I don't want to be a scaremonger here, but I cannot see how Aussie authors or small publishers are going be able to do anything than be caught in the middle of this vice (squeezed even tighter). While the big boys slug it out over the next 100,000 copies of the latest Dan Brown or Stephenie Meyer, our local artists and their support may well need to find other jobs.
Will Aussie book lovers benefit? I doubt it. I think we had better get ready for more pallet loads of titles that cannot be sold (this time from overseas) dropped on our bookshelves (wow, I can't wait!) But that's only presuming we are actually going to get cheaper books, not necessarily cheaper books that we want to read.
I think Dymocks and the Coalition for Cheaper Books have summed it up beautifully with the following excerpt from their e-mail to Katie Eberle and the Productivity Commission*:
“Dymocks and the Coalition for Cheaper Books believe Australian booklovers deserve better. Dymocks believes that lower prices will enable more Australians to read more and as a consequence Australian literacy levels will improve. Dymocks believes that the Australian book industry should be driven by the Australian book buyer and not the local subsidiaries and agents of overseas publishers.”
What a lot of poppycock folks! Do you take us for mugs? Those that cannot afford to read now, for whatever reason (financial or otherwise) will not benefit from your most 'magnanimous' actions. If you cannot afford a $35 book, you cannot afford a $30 book. I can only see parallel importing filling Dymock's and the Coalition for Cheaper Books financial reports with more zeroes. Who are the Coalition for Cheaper Books? The benevolent literary benefactors of Australian booklovers: Woolworths, Target, Big W, K-Mart and Coles. I'm sure you would agree that they must have our reading interests at heart.
So we save 20% on the latest bestsellers, or whatever. I would like to ask you: it is worth damaging (or worse, killing) our local industry for? Easy answer huh?
Don't just listen to me, have a quick look at the submissions from authors and publishers at:
http://www.pc.gov.au/projects/study/books
*Dymocks excerpt taken from:
http://www.pc.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0005/87656/subdr293.pdf
