French bookshops revolt after prize selects novel self-published on Amazon
Warning: raw personal opinion ahead. You&#x27;re welcome to downvote, but I&#x27;d prefer it if you left a response so I can learn something.<p>Europe in general but France in particular seems <i>completely</i> unprepared for the changes technology and the web are still rolling out. The market seems to me to be a morass of entrenched, sclerotic industries that grew fat after decades of governmental protection. Naturally, in many cases the response is simple: more governmental protection.<p>As dominant as Amazon it, at least in the US is has a nascent rival in Walmart, a massive retail chain that&#x27;s frantically piling onto the internet to try to catch up. The American system has produced a challenger to Amazon&#x27;s mega-consolidation by seeing another champion of mega-consolidation attempt to pivot its business. Where is France&#x27;s answer to Amazon? Does France not have large national retail chains? Why are we not seeing companies to buying one another up in order to form like Voltron against a large threat like Amazon?<p>My (admittedly uninformed) impression is: because the competitive and regulatory environment doesn&#x27;t seem allow for it. Laws on hiring and firing workers. Laws limiting discounts on books. Laws governing corporate takeovers. Why else would industries whose very existence depends on cushy regulatory favors have no way of dealing with tech giants besides more regulatory favors (Article 13, Article 11, Right to be Forgotten, the entire charade of fines for &quot;anti-competitive behavior&quot;)?<p>Instead of ripping off the bandaid and establishing a new and competitive economy by deregulating, taking the hit, and nurturing a new generation of cutthroat competition, France and the EU has protected its weakest and least-competitive industries, to the detriment of its people and the world at large.