A defender of PPMC might argue that editors routinely make publishing decisions without further consulting reviewers.
A book editor was also much closer to the marketplace and the bookseller back then, and he made many more general publishing decisions than he does now.
"Above all else," the report says, "during the Third Reich, C. Bertelsmann remained a business enterprise whose publishing decisions were based on turnover, profit, investments and other fiscal data".
The fear is that access to real numbers will begin to dictate publishing decisions even more than sales considerations already do.
A lot has been written about how the internet demands immediate, unverified imagery and how that is leading to bad publishing decisions, but it has always been thus.
A spokeswoman for Norton, Louise Brockett, said only that "we resolved our differences with the author amicably, we wish him well, and it would be inappropriate for us to discuss our publishing decisions".
Other executives at Random House said the details of her collaboration remained to be determined, and some agents wondered how effective Ms. Grann might be in attracting her former authors if her control over publishing decisions was incomplete and advisory.
At Condé Nast, which owns The New Yorker, Mr. Carey had been able to make publishing decisions after meeting with the chairman, S. I. Newhouse Jr., or the chief executive, Steven T. Florio, executives said yesterday.
After working briefly for the now-defunct firm of Nicolson and Watson -- which amazed him by turning down George Orwell's "Animal Farm" -- Mr. Deutsch decided he wanted to make his own publishing decisions.
Eventually the marketable value of a submitted manuscript became an important factor in publishing decisions.
