December 7th, 2011
“In the ongoing Internet sales tax wars, Pennsylvania’s Republican Administration has staged a surprise attack with potentially nationwide impact. In a bulletin issued last week, Pennsylvania’s Department of Revenue asserted that state law dating to 1971 requires sellers who have sales agents or use warehouses in Pennsylvania to collect its sales tax on deliveries to Pennsylvania residents. Significantly, Amazon.com has four “fulfillment” centers in Pennsylvania and Internet sellers who use Amazon’s fulfillment service will have to collect sales tax on sales to Pennsylvania residents—assuming they ship crates of product to be warehoused, packaged and shipped from the Pennsylvania facilities.”
Pa. Sales Tax Crackdown Means Grief For Amazon Merchants
As Amazon’s main media warehouses are in Pennsylvania, this will affect FBA booksellers.
Karin Isgur Bergsagel, BookThink News Editor
Posted in News | No Comments »
November 24th, 2011
From slashdot comes news of an evolved e-textbook:
“Most of today’s electronic textbooks are re-purposed versions of print books. Nature has published an e-text that departs from the traditional book format and business model. Their Introduction to Biology e-text was created from the ground up and consists of 196 modules rather than a sequential book and the student gets a lifetime subscription for $49. Nature will continuously update the e-text as the science and pedagogy evolve.”
A comprehensive review of this ‘post-Gutenberg’ text is here:
http://cis471.blogspot.com/2011/11/post-gutenberg-e-text-for-biology-101.html
Karin Isgur Bergsagel, BookThink News Editor
Posted in News | No Comments »
November 23rd, 2011
Great tribute here to the dragon lady:
http://www.wired.com/geekdad/2011/11/pern-the-first-world-i-wanted-to-be-real/
A great loss - she made a major contribution to the evolution of women, as both characters and writers in sci-fi/fantasy, and is largely responsible for the dragon in Sci-Fi.
Thank you, Anne, for many happy hours in another world.
Karin Isgur Bergsagel, BookThink News Editor
Posted in News | No Comments »
November 18th, 2011
Amazon continues its hegemony.
If this blog post in the LA Times is correct, Amazon now has its eyes (or is that just one Sauronesque eye?) on a Smartphone:
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/technology/2011/11/amazon-smartphone.html
As with the Kindle Fire, it will be a tool - a Trojan Horse - to bind buyers even more tightly to the Amazon platform.
Karin Isgur Bergsagel, BookThink News Editor
Posted in News | No Comments »
November 18th, 2011
Many sellers have been puzzled by a recent unannounced roll out of a new (and helpful) feature on their Amazon inventory page.
Some items are identified as ‘Active (with quality alert)’
What it means is that the listing itself (not your description) is “…has missing, invalid, or poor-quality information. The tool highlights listing quality improvements that can help customers find your products and make buying decisions. For example, listings that don’t have images might have quality warnings because adding images can make listings more appealing to customers and help them make buying decisions.”
Here are details on how to use the tool:
https://sellercentral.amazon.com/gp/help/200786710
Amusingly (in a warped sort of way) I’ve heard sellers say that they won’t make these changes, because Amazon should be improving their own catalog. Umm, aren’t you the one with the book to sell? Sounds to me like a perfect example of cutting off your nose to spite your face.
Karin Isgur Bergsagel, BookThink News Editor
Posted in News | No Comments »
