Amazon to cut affiliate fees to sites focused on free books

Starting March 1st, Amazon is going to cut affiliate fees for sites that have a heavy focus on promoting free Kindle books and fit the following criteria :

“In addition, notwithstanding the advertising fee rates described on this page or anything to the contrary contained in this Operating Agreement, if we determine you are primarily promoting free Kindle eBooks (i.e., eBooks for which the customer purchase price is $0.00), YOU WILL NOT BE ELIGIBLE TO EARN ANY ADVERTISING FEES DURING ANY MONTH IN WHICH YOU MEET THE FOLLOWING CONDITIONS:

(a) 20,000 or more free Kindle eBooks are ordered and downloaded during Sessions attributed to your Special Links; and (b) At least 80% of all Kindle eBooks ordered and downloaded during Sessions attributed to your Special Links are free Kindle eBooks.”

I run such a site and it will be interesting to see what happens next. I fully expect many of the sites that exist today will no longer exist in a months time. Or, they will look to promote other platforms (IE: Apple, Nook, etc).

What may be more interesting is what will this do to the authors and the KDP (Kindle Direct Publishing) offerings? What will be the new incentives that Amazon will offer up? And will authors still promote their books for free?

(I say yes and the trend will move to "perma-free" . Books that are always free to hook a reader. IE, the first of a series, character, etc...)