How Amazon treats Publishers

How Amazon treats publishers:

1. Amazon will use every means possible in negotiating. This includes how publisher books are displayed in search results, messaging availability, and in some cases not even offer them.
2. Publishers by insisting on DRM (Digital Rights Management), have made it very hard to sell e-books, except through Amazon
3. Amazon makes a huge amount of money per e-Book
4. By owning the hardware (Kindle) and with a proprietary format, this gives Amazon a huge amount of power.
5. By selling the Kindle below cost, this has helped Amazon a huge amount.
6. Amazon is going around the publishing industry, and having authors sell directly on Amazon.
7. Traditionally, the publishing industry has treated all authors, except the biggest, badly.
8. The publishing industry is incredibly inefficient.
9. Amazon has around an 80% marketshare in e-Books in the US.

References:

Amazon: malignant monopoly, or just plain evil? - Charlie Stross

Excellent write up of the issues.

Amazon Is NOT the Vladimir Putin of the Publishing World - The Daily Beast

The author basically says that Amazon provides lower prices, so it's OK what they do to publishers.

Hachette Author Stephen Colbert To Amazon, Jeff Bezos: "Watch Out, This Means War" - Fastcompany

Bad publicity for Amazon