Amazon.com, Indie Bookstores, and the Future of Books

Is mega-bookseller Amazon.com--the "everything store"--good or bad for the book business, for authors, for readers? Two recent articles take this issue on: check out George Packer's New Yorker article "Cheap Words" and Andrew Leonard's Salon.com piece "The Independent Bookstore Lives! Why Amazon's Conquest Will Never Be Complete."