Hooray for Amazon

Brad is a little behind the times regarding price fixing by a publisher.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price_fixing

"In August 2008, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that vertical price fixing by a manufacturer and its retailers, also known as retail price maintenance, is not a per se violation."

That ruling, of course, is precisely why MacMillan will be able to establish Amazon as an "Agency" with no control over what prices are presented to the customer, allowing MacMillan to "fix the price."

As an author and niche publisher (of sorts) I'd much rather Macmillan "win" and shoot themselves in the foot. Higher priced e-books from the major publishers gives independent authors and small presses the opportunity to compete at lower prices. Worked on the iPhone App Store pretty well..

In the time it took the author to sing Amazon praises, Amazon went on and accepted Macmillan's demands.

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1091282

That teaches you to never write deep reflections on breaking tech gossip. Tweet early, tweet often.