[gdilla]

Well, really it's Amazon saying no more agency model for ebooks, so they can set the price (and change the price) to whatever they want. Just like they do now for physical books. So that is a wholesale model, and that is typically 50% of list price for physical books (if the price on the book jacket is 19.99, the publisher's proceed on a sale is roughly $10, and the retailer can set the price to show a discount, like $12.99).

With agency being 70/30 split (like apps and mp3s), a publisher could net 70% of the list price on ebooks (Big pubs tend to sell ebooks at or near the physical books list price, which is a whole other debate). Now they're looking at close to 50% of list (maybe Amazon is pushing this even lower?). You'll see a world where all ebooks are cheaper on Amazon than on say iBooks, because Apple is not going to bother with anything but agency model. Big win for Amazon. Big suck for publishers.