Sci-fi and Heroic Fantasy discussion

Amazon (US, so far) and book publisher Hachette are having a little contract negotiation tiff. (Amazon wants cheaper wholesale rates for books — especially e-books — and Hachette would rather not lower their prices.)

To tighten the screws on Hachette, Amazon has stopped taking pre-orders for upcoming Hachette books.

I noticed this a few days ago. After I got done reading Parasite (which is our current Contemporary Book Discussion), I pre-ordered the e-book of the sequel, Symbiont. Two days later, I got an e-mail from Amazon informing me that product was no longer available, and they would e-mail me again when it became available. :P (Symbiont is published by Orbit, which is a Hachette subsidiary.) Indeed, the book is still listed on Amazon, but you can't order it.

(I know, it seems silly pre-ordering an e-book. I mean, it's not like I want it shipped in time for release-day delivery.)

Hachette is one of the big five publishing houses, and was recently part of the Apple anti-trust price-fixing trial.

Amazon is the Internet retailing behemoth, and coincidentally owner of Goodreads. (Amazon tried something similar once before, with Macmillan publishing back in 2010, which didn't seem to work out in their favor, though commentators seem to think Amazon has the advantage this go-round.)

SF writer Charles Stross weighs discusses the dispute. (Stross is the author of "Equoid", which is our Novella discussion for the month.)

There's a longer business-oriented article in Forbes if you're interested.

I think this is all part of the massive war going on in publishing in general. In publishing, times are a changin'.

With all the changes in publishing because of ebooks, this spat isn't unexpected. What I guess is that either publishers will have to take over primary distribution of their own ebooks, or legislation will have to be enacted to prevent publisher/distributor combinations like Amazon.

It reminds me of the war between the Time Lords and the Daleks in Dr Who - not sure it will do either of them any good.

Jeff wrote: "What I guess is that either publishers will have to take over primary distribution of their own ebooks,..."

To do that, the publishers would have to get over their love of DRM. There are only a few e-book ecosystems in the US (Amazon, Apple, B&N, Kobo), and to sell books onto them, you either go through those vendors or skip the DRM.

Baen tried selling e-books directly (w/o DRM), but eventually decided selling through Amazon was more lucrative because it produced more sales. (They still sell w/o DRM, even on Amazon.)

Tor publishes without DRM, and they had plans for their own store back in 2012, but they seem to have abandoned that idea (their parent company, Mcmillian, sells on the web, but for e-books they just refer to Amazon, Apple, B&N and Kobo). They still sell w/o DRM.

So so far, publishers haven't had a lot of luck welling direct. (Mostly because consumers don't want to think, "I want to buy 'Symbiont', who publishes that?" They want to type a few letters into their eReader and start reading.


Jeff wrote: "or legislation will have to be enacted to prevent publisher/distributor combinations like Amazon...."

I don't know about the UK, but I don't see that happening in the US. There could potentially be some anticompetitive practice suits from the US Justice Department, but just haggling over price usually doesn't qualify as anticompetitive here.

There is no pressure at all for legislation in the UK unless the EU decides to do something. The real problem is that to get the "big five" on Amazon they offered them really good terms, now Amazon is playing hardball to get them to agree to new terms more like what the indies get, and authors and readers are caught in the cross fire.

Here's a more neutral article over the situation.

http://davidgaughran.wordpress.com/20...

I found the "that margins [for publishers] are around 75% for e-books, about 60% on paperbacks, and about 40% on hardcovers." to be interesting. One spokesman for a publisher (Random House?) wrote - presumably with a straight face - that the cost of formatting & storing ebooks made them as expensive as paper books. Her point was that paper, binding, transportation, & their ridiculous distribution practices really didn't add much to the cost - an obvious lie.

The real question is, if there is so much extra money to go around, aren't their better places to spend it? It would be nice to see authors get a bigger cut, but I'd especially appreciate it if they spent more on editing & ramping up their ability to handle more authors.

Interesting point in Gaughran's article, that Barnes and Noble pulled a similar stunt recently against Simon and Schuster, and very little public fuss was made about it.

Jim wrote: The real question is, if there is so much extra money to go around, aren't their better places to spend it? It would be nice to see authors get a bigger cut, but I'd especially appreciate it if they spent more on editing & ramping up their ability to handle more authors.

It is sad how much of a cut traditional authors get from those $30 hardback books. I think it's something like $3 and $1.50 for a paperback, depending on their contract.

I've read recent articles about how authors aren't getting as much help from big publishers too. The editing has really suffered, the covers, etc. I know a bestselling author whose publishing company wouldn't pay for a map in her book, so she had to make her own. And she has to do most of her marketing too.

The golden days, as many authors have said, are gone. But it seems like big publishing companies are still raking in the money.

I was talking with someone who works at Amazon about this. He said that recently publishers have been making Amazon sell ebooks higher than print costs to clear stock (I'm assuming paperback stocks).

Not only is Amazon freezing out the pre-order books, but also they have put all Hatchette books on delayed delivery - even though they supposedly have the books in stock, they all say it will take several weeks for delivery. And they have supposedly raised prices (or removed the usual kindle discount) so an ebook they would typically sell for $7.99 is now $9.99. And they were putting banners on the pages saying something like, "If you like this book, try this other one, it's cheaper and ships immediately," though these have been removed, I guess.

The fact is whatever the problem between Amazon and Hatchette, Amazon is choosing to make readers and authors the ones who suffer. I find the Kindle app so very convenient, but I'm glad I have a tablet that I can use any app with and I will definitely be changing my buying habits.

I'm boycotting Amazon for at least two years because of this nonsense. Because of the price they're now charging for some books I'd intended to order, I'm going to lose out on a great shipping deal I was getting. And considering when I buy physical books they have to be shipped all the way to South America? I try to capitalize on all the deals I can get, because it can cost me as much as $30 just to ship down here sometimes.

Amazon & Hachette dig in for long contract fight (NY Times)

"Amazon & Hachette dig in for long contract fight (NY Times)"

I thought the last two paragraphs there, unrelated to the actual topic of the article, were the most chilling:

But even those who believed Amazon was ushering in a utopia of publishing were jolted a few months ago when it abruptly chopped the royalty rates on self-published audiobooks.

“I’m shocked that Amazon would do anything to fuel the speculation that once they grow big enough, authors will suffer,” wrote Hugh Howey, an author who is usually a champion of Amazon’s way of doing things.

I hadn't heard anything about that!?

I think I'm going to boycott Amazon even longer. If they can play their games with absolutely no consideration for readers, why should we support them by giving them our business?

For the other side of the argument http://jakonrath.blogspot.co.uk/2014_...

I've avoided buying ebooks from Amazon ever since they shut down a woman's ebook account without warning and refused to let her get all of her ebooks first and no refund for her extensive library.

She had to use Amazon UK to buy her ebooks while living in another country. I don't recall why.

When Iread about this, I downloaded my ebooks to my PC for storage. That was a few years ago and I do not recall how I downloaded to my hard drive.

Thanks, Tim. That was an interesting bit by Konrath. I've liked a lot of his blogs on this subject. He published some with Eisler a while back, too.

It is kind of nice to see Amazon beating up the publishers, but I buy elsewhere when I can. Unfortunately, they don't have much competition. Their searches, lists, & inventory are tough to beat. Their delivery is especially convenient for too many people & no one else is up to giving them a go on a one to one basis.

I've mentioned this before on another thread but I believe it to be relevant in this discussion...Nothing peeves me off like the same book being offered in Harcover at one price and an e-book at a HIGHER price. It's gauging the ebook reader - there is no way it can cost more to publish an ebook than to publish a hardcover. This is becoming a regular occurance with new releases. I think Amazon is thinking the same way and they are sticking up for us in this respect (although I'm sure that's just a side-effect of something else they are trying to accomplish). Regardless, I'm with Amazon on this one.

I agree with Jim and Rose. Amazon is the one who fought back when iTunes entered into that deal with other publishers to push book prices up. And everyone but Amazon is trying to make ebook prices equal or higher than book prices. Amazon does hold the market, but big publishers stood on that pedestal for years without competition or check. Competition between companies is usually good for consumers.

I've read & heard from authors that initial release numbers, the amount brought in, are the most important to the publisher. A book can sell steadily for years & the publisher often doesn't care, only what it made in the first few months. They often don't even have good numbers for previous sales, especially if there has been a merger & there have been a lot of those. Not good business, IMO. They have quite a few such boondoogles, though.

In case I wasn't clear, Amazon worries me. Their insistence on not supporting epub & pdf natively on their devices, DRM, & market share mean that while they may be right in this instance, the tables could quickly turn on consumers. They offer a great service, when they work, but when they don't, they can be distant & draconian.

Look at how they handled the mix up with versions of "1984". Without warning, they just yanked it from their devices. Or how they handle reviews. I wrote one that included one 'bad' word in a quote & had it rejected. They allow books to use 'bad' words in their titles, but try referring to that title in another review, even by the same author & it is rejected. None of this is a big deal, but it could be a few years down the road when they have even a bigger market share.

I see a lot of it as growing pains. If authors would publish through multiple outlets, it would take a lot of the leverage out of Amazon. From what I hear, it's a real pain to format for the Kindle & yet it's the best market. On top of that, Amazon offers special deals & weighs searches so that an author that publishes with them exclusively comes up higher & faster. IMO, that's an unfair business practice, especially for the consumer. We don't care where author X publishes, we just want a list of books that meet our search criteria.

Jim wrote: "Their insistence on not supporting epub & pdf natively on their devices, DRM, & market share mean that ..."

One small quibble: Amazon is not the one insisting on DRM. That's a publisher requirement. Apparently most of the big boys think the reading public are just dying to steal a book. As you may recall both Baen & Tor sell their e-books through Amazon and B&N and elsewhere without DRM. DRM is a self-inflicted wound by the publishers, so it's almost humorous that they now fret about Amazon having locked in so many customers to their Kindle ecosystem.

We've seen this movie before. When the music publishers first made music available for legal download, they insisted on DRM. Then it was Apple, and its iPod/iTunes ecosystem that benefited from the DRM lock-in effect. Ironically, it was Amazon that convinced the music publishers to let them sell DRM-free MP3s, finally allowing someone other than Apple to sell music effectively to the mass of iTunes & iPod listeners.

Apparently the book publishers will just have to figure this out for themselves.

BTW, Tor founder Tom Doherty gave a report on two years of Tor publishing without DRM just the other day. Long story short, they haven't seen any increase in piracy, but neither has being DRM-free increased their sales.

Jim wrote:I see a lot of it as growing pains. If authors would publish through multiple outlets, it would take a lot of the leverage out of Amazon. From what I hear, it's a real pain to format for the Kindle & yet it's the best market. On top of that, Amazon offers special deals & weighs searches so that an author that publishes with them exclusively comes up higher & faster.

It's super easy to format for Kindle. Scrivener is a wonderful program that allows an author to format for epub, .mobi, PDF, and paperback off of a single document. Compared to Microsoft Word, it's super cheap too.

While an author has the option to go with Amazon's KDP select program, it's not a must. Many authors, myself included, deal directly with Amazon and then post their book to Smashwords which distributes to all the other vendors. It's super easy.

The KDP Select program's one big advantage, from what I understand, is that you can set your book for free for a limited time and it's advertised. But with a little work, Amazon will price match other online stores, so it is possible to get your book set to free if you are running an ad on one of the other big ad sites like Bookbub or Freebooksy.

Lately, I've had more sales through B&N than Amazon, which makes me wonder if more people are shifting to Nook.

G33z3r wrote: Apparently the book publishers will just have to figure this out for themselves.

BTW, Tor founder Tom Doherty gave a report on two years of Tor publishing without DRM just the other day. Long story short, they haven't seen any increase in piracy, but neither has being DRM-free increased their sales.

So true, and thanks for the link. Very interesting article.

I use scrivener as well, but on the PC at least the ePub files it produces aren't right for Apple as they actually use the iba format. However if you go through Smashwords then they convert it for you.

Nook has zero presence outside the US, while Kobo is massive elsewhere in the world ( esp. Canada), so I expect Kobo/Apple to be Kindle's main competition. The main issue with both is that they really don't seem to understand that they shouldn't lay things out like a traditional bookstore (e.g people paying for being on the front page) but use a more algorithm based system like Amazon that picks stuff you might want to read.

I stand corrected on the DRM. I've only had second hand reports on this & the KDP Select program, so it's good to hear. I notice no one disagreed about the searches, though.

I hadn't realized there were different versions of epub files. That's disheartening.

Jim wrote: "I notice no one disagreed about the searches, though...."

I can if you'd like... :)

Back in the old days, when there were physical bookstores like B&N, Borders and Waldenbooks, those stores had physical book displays. There were usually some tables up front displaying some new or featured releases, and a couple of dedicated displays for extra-special books (e.g., the new Twilight or Harry Potter release.) Even on the standard shelves, some books were turned sideways so the front cover was displayed. That's actually negotiated between publisher, distributor and retailer. (e.g. B&N might get special pricing from Random-Penguin in exchange for putting some of their books in the front "Just Released" display.)

The online stores have much the same deal. Amazon and B&N have some prime Internet real estate. The "New and In The News" & "Coming Soon" display on barnesandnoble.com or Amazon's "Summer Reading" or "Top Picks" displays, or the weekly "new in SF/F" email I get from both stores, are akin to paid advertisements (and extremely effective advertisements, since they're placed right where people go to buy.) Except the payment is usually in the form of contract terms.

It's the same deal with other retail. If there's a special display of Skippy Peanut Butter at the grocery store, chances are Hormel offered a discount wholesale price in exchange for the sales promotion.

I'm not sure how Amazon prioritizes its search results (other than it's way better than Goodreads' search! :( ) I did notice a couple of weeks ago, before this dispute broke out in the open, that when I first went to pre-order Grant's Symbiont (an Orbit/Hachette title) it was the 3rd search result behind two other books of the same title. Today, despite the current Amazon/Hachette dispute, the Mira Grant book is now the first search result (though you can't pre-order it anymore!. :( ) I assume that change in search results order reflects Amazon's metrics on the popularity of click-through for that search term (presumably increasing as Grant's Symbiont release date approaches). i suppose its been sufficient to overcome Amazon's current de-emphasis of Hachette titles. (The Mira Grant is also the first "Symbiont" result from B&N.)


Your point is spot on, though. The more market share Amazon controls, the more valuable that display real estate on its website is, and the more concessions they can demand from publishers in exchange for preferential display.

I hear they charge a lot of money for those physical displays, but I see your point.

Salon has an interesting article on long-term disruptive changes in the book industry, going back to the introduction of paperbacks (Gutenberg somehow not in the loop.) Why authors lost the book wars long before Amazon’s dustup with Hachette.

Looks like the Duel is becoming a war...Stephen King and a buch of other authors published an open letter coming down on the side of Hachette, Hugh Howey has one making the rounds on the side of Amazon. What's more, Amazon is now using tactics similar to those it's useing on Hachette against Disney to get the price they want on DVDs. Meanwhile, negotiations are upcoming between Amazon and some of the other major publishers. This is turning into a dangerous game methinks...

It's an ugly fight & the main point has been buried beneath the rhetoric. As usual, lots of 'he said, she said' & no one is looking too good, including some of the big name authors & their various groups. Let's just hope the authors & the consumers win out in the end.

Amazon is pressuring traditional publishers on one of their more idiotic bits of business - first flush sales. Publishers think an ebook is worth more the first few months that it is out for some reason & base their numbers around it. Amazon disagrees. While I can't say I approve of all Amazon's methods, they wouldn't work if the publishers had stronger legs to stand on.
The traditional publishers are reeling, trying to make their outdated business model work when it doesn't make sense today. Instead of changing with the times, they're are frantically trying to hold on to what they've always done. It won't work. Amazon is mostly a distribution point, but they're also a publisher, so the fight isn't an even one. The publishers need to realize that, suck it up, & make some major changes to put the fight on a more even footing.

IMO, the publishers need to prove they're adding value to the process. They haven't been doing a great job of that for quite some time. They've lied about the costs as they tried to make a case for high ebook prices with little to no cut for the authors.

Publishers need to support their authors, especially those that have been selling steadily for years. They often don't. Most can't keep the same editors, get any marketing, or recognition. More onus is being put on all their authors to get involved in the process, one they're not particularly suited for. If they were or wanted to, they'd self-publish.

Quality is the one big advantage consumers believe that traditional publishers have over self-published books. It's losing ground, though. Since the error filled Ace reprints of the early 90's to the poorly bound, barely edited mass paperbacks today, too many have let quality slide which has ticked off many of their consumers.

'Free' editorial services. If an author has to get an agent, why not pay an editor instead?

Publishers have to turn around products quickly, but it's close to a year for most books, I think. It can take months for authors to hear from them.

Marketing support by publishers is practically non-existent for any except big name authors. I've seen TV ads for Martin, Patterson, King & others. Not one of those ads was leveraged to help out other authors, though.

Distribution is ridiculous. Book stores can order as many copies as they want then destroy them & get full credit. CreateSpace printed books are like trade paperbacks. No hardbacks or regular paperbacks, but ebooks, especially instantly delivered Kindle ebooks, have taken a big bite out of them & it's getting bigger all the time.

The above are all reasons traditionally published authors have started self-publishing. Amazon doesn't help with quality or editing, but does help with all the rest. No returns on sales, either.

No, I don't feel too sorry for Hatchette or any traditional publisher. I do feel sorry for most of the authors, not the big name ones, though.

Jim wrote: "It's an ugly fight ..."

It's an ugly fight, it's a bug fight, it's a fight hostile to life as we know it.

Would you like to know more?

Sorry, just the way my mind works in the morning.

Hah, G33z3r! And really well said, Jim. I've been following this drama too and your points are spot on.

I think you have to give credit to Hachette for a brilliant PR department (of course, publicity is one of the things traditional publishers are supposed to add to the book manufacturing process.) They keep rolling out authors to complain about Amazon's "bullying tactics", as if Lagardère wasn't a multi-billion-dollar conglomerate itself.

I really have come to hate the way authors wrap themselves in a holy shroud as if books were some sacred artifact not subject to the usual market negotiations. (Why is it when General Motors decides to muscle its aluminum suppliers, bauxite miners don't show up on TV complaining about being used as pawns between automakers and mining companies?)

I also think Amazon's arguments on price have some validity. I just bought The Strange Affair of Spring Heeled Jack. When I looked at the Kindle price, I decided it was too high; and the paperback was even more expensive (despite being 4 years old, it still has no mass market paperback edition.) So I bought a used copy for $3, and as a result neither the publisher nor the author gets a cent. :( Had it been the usual $7.99 mmpb/ebook price, I would've just clicked the buy button.


Jim wrote: "Publishers think an ebook is worth more the first few months that it is out for some reason & base their numbers around it...."

I don't know if they think it's worth more, but they know the market will let them charge more. A premium price for books hot off the press earns them a few extra dollars from fans of the author or series. It's the same reason they don't publish paperbacks until the hardcover has been out for a while. (Also, during the first few weeks a book is out, there are no used copies floating around on the cheap.) The same tactic is used in lots of other entertainment products, including DVDs and video games. They play a supply & demand game trying to maximize profit. I don't see anything wrong with that.

I will pay the premium price for ebooks when I'm hotly following a series or author. I did it for Gladstone's Full Fathom Five & Andrews' Magic Breaks last month, and will do it for Scalzi's Lock In & Hurley's The Mirror Empire next month. Authors I'm less thrilled with wait for the paperback :) Publishers who never seem to get around to paperback pricing get bought used, which I think is a tragedy all around. :(

G33z3r wrote: Had it been the usual $7.99 mmpb/ebook price, I would've just clicked the buy button.

So true. This happened to me at B&N recently. I found a 200 page nonfiction title I wanted to buy, but it was $35. If it had been in the $20 range, I would have bought it, but instead, I left empty handed.

I'll drop $26 on a hardback from my favorite author in hopes of getting it signed one day, but I can't imagine spending $20 on an ebook.

And this article that Hugh Howey just posted this morning is great: http://publishersweekly.com/pw/by-top...

You have a point on the first flush pricing. The entertainment industry relies heavily on it; movie premier receipts, first night TV ratings, & such. I've never thought it was a particularly good method of accounting especially for books. Too many haven't done well at first yet lasted. From the little I've heard, that doesn't count much for the author, though. Often the information is compiled, if it is even available after all the mergers.

It's complicated & there isn't a simple solution. While my last message pointed out how poorly the publishers are doing, there's a lot that Amazon does that's every bit as bad. They've become the 900 lb gorilla in the field & they're pushing their advantage. That's dangerous, especially when you read their terms closely. Having worked with Microsoft for 25 years, I have a pretty good idea just how dangerous, too.

That's what the publishers & authors have found out with Amazon. I doubt very much that Hatchette is taking such a big hit simply for the price of ebooks. There's more going on & I've heard a lot of it is over draconian terms & conditions they want to put on the publisher in other areas. If that's the case, other publishers should be stepping up with Hatchette to stand firm against Amazon, although there may be legal reasons why they don't or won't.

I'm sure it's a lot more complicated than anyone outside of the top folks in both companies know. This is one of those ugly points in history where there's going to be a shake up that will set the stage for decades, if not longer. It was back during the Depression they started letting book stores order as many books as they wanted & return just the front covers for full credit. That decision endures to this day. Let's hope they make better decisions now.

My worry is the upcoming negotiations with other publishers...if they decide to stand with Hachette, they could make trouble for Amazon...but the minute one bolts and takes the Amazon deal, they will all sign. Also, if they DO decide to all go toe to toe with Amazon, Amazon will whip out a lawsuit for price fixing or something (hey, that high-priced legal staff needs something to keep '"em busy)...anyway, right or wrong, I'm pulling for Amazon...I have way to much invested in my digital library...sigh....

Spooky1947 wrote: "...I'm pulling for Amazon...I have way to much invested in my digital library...sigh.... "

Not reason enough, IMO. It's easy enough to save your books to your own storage without DRM. Everyone should. Relying on the good graces of a company that controls the entire supply chain isn't a good idea. We have to do it too often today. Last time my home phone went out, it took them most of a week to fix it. When I got a new TV & needed an HD receiver, it took threatening to go with a rival before I got one for free. They were going to charge me $10/month even though they were giving it away to all new customers. Me? I was just an established customer of over 3 years who had always paid on time & in full, so I deserved no consideration. Microsoft charged us about $100 for downgrade rights on preconfigured systems from Dell... The list goes on & none of it speaks well for large companies that hold the reins.

Wow, I haven't posted here before! Oh, well. Jumping into the fray anyhow.

This is a tough one to me. It isn't that I don't support Amazon - I spend tons of money there. But, I still actually go to the local B&N to purchase even my digital books - because they are a brick and mortar store and I would be lost without them. I wander around in there for hours picking out things to read. It does, however, truly annoy me that I can use that discount card for everything in there but digital books.

On the surface, it looks like the consumer wins if Amazon wins - I mean, that does mean lower prices on eBooks, right? But, I think what you *have* to realize is that Amazon doesn't really care about what you pay for your ebooks - they want you to buy a kindle - or a kindle phone - or whatever else they are building now. THAT is where they are making money. So, anything that ties you into their version is a win for them. And, you are more likely to buy a Kindle if eBooks are cheaper.

Unfortunately, even knowing this, reading both sides, it still makes it really hard for me to support the publisher. I am wonderfully, delightedly happy to support my favorite authors so they can afford to just sit and write all day instead of attending another job for actual monetary support. I highly resent that the big corporations get a bigger piece of the pie than the author does. (I only read - I do not write, so this is purely from a consumer point of view.)

Amazon sells the Kindle pretty much at cost...they make their money on the back end, when you buy digital content for it...at least that's the way it was last I checked. However, you can bet they won't take a hit to their proft margins if the deal goes their way. I still think publishers charge too much for digital books...no printing costs, no paper to buy, no spoiled copies, no shipping costs, ect. Besides, publishers have been ripping off SF authors for decades. Go read Breakfast in the Ruins by Barry N. Malzberg among other sources I could name.

Amazon and Hachette have reached an agreement - many of their book prices have dropped, and books are being shipped out much quicker.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/14/tec...

Michele wrote: "Amazon and Hachette have reached an agreement - many of their book prices have dropped, ..."

Wow, yeah, prices did drop. Ancillary Sword (ebook) went from $12.99 last week to $6.49 now.

From what I understand of the deal, Hachette got the power to set their own pricing (which had been a point of contention), but Amazon is giving them incentives to keep it low.

Sounds like Hachette have got the same deal as all the indie authors, more royalties under $10.

G33z3r wrote: "Michele wrote: "Amazon and Hachette have reached an agreement - many of their book prices have dropped, ..."

Wow, yeah, prices did drop. Ancillary Sword (ebook) went from $12.99 last week to $6.49 now..."

Huh. And Ancillary Sword went back up to $9.99 on Amazon. Go figure.

I did notice another recent Hachette title, Symbiont, was included in a SF/F promotional email I received this morning.