Finance

Readers upset at paying more than $10 for an ebook could soon rejoice: The days of the $14.99 ebook may be numbered.

When the Department of Justice announced that several publishers had settled a lawsuit that alleged ebook price-fixing, which would eventually give ebook retailers pricing control that they didn’t have before, an Amazon spokesperson said, “This is a big win for Kindle owners, and we look forward to being allowed to lower prices on more Kindle books.”

Macmillan, the last of the major publishers still fighting the U.S. Justice Department over antitrust charges, says it has renegotiated its e-book deals with retailers to allow some discounting.

In an open letter posted on his book-publishing company's website Wednesday afternoon, MacmillanChief Executive John Sargent said the firm is still committed to fighting the antitrust case brought by the Justice Department involving allegations that Macmillan and four other publishers plus Apple Inc. (AAPL) conspired to raise e-book prices.

There may be a reason for last week's fire sale on Amazon.com's Kindle Fire.

Maybe they're just not selling.

Pacific Crest analyst Chad Bartley lowered his unit sales target for Amazon's attractively priced tablet yesterday. His supply chain checks show that Amazon is likely to sell just 6 million Kindle Fire devices this holiday quarter, well off the 8 million that he was originally targeting.

Obviously, most companies outside of Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL  ) would kill to move 6 million tablets

New deals signed last week between Hachette and Simon & Schuster and their ebook retail partners have driven down prices of ebook best-sellers.

This week, both Hachette and Simon & Schuster inked new retail contracts with Amazon and their other partners, giving up pricing control per a settlement both publishers signed with the Department of Justice over the issue of ebook price-fixing. The retailers have wasted no time discounting some of the publishers’ ebook titles.

We’ve reached an interesting point in the ebook pricind saga: All three publishers that settled with the Department of Justice to resolve an ebook price-fixing lawsuit have now fulfilled the first and most important part of their agreements — sign new ebook deals with their retail partners.

Simon & Schuster was the last to sign a new deal with Amazon and others — putting its new agreement into place this weekend. Hachette had its new deal up and running earlier this past week. And HarperCollins was very early out the gate…

Is Android to blame for Apple's stock plunge? What's your reaction to the Random House bonuses?

Random House had its corporate Christmas party on Wednesday night in New York, and word is that Santa likes bondage. A lot.

Markus Dohle, the chief executive of Random House, promised employees — from top editors to warehouse workers — a $5,000 bonus to celebrate a profitable year. The cheering went on for minutes, according to people in attendance.

Call it 5,000 shades of green.

The nature of book publishing is changing, in ways big and small. In fact, the very nature of what a book ‘is’ is shifting. But that’s not what I’ve been thinking about these past few days. No, my exploration today is about authors – and what the author of the future needs to do in order to be good partners with their publisher.

Wow, did I just say that? You bet I did. Partners. Because the nature of how books are conceived, written, and brought to market, is being dramatically re-invented.

Hachette has entered into new ebook contracts with retailers following the ebook pricing settlement with the Department of Justice. Amazon and Barnes & Noble are now discounting the publisher’s ebooks, and other retailers should follow soon.

 Not content with threatening high street bookshops and disrupting the traditional publishing model with its Kindle e-readers, the web giant has written to authors’ agents to announce its attack on another link in the chain.

From early next year, Amazon Publishing in Europe will compete to sign up English language authors from the firm’s base in Luxembourg. The new unit will be led by Vicky Griffith, who currently runs Amazon’s publishing efforts on the US West Coast.