In France there is a law that says you are not allowed to sell books for more than 5 percent off the list price. We have lots of silly laws in the US as well so it is tough to fault the French for this ridiculous anti-consumer law. The problem is this law is obviously not good for a company like Amazon who has decided to ignore the law and instead pay a relatively small fine.

The challenge for the company is that soon the fine amount may increase and Amazon will have to decide how to proceed. Jeff Bezos has tried to rally the French public in support of free shipping by the way. It will be interesting to see how this plays out.

In the mean time here is an Ars Technical article with more details.