Paragraph of the week

From Keith Gessen’s December Vanity Fair article “The War of the Words”, about the battle between online retailer Amazon and print publisher Hachette, and the battle’s ramifications for authors, publishers, self-publishers, booksellers and readers:

He took me over to his window, which looked out over Seattle’s downtown. Due largely to Amazon’s expansion, Seattle is one of the fastest-growing cities in America. The size of the self-publishing program alone within Amazon is already so large that, because the company does not reveal any sales figures about self-publishing, some believe that statistics about book publishing in general can no longer be trusted. Some huge and growing part of the market is simply unaccounted for. Berman pointed at the dozens of yellow and red construction cranes that rose in spikes above Seattle all the way to the water. He made sure I was looking and said, “That’s all Amazon.”

So here are the Band with “It Makes No Difference”. That’s Rick Danko singing the lines “Cause just like the gambler says, read ’em and weep.” Also, “Stampeding cattle, they rattle the walls.” I hope these are not metaphors for our industry.