With the big chains, buying power gets concentrated into a few hands, and thats dangerous for a free press. This is the one argument that, on the surface, appears to have some teeth. Of course, nobody wants the caprice of some cubicle-bound drone to dictate whether a writer will have a career, or be found beneath the dark waters of a lonely canal, a suicide whose frustrated death should be blamed on Borders. The reality is that as long as there is a multitude of authors, publishers, readers, and sellers in the market, bookstore buying cannot lapse into sloppiness or be driven by corporate whim or ideology. If a chain were to lapse in some way, a significant hole would develop in its ability to serve a heterogeneous market, one into which its competitors will be more than happy to jump and scoop up that market share for themselves, be they other chains or a slew of sharp independents.