Why on earth does Fahrad Manjoo, otherwise smart writer and NPR commentator, say this:
To tell you the truth, I have no idea. Nobody outside Amazon does. What struck me when I saw the zero price for The Hunger Games is that I simply don’t know what Amazon is up to with the lending library. This is not a novel sensation: I am frequently flummoxed by Amazon, the most inscrutable of all the companies I cover regularly.
via Nobody Seems to Understand What Jeff Bezos is Doing. Does He? | PandoDaily.
Could it be more obvious? Like every retailer, they use shocking low prices, on and off, ‘get it while you can’, to turn the wheel of a virtuous circle: more customers/distribution, lower costs, more and better product, lower prices, more customers.