“A victory for authors.”

That’s how some people are describing Amazon’s capitulation to Macmillan over the pricing of ebooks. They say it in the same tone as people describe more expensive milk as “a victory for farmers” or subsidies for domestic cars as “a victory for American auto workers”, which is to say the same tone as you might use to pity a cat with three legs.

Poor authors, after all, need all the help they can get. They work for years on their Great Novel, probably subsisting on stale cheese and rats’ milk as they do so, and what thanks do they get? A measly royalty, chipped away at by heavy discounting in book stores. Thank God then for Macmillan taking a stand against Amazon and its aggressive discounting. And thank Jesus for all of the other publishers bravely following them.

Oh please.

Hmmm.

The Lighthouse Archeological Marine Program (LAMP) are the focus of this documentary about their efforts to find the Jefferson Davis. You can learn more about this project at their web site (http://www.staugustinelighthouse.com/lamp.php).

MacMillan fights with Amazon to protect the physical book market from e-readers. Bet on Amazon.

Bridge of Lions rehabilitation starts wrap up

January 31, 2010

As Historic City News starts the countdown for the long awaited re-opening of the Bridge of Lions, the St. Augustine local news desk will publish a look back on the work that has been accomplished and a peek ahead to the completion of the Bridge of Lions rehabilitation project.

The most visible part of the project during the past several months has been the extensive work on the foundations for the piers.

Behind the scenes, however, project team members have been cautiously studying each layer covering pieces of railings and steel girders to find the original color of the Bridge of Lions.

Welsh Color & Conservation, Inc., a company specializing in analysis of historic paints and wallpapers, used their meticulous sleuthing skills to uncover the 1927 paint color.

After laboratory analysis of collected samples from the Bridge’s girders and railings, The Welsh Color team preservationists discovered a subdued shade of spring green as the first layer of finish paint over the initial layers of primer coating on the original bridge.

Much of the railing is up, the light poles are up with many of the light fixtures now attached. There's still no railings around the towers, but the towers themselves are looking very nice. The only obvious difference is a concrete barrier between the driving lanes and the sidewalks and it's been done very tastefully.

Last night, several blogs including Venturebeat and NYT’s Bits Blog noticed something was amiss on the website of the world’s largest retailer: Amazon suddenly stopped selling books from Macmillan, one of the world’s largest book publishers.

Not every Macmillan book is gone, but popular ones such as The Gathering Storm are no longer sold by Amazon, either in physical or Kindle form. You can still find the Amazon pages for Macmillan’s books — you just can’t order the actual books.

According to the New York Times, the reason the books were pulled was the iPad. Macmillan told Amazon that it wanted to change its pricing and compensation agreement, upping the price of some books from $9.99 to $15 and splitting sales 70/30, the same model Apple uses for the iPhone app store and its upcoming iBooks store. Amazon’s apparent response was to flex its muscle and pull countless Macmillan books off the virtual shelves.