Doesn't the answer to Amazon's dominance lie with you, the publishers? Apple's dominance in the music market has left most record labels over a barrel, but there was no precedent at the time to caution the labels into uniting and negotiating a better deal, or at least maintaining some kind of open market. I worry that many publishers will rush to Amazon in the fear of being left out, but unlike the record labels, publishers are still in a position to supply a superior product (the music business model was already broken when Apple ripped it apart). I found the comments on the resurgence of serials/shorts interesting though; maybe this is an opportunity to create a market for something new/out of favour, rather than reinventing the wheel for the sake of it. Interesting times...

Many authors are not natural performers and do not anyway (despite the growth of literary festivals) have the same access to other sources of income enjoyed by musicians.
So we depend on publishers (like Snowbooks) to keep the market vibrant, innovative and competitive - and growing.