More discussion on Diamond’s Point of Sale around the net

September 13, 2007 in Comics Conundrum, Manga Minutiae | 4 comments

Looks like Diamond’s introduction of their POS system at Baltimore is going to be the biggest comics industry news of the year… barring the materialization of new direct market distributors that has been rumored.

Having attended the retailer meeting at Baltimore, Heidi MacDonald gives a not-so-romantic view of the “merchant class” of the direct market and the numbers games being played on all sides.  Well, that’s what makes good business-people, really…

Dirk Deppey raises a lot of keen questions, most importantly whether the system, which is almost certainly being offered by Diamond at cost or less, is a trojan horse that extends Diamond’s grip on the industry into each and every store.  Just how “proprietary” is the software to Diamond?

Jamie Coville points out how the barcode requirement may spell trouble for some publishers at Comics Worth Reading.  I don’t think Diamond in introducing this rule is intentionally whittling down the number of vendors, but there is no doubt this is yet another headache for the many already cash-strapped indy and self publishers.  Yet for those who are able to surmount the additional cost (and I think most will), the advantages of an automated system for ordering will work to their benefit; books that retailers would have forgotten otherwise will now have their own trackable sales history.

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Now that I think about, there is one other potential silver lining of industry-wide adoption of Diamond’s POS, and this is one many indy creators have been complaining about… true, reliable, and complete sell-through data for all books.  With electronic sales tracking, there’s no reason for Diamond not to possess accurate cumulative sales data.  Although whether they choose to release it or not is a completely different matter.

Edit: Cabil points out in the comments section that Diamond will not be tracking sales data with the system.  Bummer.

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ANN is reporting that the 11 manga artists who sued the proprietors of an unauthorized manga downloading site have been awarded approx. $178,000 by Tokyo District Court.  The thing that sticks out most about this case is the way the damages were calculated.  Compared to similar cases filed in the states, the damages sought by the plaintifs were relatively reasonable, derived from fair market prices and sound estimates… as opposed to the insane figures that the likes of RIAA use to frighten grandmothers and coerce settlements.

4 comments

  1. cabil on September 17, 2007 at 8:19 am

    I specifically asked whether or not the system captured sales through data, and it does not. They (as in Diamond) currently do not have any plans to do so. If a manufacturer makes some sort of deal, say offering an extra point of discount in exchange for sell through data, they will support (as in assist in the software implementation of it) that.

  2. Simon on September 17, 2007 at 9:39 am

    Wow.

    That is just… wow.

    I can think of a bunch of other mono-syllabic words to describe what I’m feeling, but I don’t think my Benevolent Overlords would appreciate it.

  3. cabil on September 17, 2007 at 12:17 pm

    Just in case I didn’t make it clear, the store will be able to track their internal data, but the only data sharing that the new system can do right out of the box are what is currently available. As in lookup of items, search of Diamond inventory, and ordering from Diamond.

  4. Jamie Coville on September 19, 2007 at 12:08 pm

    I don’t think the bar code thing is a conspiracy either, just in case somebody assumes that by my comments. It’s just I doubt a lot of tears will be shed if Previews is thinner due to less publishers that are so under-capitalized they can’t afford bar codes.

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