Yesterday's news about Apple and three major trade publishers agreeing to give up agency price controls in Canada has been misreported in some circles, with one person going so...
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Category: Agency
Kobo Wins Appeal Over Agency eBook Pricing in Canada
Kobo has successfully appealed a 2014 consent agreement between the Canadian Competition Bureau and Hachette, HarperCollins, Macmillan, and Simon & Schuster where the publishers had agreed to abandon agency pricing...
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Breaking News: Agency Price Controls Reduce eBook Sales
There's still no proof that Amazon is behind the return to agency, but evidence continues to grow that publishers have shot themselves in the foot by taking control of their...
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Is Amazon Behind the Return to Agency?
It was widely assumed that when the Big Five (and later other publishers) secured agency ebook contracts in late 2014 and 2015 that the publishers had pressured Amazon into...
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Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Signs Some Kind of Agency Deal With Amazon, Apple, Google
When I broke the news on Monday that US publisher Houghton Mifflin Harcourt might have signed an agency deal with Amazon, I said that I didn't think it had...
Continue reading Did HMH Sign an Agency eBook Contract With Amazon? (Maybe)
For as long as we've had agency ebook pricing, we've always talked about the same six publishers having control over their ebook prices: Hachette, Macmillan, S&S, HarperCollins, Penguin, and...
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Canada Investigates Apple for Possible eBook Pricing Conspiracy
Here in the US the DOJ may have completed its investigation into the price-fixing activities of Apple and 5 major trade publishers and gone after the parties involved, but...
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HarperCollins, Amazon Ink Distribution Deal
The months-long contract negotiation between HarperCollins and its biggest customer came to an abrupt end today with the news that the two parties had signed a multi-year contract. Few...
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HarperCollins to Bring Back Agency Pricing as Early As Next Week
Following tense months-long negotiations with Amazon, HarperCollins is reportedly planning to force ebook retailers to adopt agency pricing as early as next week. Publishers Lunch reports that: Multiple retailers report...
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No, the Canadian Competition Bureau ISN’T Investigating Indigo, Kobo on eBook Prices
There is a story circulating today that Canadian regulators are now investigating the Canadian bookstore chain Indigo and its ebook partner Kobo "over alleged anti-competitive e-book pricing practices", in the...
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Agency eBook Pricing Will be Alive and Well in Canada Until at Least May 2015
The major US trade publishers may have relinquished control of their ebook prices here in the US and in Europe but Canada, well, that is a different story. A...
Continue readingAAR Joins the Fray in the Amazon-Hachette Contract Dispute
Hachette and Amazon's brutal months-long contract renegotiation picked up a peanut gallery commentator today. The AAR (Association of Authors Representatives) has sent an open letter today to Amazon, calling...
Continue readingCanadian Judge Explains Why Agency eBook Pricing is Still Alive North of the 49th Parallel
No one was surprised when Kobo objected to the end of Agency pricing in Canada, but when the Canadian Competition Tribunal granted them an initial delay it did come...
Continue readingAmazon Just Sent Me My Share of the eBooks Antitrust Settlement
It's been over a year since the last publisher settled the antitrust lawsuit brought by the Dept of Justice, and we're finally starting to get our money back. A...
Continue readingKobo Wins Stay of Execution on the End of Agency Pricing in Canada
Kobo just won the first battle in their month-old fight to keep price competition out of the Canadian ebook market. The Canadian Competition Bureau announced on Tuesday that they...
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