Save Bookshops

[dutchguylivingintheuk]

Not really. As Bromptonaut already explained, one is a metaphor for the other. There's nothing obliging you to be in favour of fairness. Acknowledging that you are not saves people wasting a lot of energy on arguments grounded in the belief that you perhaps don't see why something is unfair.

That is wrong, fairness is being fair, a level playing field, might be a way to try and archieve fairness but it's far from a metaphor. because it does not warrant a fair outcome.

Edit: clarification above is an reply to @theclaud below is in general reply to the whole thread

Secondly i hear a lot about Amazon is Baddd, amazoon kills the local bookshop etc. but what about business rates all shops have to pay and amazon and suchlike not? What about parking prices/lack of parking space leading to a downfall in willingness to go to a town centre etc. Before amazon was a thing, there was a drop in demand too, it was only expected that it would become worse for the highsteet one internet became more mature and penetrated.

Thirdly, There are lots of small sellers, yes might as well the small bookshops you are here defending who also sell on amazon, on amazon that's service is called fba, it allows then to send their stock to amazon and amazon does all the rest. There are also lots of sellers on ebay, from private sellers to small businesses, should they all be taxed extra to save the stores in the high street? Or should the focus lie on reviewing the outdated way high street taxation works, for a start.

 

[FishFright]

Why?

Because they are all attempts to avoid my main point that High Street retailers need to provide the service that customers want if they are to survive. It is not for customers to adapt to the High St retailers when they can get the service they want from another source

Although I wish it wasn't so this is what is actually happening. It's nice to pretend the odd visit to a traditional book shop will save the high street but convenience will out over cuddly shopping habits.

 

[Bromptonaut]

That is wrong, fairness is being fair, a level playing field, might be a way to try and archieve fairness but it's far from a metaphor. because it does not warrant a fair outcome.

I can assure you that the concept of a Level Playing Field in colloquial English is a metaphor for fairness.

If you want to put some more literal construction on it then so be it but it may confuse the situation.

 

[Deleted member 49]

Although I wish it wasn't so this is what is actually happening. It's nice to pretend the odd visit to a traditional book shop will save the high street but convenience will out over cuddly shopping habits.

So that makes this right ? I'm sure you know about the way Amazon operate,price surging,fixing, algorithms.I avoid the company like the plague.
I take your point about the high street.The same way there was some fake horror after the accident at a Primark factory few years ago.How the workers were being exploited etc....I was totally shocked you couldn't make a t shirt ethically for 99p ! Guess what it's as busy as ever 🙄
I agree that the high street has to change to survive,but giving a monopoly to these huge companies isn't going to help.Same as Uber and others they don't give two fecks about employees until forced to.Just my view obviously and I'd be a hypocrite to say I've never used them....but I try my damnest not to.
But to say it's a level playing field....lol like feck it is.

 

[FishFright]

So that makes this right ? I'm sure you know about the way Amazon operate,price surging,fixing, algorithms.I avoid the company like the plague.
I take your point about the high street.The same way there was some fake horror after the accident at a Primark factory few years ago.How the workers were being exploited etc....I was totally shocked you couldn't make a t shirt ethically for 99p ! Guess what it's as busy as ever 🙄
I agree that the high street has to change to survive,but giving a monopoly to these huge companies isn't going to help.Same as Uber and others they don't give two fecks about employees until forced to.Just my view obviously and I'd be a hypocrite to say I've never used them....but I try my damnest not to.
But to say it's a level playing field....lol like feck it is.

Of course it doesn't make it right where on earth did you get that from what I wrote?

I've never bought anything from Amazon and don't plan too , I've known about their lack of ethics for a long time so I did something about it and not given them any custom. The same with Primark.

Sadly too many people type pretty words but still use the service.

 

[BoldonLad]

So that makes this right ? I'm sure you know about the way Amazon operate,price surging,fixing, algorithms.I avoid the company like the plague.
I take your point about the high street.The same way there was some fake horror after the accident at a Primark factory few years ago.How the workers were being exploited etc....I was totally shocked you couldn't make a t shirt ethically for 99p ! Guess what it's as busy as ever 🙄
I agree that the high street has to change to survive,but giving a monopoly to these huge companies isn't going to help.Same as Uber and others they don't give two fecks about employees until forced to.Just my view obviously and I'd be a hypocrite to say I've never used them....but I try my damnest not to.
But to say it's a level playing field....lol like feck it is.

if it makes you feel any better, I am sure, at some point in the future, a new Bezos, will come along, with a new idea to service customer “needs”, and, Amazon will have to adapt, or die.

 

[Rusty Nails]

I am not familiar with the Swansea "Fulfilment Centre", but, similar a Amazon development has been built near where I live. Existing roads have been improved, no doubt at great cost. However, other business units have also been set up, on the same site. Plus, judging by the number of people I see arriving/departing by bus and car, as I cycle past, it does employ slightly more people than any local book shop.

There's no questioning your powers of observation there. An Amazon warehouse does definitely employ more people than a local book shop. Debate over.

 

[BoldonLad]

There's no questioning your powers of observation there. An Amazon warehouse does definitely employ more people than a local book shop. Debate over.

Yes, I always try to observe the world around me.

Employment (or lack of it) is a major problem in the area I live, so, I am always pleased to see new employment opportunities, although, they are not relevant to me personally (now), at 74, I just pedal my bike.

 

[icowden]

Perhaps one counterweight towards actual independent bookshops is the problem of mass availability.
When looking in the kindle ebook content for example, it is nigh on impossible to distinguish between books which have been properly proofed, edited and published and those which are utter shoot by the self-published and talentless. Reviews do go *some* way to helping you sift the dross from the good, but you don't get the peace of mind that you get in a bookshop where you know that the books have been through a process of weeding and approval (well unless you are in the section that has Nadine Dorries in it).

I find this the most irritating part of online buying, especially as I get older and my favourite authors start to drop like flies (see Pratchett, Iain M Banks etc). Occasionally you find a good author who has seemingly been abandoned by the bookshop (Jodi Taylor is a new favourite) but by and large Amazon do push out a lot of stuff that should never have been published.

 

[matticus]

... by and large Amazon do push out a lot of stuff that should never have been published.

But it's cheap, quick, and available at a mouse-click. And postage is £0.01 !

 

[Archie_tect]

Wonder what the wholesale discount %age is that Amazon, and similar companies, demand off the cost of products?

Anyone know?

 

[Deleted member 49]

Wonder what the wholesale discount %age is that Amazon, and similar companies, demand off the cost of products?

Anyone know?

Your soul....

 

[The Crofted Crest]

Meanwhile in the EU, the surrender monkeys are taking back control:

The French government is seizing on this increased support for independent bookshops to pursue its war against the domination of big tech firms. In a blow to Amazon, new legislation in France is to set a minimum price for book deliveries, in order to stop what the government calls “distorted competition” against independent bookshops from digital giants. [...] Now the French parliament is limiting the market advantages of net giants, which it hopes could set a precedent for other European countries seeking to protect small bookstores. The minimum delivery fee, which still has to be decided in negotiations with the state regulator, should come into force next year.

 

[matticus]

Meanwhile in the EU, the surrender monkeys are taking back control:

Spooky - that's uncannily like the text in the first post of this topic. Don't tell me somebody actually read it?!?

 

[dutchguylivingintheuk]

I can assure you that the concept of a Level Playing Field in colloquial English is a metaphor for fairness.

If you want to put some more literal construction on it then so be it but it may confuse the situation.

ok, i believe you on the metaphor part, be but if were talking about protecting the high street/book stores so it has to be seen in the wider picture and yes that makes the situation more confusing, but the alternative is making it pointless BS, that's where Westminster specializes in and the government hates competition.
So lets not do that, Goverments solutions are mostly based on getting more money in so the most quick solution in this case would be to come with an ''amazon'' tax. But as all companies it will just result in Amazon calculating this tax in his prices so in the end it's just an tax rise. (that's not to say i agree with all the ''i'm a big companies so give me a tax discount'' kind of deals)
So the better solution in my view would be government, to stop charging for example business rates and other things, and or maybe create a way to make shipping cheaper? It's kind if a hard point in terms of surely the availability of amazon and the likes doesn't help getting the high street more popular but the decline of the high street started long before that, amazon is just an answer to a demand. Not the creation of a demand that not yet existed before.
If you look at the ta pressure in most of western europe than you can concluded that it might be about time to change this, to make a better goverments by reviewing their spending, to stop wanting to fund/regulate etc. everything and come to a core set of features the goverment need and make these really good, instead of the current trend of the goverment handling lot's of things all terrible and some even more terrible than others.