vincevincevince - 1:27 pm on Jan 16, 2008 (gmt 0)

The reason for the law is to prop up the long-tail book sellers who otherwise would lose all their bestseller income and become significantly less viable, meaning that French people would have difficulty getting any thing but bestsellers.

Now, Amazon.fr have a much longer tail than any other book seller in France and so they are actually working in the spirit of the law by bringing long tail books to every remote corner of France, even tiny villages many kilometres from a physical book seller.

Surely there is a case for an exemption from the law applied to any retailer who undertakes to keep a reasonably priced long tail range. In fact, it would provide an incentive for 'supermarkets and the like' to start stocking a substantial long tail of books just to be able to discount bestsellers, something they would never even consider now.