France goes after Amazon’s books business

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 ?