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Publishers have called territoriality on Amazon "on the verge of non-existent" following an exclusive Bookseller investigation into territory rights and e-book downloads.
The Bookseller was able to crack Amazon's territorial controls, buying 10 US Kindle editions, all of which have different UK publishers, with different rights deals in place. The purchases were made by inputting a valid US address, but with a credit card linked to a UK address.
The titles were taken from Amazon.com's Top 100 Paid Kindle chart as of 15th October, and included Stieg Larsson's The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (Knopf/published in the UK by Quercus), Jonthan Franzen's Freedom (Farrar, Straus & Giroux/Fourth Estate) and Emma Donoghue's Room (Little, Brown US/Picador).
Publishers said they frequently tested Amazon's territorial controls—and regularly circumvented them. One c.e.o. of a major translatlantic publisher said: "Territory on Amazon is on the verge of non-existent. Our digital team in the UK regularly cracks it. This is a problem we have notified Amazon about. They've said: 'Don't worry, [a customer] can only [crack the territory] before the IT kicks in.'
"That's a response, even if it's true, I've found to be astounding and unacceptable. Once is too much."
A digital director of a UK/US publisher claimed to have broken territoriality for the same title 25 times. The digital director added: "Amazon aren't inclined to do anything about this. It's not really in their interest to aggressively go after their customers. Amazon makes money, after all, no matter where they are downloading from. I think they largely work on a 'don't ask, don't tell' basis," they concluded.
A spokesman for Amazon UK responded: "Each customer has a content catalogue associated with their region or country, and we display the appropriate catalogue for each country."