Barnes & Noble has removed all DC Comics’ books from the shelves of its stores in reaction to the publisher granting the digital exclusive to Amazon’s Kindle Fire. Adding fuel to this flame, Barnes & Noble asserts that DC Comics has declined to make its books available on its competing Nook Color device.
An email sent to stores yesterday instructed them to remove all physical copies of the 100 graphic novels in the Kindle Fire deal, according to information first reported by BleedingCool, including reliable strong sellers like The Dark Knight Returns, Neil Gaiman’s Sandman series, Fables, Superman: Earth One, Brian K. Vaughan’s Y: The Last Man series, and Alan Moore’s Watchmen and V For Vendetta (pictured). B&N customers can still order them on the website and special order them in stores for home delivery, but they cannot opt for store pickup.
“Regardless of the publisher, we will not stock physical books in our stores if we are not offered the available digital format,” Barnes & Noble’s chief merchant, Jaime Carey, said in a statement. “To sell and promote the physical book in our store showrooms and not have the e-book available for sale would undermine our promise to Barnes & Noble customers to make available any book, anywhere, anytime.”
DC Entertainment replied with a statement of its own that noted the graphic novels from the Warner Bros.-owned DC Comics will be available on Apple’s iPad and any other device compatible with Amazon’s Kindle app, adding, “We are disappointed that Barnes & Noble has made the decision to remove these books off their shelves and make them unavailable to their customers.”
Related links:
Bleeding Cool – http://tinyurl.com/63ceb8y
Los Angeles Times – http://tinyurl.com/3mwj9u4
“Barnes & Noble has removed all DC Comics’ books from the shelves of its stores in reaction to the publisher granting the digital exclusive to Amazon’s Kindle Fire. Adding fuel to this flame, Barnes & Noble asserts that DC Comics has declined to make its books available on its competing Nook Color device.”
How is that adding fuel to this flame? That’s a restatement of the exact same problem (that’s what “digital exclusive” means, no?).
I see your point about that being the very definition of digital exclusive – thanks for your comment.
I was trying to get across the idea that the situation involved escalating tensions and retaliation.
I’m a little confused. At the start of piece, the writer states that B&N has removed all DC Comics titles from its stores. Then, later in the piece, it refers to B&N tellings stores to remove the 100 titles for which Amazon will have a digital exclusive. My days ordering comics for stores are a bit behind me, but I’m pretty confident DC has more than 100 trade collections.
You’re correct. I should have been more clear that the removed DC titles were just the 100 that will be exclusive to the Kindle Fire.
Thanks for pointing out that this is not the entire catalog of DC Comics.