Well, it happened—Amazon finally went too far. The online retailer is going to war with Hachette, a major New York publisher, and Amazon has recently resorted to some pretty despicable business tactics to get its way. Of course, I’ve written about the unnerving and ever-growing power of Amazon on this blog before, and hand-wringing articles about the influence of the company on the book business can start to seem old-hat.

But if you care about books, you need to listen up, because this is serious. If someone doesn’t take action to keep Amazon in check, it won’t just be publishers and writers who will suffer. What Amazon is doing is bad for readers as well—and if the company keeps growing, what we see them doing today in bookselling we may see tomorrow in all sectors of the retail economy.

What’s happening is this: Amazon, who is under pressure by their investors to increase their profit margins, is trying to get more favorable terms on ebooks from Hachette. Hachette doesn’t want to give in.

So far, so good—business partners negotiate with each other all the time, working their way to terms that are mutually acceptable and beneficial to both parties to the partnership.

But where Amazon is stepping over the line is in its use of underhanded negotiating tactics. They’re not getting what they want from Hachette. And in response? Well, so far we’ve seen them delay shipping times on the Hachette titles they have in stock. Ann Leckie’s Ancillary Justice, which just won a Nebula and which sci-fi fans might reasonably want to read, has a shipping time of 2 to 5 weeks as of this writing. Many others in the Hachette catalog are the same. Which is ridiculous when you consider that Amazon is known for extremely short shipping times, most recently offering free 2-day shipping to Prime customers. Amazon has these books in stock. There’s no reason for the delay. They’re just trying to screw over Hachette for not giving them what they want.

Today, Amazon escalated their war and made things even worse. Now, forthcoming Hachette titles no longer have buy buttons for customers to preorder. That includes a new novel by Robert Galbraith (aka J.K. Rowling).

Now, though Amazon is acting extremely shady here, there’s nothing illegal about what the company is doing. As a business, they have every right to say to Hachette: “We don’t like your terms, so we’d prefer not to do business with you.” And Hachette, for their part, could walk away from the partnership as well. Something similar happened not long ago with Barnes & Noble and Simon & Schuster, and the dispute was eventually resolved.

But the thing is, Hachette can’t just walk away from a partnership with Amazon. Amazon is so big and so powerful that to not do business with them would be a death-knell for a publisher like Hachette.

That’s what makes this whole thing so scary. It reveals the extent to which Amazon has become a monopoly when it comes to bookselling. Technically, Amazon may have competitors: Barnes & Noble is still a (weak) player, and independent book stores are alive and kicking. But the only reason Amazon can do what it’s doing and get away with it is that when you really come down to it, Amazon is the only game in town. If consumers can’t find a book at Amazon, or can’t get the book they want fast enough, a lot of them just won’t buy the book. Hachette and its authors will feel the hurt. But Amazon will be fine.

That’s a pretty huge bargaining chip for Amazon. And it’s one that’s screwing up the market. We’re talking about one company that is exerting a tremendous influence on the book business—more, perhaps, than B&N and the big six publishers combined. They’re throwing their weight around in business partnerships, and using their size and power as an unfair advantage in negotiations. And they’ve got very little meaningful competition in the bookselling space.

What’s more, Amazon is increasing its reach into other sectors of the retail business. How long will it be before we see Amazon pulling the same shenanigans with Proctor & Gamble, GE, Nestle, and General Mills?

More importantly, how long will it be before the consumer finally starts to feel the pain of decreased competition and unfair business practices?

It’s time to stop this. Here are three things you can do to stop Amazon’s unethical business practices and their increasing power over the retail industry:

1. Stop buying from them. Until this thing with Hachette gets worked out, don’t buy anything from Amazon, whether it’s books or anything else. Don’t download anything on your Kindle. And cancel your Prime membership if you’ve got a renewal coming up. I know, I know—they just started offering HBO shows, but this is short-term pain for long-term gain.

2. Ask your state or federal representative to level the playing field. One of the reasons Amazon has gained such power in the marketplace is unfair advantage: in many states, they don’t have to pay sales tax. That means that they get to offer lower prices than many of their competitors. If you live in a state where Amazon doesn’t have to pay sales tax, tell your state representative to do something about that. Or contact your senator or representative and ask for a solution at the federal level.

3. Petition for antitrust action against Amazon. Look, I’m not a lawyer. But it seems to me that we’ve reached some kind of tipping point where it’s clear that Amazon’s size and power are harmful to the working of the free market and the public good—at least when it comes to the book industry. It’s time to put a stop to it.

Let me be clear: I love Amazon. I think they’re an awesome company. For years, they’ve helped me fill my bookshelves with books that I love, and helped push their competitors to provide better service and book recommendations to consumers. But even as a consumer, I fear a future in which they dominate the retail industry—when everyone works in an Amazon warehouse, local retail is no more, and everything from books to toilet paper comes to our homes by Amazon Drone.

Let’s stop it from happening, OK?

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