On the two issues which Daunt raies:

1. It is far from being clearly 'wrong' for Amazon (and, lets not forget, many other e-retailers) to exploit this loophole. Amazon operates in many different (EU) countries (including Luxembourg, I presume) so for them to choose to base their operations in a location which offers them a competitive advantage over their competitors just seems like good business sense (why pay more when you don't have to? [taking into account moral restrictions]). Mr Daunt: stop moaning about it, and start competing.

2. 'Showrooming' will always be a problem until you start offering comparable prices. In the current economic climate the consuming public simply cannot afford the prices charged at Waterstones. From a strictly consumer perspective, it's nonsensical to pay 30, 40, even 50% more for a book when it can be acquired cheaper online. Again, stop moaning about it, and start competing.

Ultimately, Daunt is trying to create a level playing-field upon which Waterstones and Amazon compete. Yet the very nature of e-retailing means that this cannot, and possibly should not, happen. Why doesn't Daunt just move his e-retailing operation to Luxembourg?

It seems that he has two options: sit back in his ivory tower and moan about the apparent injustices of the business world, or stand up and compete.

Moaning gets you nowhere.

Why has my comment been removed?

'In the current economic climate the consuming public simply cannot afford the prices charged at Waterstones.'

Absolute rubbish. Books are cheap, very cheap, and are enormously good value. How much do you pay for a cinema ticket or a DVD to keep you entertained for two hours? How much for a round of drinks or a bottle of wine? To suggest that people cannot afford eight quid for a paperback novel that they could spend two or three weeks reading is facile.

The extra cost at Waterstones is associated with maintaining a high street presence, a pleasant space in which people can browse and staff on hand to answer queries. Merely shopping online in one thing; 'showrooming' is a disgraceful way to behave, a horrible manifestation of cynical short-termism, and if you're defending this practice because it is one in which you indulge you should be ashamed of yourself.

'Absolute rubbish. Books are cheap, very cheap, and are enormously good value. How much do you pay for a cinema ticket or a DVD to keep you entertained for two hours? How much for a round of drinks or a bottle of wine? To suggest that people cannot afford eight quid for a paperback novel that they could spend two or three weeks reading is facile.'

My point - which has clearly sailed over your head - is that in these economic circumstances disposable income is squeezed to such a point that when a significantly cheaper alternative is offered (regarding books, dvds, cds etc.) the consumer is compelled to take it seriously and is consequently more likely to take it up. A further point: if that eight quid paperback is five quid on Amazon, why spend more? Especially when your disposable income is squeezed. Why do you think HMV have just released depressing revenue figures? They are, in many ways, in a similar position to Waterstones.

'The extra cost at Waterstones is associated with maintaining a high street presence, a pleasant space in which people can browse and staff on hand to answer queries. Merely shopping online in one thing; 'showrooming' is a disgraceful way to behave, a horrible manifestation of cynical short-termism, and if you're defending this practice because it is one in which you indulge you should be ashamed of yourself.'

I neither defended 'showrooming', nor endorsed it. Your vehemency is mis-placed and...facile.

The playing field needs to be levelled by treating ebooks like other books and making them zero rated for VAT for all sellers. There's a real crisis in bookselling, and levelling the playing field by keeping prices high won't help it.

If books were so incredibly cheap and such good value then authors would have higher average sales and they don't. Daunt imagines that Waterstones is losing customers due to online sales, but the fact is that it's hard to sell books everywhere. Look at the average number of sales per author to get a more realistic picture.

Daunt should be helping the campaign to get VAT removed from ebooks. Ebooks shouldn't be treated as an 'electronic service'. They should be treated like printed books if we really want to level the playing field. Publishers really need ebooks to take off in order to help us survive, so let's campaign for VAT to be reduced for everybody.

Or, lets not.

I earn only a little more than the national average wage, which counts for slightly less, living as I do in London. Your original assertion - that the 'economic climate' means that the 'consuming public simply cannot afford the prices charged at Waterstones' is nonsense. If you cannot afford to spend (say) £10 on a book, you most likely cannot afford £8 either. Since book-buying has always been a predominantly middle-class habit, the vast, vast majority of people can afford to buy as many books as ever they have done.

You seem to have misunderstood what 'showrooming' is. It is not comparing prices at two competing outlets; it is using the advantages of the high street's visible stock and staff and then taking advantage of Amazon's low-tax (and often loss-leading) trading model. I would have thought the difference between looking in Waterstone's and buying from their online shop and doing the same with Amazon were so obvious as to render explanation redundant.

Even if you have only worked in the book trade for five years, you surely cannot be so ignorant of the financial pressure that high street bookshops are under as your post suggests. 'Stop moaning about it, and start competing' is an unbelievably glib comment to make. How should the high street compete with Amazon? Price-matching? How long would Waterstone's last if it started a price war with an offshore company? Let's hear it: what's your big idea?

If I were just starting in the industry, as you are, I wouldn't be so quick to defend Amazon; there's a strong chance it will have you out of a career in the next few years.

"Showrooming" can work both ways. Amazon is a very useful catalogue to use on your mobile phone when you're lost in a large bookshop (wonderful though that state is) trying to find a book you saw reviewed, and can't remember an author's name. It's also a very useful catalogue to use at home, to root out books coming up by your favourite authors, which you can then buy in your local bookshop. Thanks to Amazon, I'm much more aware now than I have ever been of what I'm planning to buy over the next few months (I even have a few marked down for 2013).

I agree with David and Diana. I read poetry and literary fiction and remember the days I had to come to London from Canterbury to get my poetry books in Camden. Nowadays I can find the books I want, but not in bookshops.

When I've said this before I've been told I could have ordered the books through the bookshops - but as Diana says, I found a lot of them by browsing online. So the showcasing definitely works both ways.

I would still prefer to order the book in a bookshop, or direct from the publisher, and often go direct to the publisher's website. Amazon displays poetry and literary fiction but their messages can be misleading, and often they take the order but keep delaying, saying the book is temporarily out of stock, and don't ultimately send the book. This loses sales for publishers as it happens even when the book is easily available from the wholesaler. And it leaves customers dissatisfied and believing the book is no longer available, when it is easy to get through other suppliers.

So bookshops are missing out here. As Diana points out, what they lack is an easy way to browse for all books, even those out of stock. There should be an easy way for customers to look for books online in bookshops, just as they can with online sellers.

They could then order the book through the bookshop, but that can take way too long while the bookshop waits for the book to arrive from their wholesaler before selling it to the customer. Can't the bookshops order books from the wholesaler to be sent to the customer, just as the online sellers do?

If the bookshop managers get orders from customers in this way, letting them browse a website with all books on the Nielsen database, then order it via a wholesaler who sends it direct to customer, I would certainly use bookshops more. Or am I missing a problem in this?