Indigo cutting back Linux magazines?

[John Macdonald]

On Sat, Aug 20, 2005 at 01:00:45PM -0400, Christopher Browne wrote:
> On 8/19/05, James Knott <james.knott-bJEeYj9oJeDQT0dZR+AlfA at public.gmane.org> wrote:
> > Indigo should never have been allowed to buy Chapters as they've
> > pretty well destroyed the book business.  Years ago, I used to buy at
> > Coles, World's Biggest Bookstore, WH Smith, and Litchman's (never cared
> > for Classic Books).  Now, most of have been absorbed by Indigo and the
> > book selection has taken a dramatic turn for the worst.  Even PC-Maniak
> > is gone.  :-(
> 
> Their effective exit from the book business ought to mean there is
> room for someone to enter the book business anew, no?

I suspect you've got cause and effect backwards here and that
it is the competition from online booksellers (like Amazon and
their own chapters.ca) that makes them look for something to
make a brick and mortar bookstore have extra appeal.

> There are several directions for new entries:
> 
> 1.  For individual presses to jump in and arrange for "niche" displays
> at "niche" stores.  Such as folks like Wrox/Apress/O'Reilly/... to set
> up displays of their entire selections at one computer store or
> another.
> 
> I'm not sure how that works for Oracle Press or other "even nicheier"
> sorts of publishers, but I'll bet they could work a deal with a
> computer store.
> 
> An interesting one would be Dover...
> 
> 2.  For specialized bookstores to pop up that go after "niche" areas.
> 
> There are a couple in Ottawa; they seem not to have survived in Toronto.
> 
> Hey, it might make sense for LinuxCaffe to put in a bookshelf or two
> with this in mind...  Prices will have to be premium due to lower
> quantities, but that's a way to get the specialized books.

Premium prices are hard to justify because of the same online
competition.  Arranging a deal with Amazon that allows stocking
a bookshelf but being able to sell them at Amazon's standard
(discounted) price, with no shipping charges, and no delay (if
it is in stock on the shelf) could work.

> 3.  We already have the option of amazon.whatever, which has the merit
> of making practical distribution of books that were never economically
> feasible when books had to pushed into the inventory of 150 stores...

Exactly.

-- 
--
The Toronto Linux Users Group.      Meetings: http://tlug.ss.org
TLUG requests: Linux topics, No HTML, wrap text below 80 columns
How to UNSUBSCRIBE: http://tlug.ss.org/subscribe.shtml