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posted by mrpg on Tuesday November 20 2018, @04:50AM   Printer-friendly
from the La-Belle-Province dept.

As covered by the Guardian, and CBC Radio Canada, but not the English side of CBC.

The annual Prix littéraire des collégiens has been cancelled following protests by the Quebec authors who were in the running for a $5000 prize. Authors were concerned that the prize was now being sponsored by Amazon. In a statement they said:

“Our great unease comes from the dangerous competition this giant has with Quebec bookstores. Need we remind you of the precariousness of the book trade and literary publishing? Need we mention the inhumane methods of this online giant, which constitute a danger for small traders and culture at large?” they wrote.

“Could the [award] do without the money from Amazon? Find sponsors more in line with the values ​​it stands for?” they asked. “Unfortunately, we believe that by uniting with Amazon, the prize is failing in its principal mission, which is to ‘promote Québécois literature today’ … We believe that the defence of Québécois literature and the promotion of a multinational that harms bookstores … cannot go together.”

Award organizers are now working to find alternate means of supporting the award.


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  • (Score: 3, Funny) by bzipitidoo on Tuesday November 20 2018, @05:20AM (7 children)

    by bzipitidoo (4388) on Tuesday November 20 2018, @05:20AM (#764150) Journal

    So, to avoid the danger of Amazon abruptly cutting them off and torpedoing their prize, they cut themselves off from Amazon first?

    Sounds awfully defeatist in a very French way.

    • (Score: 5, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday November 20 2018, @05:52AM (6 children)

      by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday November 20 2018, @05:52AM (#764156) Journal

      Actually, I respect them for their position. In effect, "This contest is meant to promote our home (city/state/nation). By accepting big corporate dollars, we dilute the purpose. Either end the corporate participation, or end the contest."

      Salutes, you Frenchy Canucks!

      • (Score: 5, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday November 20 2018, @06:19AM (3 children)

        by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday November 20 2018, @06:19AM (#764161) Journal

        Decades ago, pretty much every town, large and small, had various events throughout the year. Fourth of July, Memorial day, Corn Festival (or lobster, or beer, or whatever the town was known for). Those events were sponsored by the various businesses in the town. Merchants, manufacturers, craftsmen, maybe the Shriners - townsmen and townswomen, people who belonged to the community.

        Today, so very many of those people have been put out of business by the likes of WalMart, Amazon, and offshoring of American industry. Do those corporations sponsor these events? I've never seen anything around here sponsored by Amazon. WalMart has a physical presence in several towns around here - but I dont' see them sponsoring any events.

        These huge corporations may be very "efficient" at what they do, but they contribute nothing to local culture.

        In view of the fact that Amazon contributes nothing to any town near me, I have to conclude that the only reason Amazon would contribute to the contest in TFA: Amazon sees some kind of opportunity, an opening, to make money.

        Again, salutes to those Quebecois who have told Amazon to just fuck off.

        • (Score: 0, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 20 2018, @09:57AM (2 children)

          by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 20 2018, @09:57AM (#764194)

          Half their own conduct. As nasty as amazon and company are, I remember going to the local stores, finding them overpriced, and dicking you around when returning merchandise that was unfit for use. In contrast, K-Mart, Ross, TJ Maxx, Sears, etc were quite good with returns, and slowly other segments of the market got similar 'big box stores' who eventually ran the other little businessmen out of town. Other businesses with unpleasant locals survived either because no other business served their niche, or they had a lucrative location with Apple-esque cult of personality. Most of those businesses still survive around here to this day, to different levels of success (some have shrunk in size, some have expanded, some have remained the same.)

          Long story short: Some areas did better thanks to the big nasty corporations, others did quite badly. But how much each was just about cost vs how much was about service, would really require more in depth interviews with locals who can still remember the good (or bad) old days and what sorts of trials dealing with the locally owned businesses really entailed.

          On a related note: The majority of comic/rpg hobby shops in the area are now corporate owned where I am. There are still established invidividual stores, but most of them are either aging out or running out of business over time.

          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 20 2018, @03:12PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 20 2018, @03:12PM (#764252)

            I've seen small businesses bend over backwards to serve the customer however when they start the the path to going out of business it forces miserly behavior. As soon as I notice this in a restaurant I'll stop going there because it'll be downhill quality till they do close.

          • (Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday November 20 2018, @06:14PM

            by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday November 20 2018, @06:14PM (#764319) Journal

            There were miserable, miserly fools in most towns. They didn't participate much in those events I mentioned. Some might, if they were dragged along by peer pressure, but the really miserable old fools weren't easy to pressure.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 21 2018, @12:26AM (1 child)

        by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 21 2018, @12:26AM (#764474)

        we get a lot of shit for this from the press from the rest of Canada for thing like this. You see, most Quebecers are nationalist, not really separatist but proud to be from Québec first Canada second. Also most Quebecers are against religious clothing like burqua, tchador and the like and most boomers are really anticlerical for them any religious symbol visibly worn in public. The Canadian medias are pro multiculturalism beyond belief and were pro assimilation integration. We welcome the good thing from emigration but we demand that they adopt our language and shared values, like equality between sexes and the laicity of the state.

        But be warned, politically our rigth that you can vote for is as socialist Bernie Sander and our left lead by https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manon_Massé, [wikipedia.org] but we're not communist we're quite centrist by European standard. Traditionally the cleavage use to be between separatist and federalist now it is between separatist left, separatist center, the weakly nationalist center and federalist center. the weakly nationalist center won.

        • (Score: 2) by dry on Wednesday November 21 2018, @04:16AM

          by dry (223) on Wednesday November 21 2018, @04:16AM (#764578) Journal

          Learned a new word, [url:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La%C3%AFcit%C3%A9] which seems a good thing to strive for.
          While I don't like religious clothing or most religions, I don't think it is the States job to police it, which seems more Laïcité to me.

  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by zocalo on Tuesday November 20 2018, @07:55AM (4 children)

    by zocalo (302) on Tuesday November 20 2018, @07:55AM (#764173)
    "Inhumane"? Really? Amazon undeniably has some aggressive business practices that have devastated retail outlets that have failed to adapt, bookstores in particular, but I don't think that word means what they seem to think it means. I sympathise with their general position, but for authors in the running for literary awards I'd expect a better understanding of word definitions and the use of hyperbole than that - maybe these awards are not for them in more ways than one...
    --
    UNIX? They're not even circumcised! Savages!
    • (Score: 5, Insightful) by Blymie on Tuesday November 20 2018, @08:49AM

      by Blymie (4020) on Tuesday November 20 2018, @08:49AM (#764180)

      I say this in the best form of an English Canadian, making fun of my French Canadian brothers.

      You see -- you're reading it wrong. It's not "inhumane", it's "in-human". Amazon is an English company, run by English people, who do not speak French... and such people are not considered a human being. :P

    • (Score: 3, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 20 2018, @09:09AM (2 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 20 2018, @09:09AM (#764185)

      Really. They treat their employees like robots.

      • (Score: 3, Touché) by takyon on Tuesday November 20 2018, @01:37PM (1 child)

        by takyon (881) <reversethis-{gro ... s} {ta} {noykat}> on Tuesday November 20 2018, @01:37PM (#764233) Journal

        Amazon is a progressive company that is getting ahead of the curve by minimizing meatbag inefficiency.

        Soon they will deploy the Amazonk Prometheans, liberating their warehouse workers to take on new positions as nuclear fusion technicians, mathematicians, robot salespeople, outsourcing analysts, professional protesters, prostitutes, drug mules, etc.

        --
        [SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by choose another one on Tuesday November 20 2018, @08:19AM

    by choose another one (515) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday November 20 2018, @08:19AM (#764175)

    Award organizers are now working to find alternate means of supporting the award.

    Well how about the very simple route of just giving the award but without the prize money that apparently nobody wants anyway because it comes from Amazon?

    What is it that the authors are actually interested in, the prestige of the award or the prize money? If it's the latter then what is wrong with taking the money of a enterprise that values commercial success over Québécois literature and bookstores since you value commercial success over Québécois literature and bookstores, if it's the former then what is wrong with simply giving the award without any prize money?

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