5 reasons to wish Amazon an unhappy birthday - Salon.com

3. Destroying the profession of author Amazon and the rise of e-books and the other digital shifts have not just damaged bookstores, the people who used to work there, and publishing folk as well. It's undercut the advances authors use to buy time to write something - slicing it by as much as half. Around the time of Amazon's war with the publisher Hachette, a number of authors became vocal. One of them was Janet Fitch, author of "Paint it Black," who prefaced an open letter to Bezos this way: As a middle-aged woman who has had some luck as a writer, I'd like this profession of author to remain a possibility for young writers in the future - and not become an arena solely for the hobbyist or the well-heeled. What will be lost when working writers no longer can support themselves pursuing their ideas, their art? What will be lost to this country, if these most talented can no longer make a living? I am making this an open letter, because I believe we are at a crossroads, and decisions are being made now which will affect our country permanently.