large online retail sellers of books in France (ex: Fnac, Decitre etc) but they don’t want to build the same stocking capacities than Amazon. Therefore most books are out of stock at these retailers and Amazon has a crushing lead online. On the other hand large publishers traditionally are very well connected to the political world. So I see why they want to break Amazon’s lead.
On this other hand the local book stores and their customers represent a vocal minority, mainly consisting of left leaning educated voters. This demographic is probably interesting especially since 2022 is election year…
The Atlantic had an article a few years back about how independent bookstores in Germany managed to be doing so well. As I recall, German law mandated that all books be sold at cover price. How Germany can have a different law on something so basic from other countries within the EU I don't know.
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[ 3.6 ms ] story [ 26.7 ms ] threadAlways the same story: screw one group of people (French customers here), to protect another group (local incompetent shops).
The outcome of such market distortions has been a nation losing its relative standing in the world since 1980s (following three golden decades).
It’s amazing how expensive these local shops are, how bad the products are, how bad (and rude) the customer service is, how much scam there is etc. Every time I shop in Paris, I wish there were alternatives.
I think it's abundantly clear that Amazon is using its size to make shipping be basically free. It's just about scale, it's not about offering particularly better service. It's the price of books. Of shipping!
If the internet will be destroyed by asking people to pay for shipping, it's honestly not that great.
I always feel a bit weird about these kind of piecemeal efforts, rather than a larger coherent movement with more well-defined goals around having values beyond shareholder value and.... cheapness. But Amazon charging 1 cent for shipping of books is blatlantly disregarding the spirit, intent, and I believe letter of the law on fixed pricing for books in France.
Most French people, including myself, would agree that :
- Books aren't a mere commodity.
- Bookstores have cultural and social value, beyond their commercial nature.
- Amazon is using every possible trick in the bag to distort the market to its advantage, regardless of the damage it's causing. It's almost a caricature of a scummy company.
As a long time and recurring French book buyer, the supposed group being screwed over : Amazon can fuck off and shouldn't be able to be cheaper than state-subsidized postage rates regular book sellers use.
If regulating those clowns causes gnashing of teeth abroad, what of it ?
On this other hand the local book stores and their customers represent a vocal minority, mainly consisting of left leaning educated voters. This demographic is probably interesting especially since 2022 is election year…