Most traditional publishers have thinned out their editorial staffs over the last decade. As Amazon gets into the publishing business they will likely find that you are correct in suggesting they work with editors (and copy editors) to polish the material they publish.
You highlight a very important point here. In most cases when you purchase an e-book, just like with digital music, you are only licensing the content. You don't actually own it and therefore the first sale doctrine does not apply.
Back in the 1980s and 1990s studios priced home video product at two levels "Rental" and "Sell Through". If it was a title that the studio thought would sell millions of units (like an animated film) they priced the video tape at a sell through rate of $16 to $40. That would ensure consumers would go into Walmart and purchase it. However, if the studio thought the number of consumers who would purchase a title was limited to the thousands, then they priced the video at $80 to $99 so that they could make all of their money from video stores purchasing tens of thousands of copies to rent out. There are a number of reasons this pricing practice stopped, including the rise of Blockbuster Video (with whom some studios received a cut of the revenue) and the adoption of DVDs.
Under the first sale doctrine (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First-sale_doctrine) Netflix is allowed to rent any DVD which they purchase outright. Streaming however, like broadcasting, requires a license because there is no physical media involved and the Netflix is not actually purchasing anything (and they certainly don't own the movie). Usually licensing deals for subscription services focus on the number of subscribers with a maximum number of times the content can be streamed. This is how Netflix ran into problems with Sony, when the studios content was streamed too much.
In regards to your comment:
"I have no data to confirm this, but I suspect that Netflix is actually taking away a lot of their traditional business (DVD sales, pay-per-view showings, etc). The studios gave Netflix great rates before under the impression that it would be an additional source of revenue, but now they're losing money on the deal and are jacking up the rates as their contracts expire."
You are absolutely correct. The cannibalization of DVD sales and pay-per-view was the reason they started pushing back the Netflix release date by 28 days. The studios were trying to be somewhat upfront about it.
I agree that Netflix could have handled the issue better. That's exactly the argument I make on the podcast (to which this post links). Rather than gain goodwill and help get us on their side by being open about the price hike they fed us a story that seems questionable.
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Most traditional publishers have thinned out their editorial staffs over the last decade. As Amazon gets into the publishing business they will likely find that you are correct in suggesting they work with editors (and copy editors) to polish the material they publish.
You highlight a very important point here. In most cases when you purchase an e-book, just like with digital music, you are only licensing the content. You don't actually own it and therefore the first sale doctrine does not apply.
Back in the 1980s and 1990s studios priced home video product at two levels "Rental" and "Sell Through". If it was a title that the studio thought would sell millions of units (like an animated film) they priced the video tape at a sell through rate of $16 to $40. That would ensure consumers would go into Walmart and purchase it. However, if the studio thought the number of consumers who would purchase a title was limited to the thousands, then they priced the video at $80 to $99 so that they could make all of their money from video stores purchasing tens of thousands of copies to rent out. There are a number of reasons this pricing practice stopped, including the rise of Blockbuster Video (with whom some studios received a cut of the revenue) and the adoption of DVDs.
Under the first sale doctrine (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First-sale_doctrine) Netflix is allowed to rent any DVD which they purchase outright. Streaming however, like broadcasting, requires a license because there is no physical media involved and the Netflix is not actually purchasing anything (and they certainly don't own the movie). Usually licensing deals for subscription services focus on the number of subscribers with a maximum number of times the content can be streamed. This is how Netflix ran into problems with Sony, when the studios content was streamed too much.
In regards to your comment: "I have no data to confirm this, but I suspect that Netflix is actually taking away a lot of their traditional business (DVD sales, pay-per-view showings, etc). The studios gave Netflix great rates before under the impression that it would be an additional source of revenue, but now they're losing money on the deal and are jacking up the rates as their contracts expire." You are absolutely correct. The cannibalization of DVD sales and pay-per-view was the reason they started pushing back the Netflix release date by 28 days. The studios were trying to be somewhat upfront about it.
I agree that Netflix could have handled the issue better. That's exactly the argument I make on the podcast (to which this post links). Rather than gain goodwill and help get us on their side by being open about the price hike they fed us a story that seems questionable.