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Amazon Dispute Now Making Movies Harder To Order

Posted by Soulskill on from the one-retailer-to-rule-them-all dept.

trazom28 writes: Hachette books aren't the only products that are now harder to order on Amazon — the online retailer is going after movies, too. Amazon has turned off the preorder function for DVDs of prominent Warner Bros. films as it seeks to raise pressure on the company during negotiations. The Lego Movie, for example, is listed as "currently unavailable" on Amazon. Set for release in the home video marketplace on June 17, there is no option to place a preorder."

10 of 210 comments (clear)

  1. Now wait by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    To be fair, WB is the one who put amazon in a crap situation in this one. They had a pre-order for a blue ray, for like $25....The move did exceptionally better than they anticipated, so WB decided NOT to produce the cheaper blu ray, and then put out a new $40 one. Amazon then had to cancel all the other cheaper pre orders, and deal with the legitimately pissed off customers. Amazon is doing some shady things, but they certainly aren't alone in it.

    1. Re:Now wait by DarkOx · · Score: 5, Interesting

      There is nothing shady about managing your suppliers. Every well run business does it. The only thing different is Amazon's suppliers are used to having monopoly power and getting any terms they want. Amazon is pushing back! Its a good for the consumer and I think ultimately will be good for the talent.

      On the book side the job publishers actually do is shrinking (doubly so if we are talking e-books). Everyone I know that has ever had anything published or tried recently, tells me they are expected to provide manuscript in very very specific formats, already largely edited. At that point the only value adds pretty much come down to bundling it into the e-book container (they could do that themselves but for DRM signing etc) and access to the distribution channel (which Amazon could pretty easily provide them with directly), and some fancy name with authority behind it to slap on the work.

      Amazon thinks they don't deserve such a big cut for all that lack of actual work; and I agree. The publishing industry does not have to be the gatekeepers anymore unless you want a large run of dead tree, where someone needs to put up real capital. A quick look at interest rates these days ought to give you an idea of what the real value of that is too.

      The movie world is still a little different, the talent isn't in a position to produce a feature film, although that isn't necessarily the case with an animated work like "Lego Movie"; and if you look the gulf between what really talented folks can do in their basement vs. what Hollywood cranks out is for the most part narrowing too. So value the 'Studios' are providing is declining not matter what fantastic sums of money they manage to blow on the production. I am all for Amazon putting the squeeze on these guys too.

      Amazon *IS* the market, the market should set prices. If Amazons history is any guide at all they will use any cost to compete, so as consumers we cant expect to see some of it passed on to use in the form of lower prices. I also can't think of well anything other than Amazon's own products Kindle etc, that are exclusive to them, so I am not worried about Amazon being a monopoly yet; someday it might be a concern but not now.

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    2. Re:Now wait by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Largely I think publishers just don't give a fuck about quality anymore. If I judged publishers solely by the piss-poor print-to-e-book conversion jobs they've been doing I have to say they're fucking worthless. I'm reading one book right now on my kindle that makes it painfully clear no one at Bantam bothered to even edit the e-book format. There are so many word fuckups from the OCR process it's not even funny.

      I've actually had similar experiences with Dune. It's just sad that they don't even bother checking the content after running it through OCR software and then they have the gaul to charge nearly $10 for what amounts to a fucking PDF.

      Pisses me off to no end.

    3. Re:Now wait by fistfullast33l · · Score: 4, Insightful

      While I agree in principle that publisher's are a bit superfluous to the publishing equation, acting solely as a middle man, you did leave out one major point regarding their value add. They provide substantial marketing muscle that it's not clear Amazon would provide to an individual author alone. They arrange book and media tours as well, especially for up and coming authors. Established authors obviously have their own agents or PR people who could help with this, but new authors have neither the resources nor the experience to participate in this critical marketing tool.

      As a corollary - look at the Apple or Android app stores. Obviously the larger apps have marketing muscle behind them (in the form of publishers, of course), but the day that the individual could make a lot of money is few and far between. I would argue that the window for indie developer success lasted about 6 months after the app store launched. After that, you were just one person shouting in a crowd and had no chance to break even without marketing saavy or dumb luck.

    4. Re:Now wait by tlhIngan · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I think Amazon is getting arrogant and stupid, and think they own the market and have no competition. My books aren't affected, they're available at Amazon. But they're cheaper from Barnes & Noble, and B&N listed them in their catalog two days before Amazon did (I'm my own publisher, no hatchets are war nerd brothers).

      I think it's dumb, B&N will eat their lunch. Want a WB movie or Hatchette book? B&N. And probably a hundred other places.

      Amazon DOES own the market. The first place most people go to for a book or movie or any other thing online? Amazon. I know people who rarely spend a dollar outside of Amazon as Amazon has practically everything in one place. (Or if it's not available from Amazon, they send a nasty letter to the manufacturer asking them why it's not on Amazon).

      B&N is a poor comparison - they are circling the drain. So they have to lower prices to compete. But few people shop at B&N, and even fewer have ebooks there (I've run across many that are Amazon only, annoyingly).

      And with the DoJ putting the smackdown on the Apple Agency model of selling e-books, coupled with Amazon's practical monopoly over ebooks, well, Amazon will soon be the only place. Nook's in trouble, too. When the DoJ as part of the Apple thing hacked up all the contracts, well, Amazon picked up the pieces and benefitted, while everyone else started dying. Other than Nook, there's no real other source of ebooks, and Nook's in trouble.

      Basically, Amazon's become the Wal-Mart of the online world.

  2. Re:Barnes and Nobles still lets you preorder by gurps_npc · · Score: 4, Funny

    So you are saying "Fight the Power, Buy a Nook"?

    --
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  3. Re:Fuck Amazon by cdrudge · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Evil, vile company.

    As oppose to book publishers that want you to pay the same for an ebook as a hard copy?

    It's easier to just go through life when you realize that ALL companies are evil, vile companies and they are all out to maximize THEIR profits at the expense of others.

    If publishers and distributors don't want to deal with Amazon, don't do business with them. Amazon's not the only ecommerce site on the internet. Yes you may lose sales from people who want to buy it on Amazon but can't. But Amazon also loses the sale. And if people want your product, if you make it easy for them to get it elsewhere they'll still get it. If I REALLY wanted to go buy The Lego Movie and Wal-Mart didn't have it, I'd go to Best Buy. Or Target. Or some other store. This is no different.

  4. I have preordered the torrent by chmilar · · Score: 4, Informative

    Fortunately, torrents are not subject to contract disputes.

    Amazon, Warner, Hachette and others seem determined to drive everyone to torrents.

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    Reading Slashdot is ruining my spelling and grammar.
  5. Re:Available in Amazon UK by harrkev · · Score: 4, Funny

    It is listed at 10 pounds.

    Wow. Shipping for that DVD must be VERY expensive. They are only an ounce or two here in the USA.

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  6. Re:Barnes and Nobles still lets you preorder by rwv · · Score: 4, Interesting

    The usual villain here is Walmart. They have been abusing suppliers long before Amazon got in the act.

    Point of consideration that Walmart bullies around smaller suppliers while Amazon is taking a stand against one of the major publishers with Hachette and Warner Bros which is operated by Time Warner who is currently seeking Anti-Trust approval to merge with Comcast.

    If anything, Amazon's ability to stand up to Big Media seems to be in the best interest of consumers. Big Media is where the evil monopolies seem to be. Amazon's power over online sales relies on convenience, their customer supplied rating/feedback system, and their pricing policies. Amazon wants to charge small for high quality because cheap crap will be rated as such on Amazon and nobody will buy it. Meanwhile Walmart wants to charge small for low quality because who cares about customers and suppliers if they can earn 20% of half a Trillion bucks each year (http://www.marketwatch.com/investing/stock/wmt/financials).