Here is a piece presenting similar concerns to my Terrible Confession of earlier. It offers evidence for the destructiveness of book lovers' bargain hunting. I'm not really buying the writer's injunction not to "blame [recent bookstore-killing] carnage on the recession or any of the usual suspects, including increased competition for the reader’s time or diminished attention spans. What’s undermining the book industry is not the absence of casual readers but the changing habits of devoted readers." Still, talk about nails in coffins. I don't know what to say about this, or what publishers could do about it since, as Editorial Ass has schooled me, lowering book prices is not an option. Nothing comes without consequences, I guess. It's very discouraging to think that Amazon and such sites, even as they help bring books to the masses, are actually hurting those that produce the books, in more ways than one. If even book advocates end up hurting the ones they love, then what is to be done? The only thing I can think of is a publisher takeover of all book-selling sites. They could control the market with an iron fist. Alas, I fear they lack the capital for such a coup, even if they banded together. And I'm sure someone would just start another site, and people like me would continue patronising brick and mortar used book stores. Sigh.
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