Alapage was an online bookstore founded in 1996 by Patrice Magnard, before being bought by France Telecom in September 1999. Alapage became a subsidiary of Wanadoo, the internet service provider of France Telecom, in July 2000. Chapitre.com was an independent online bookstore, created in 1997 by Juan Pirlot de Corbion. BOL.fr was the French subsidiary of BOL.com (BOL: Bertelsmann On Line), launched in August 1999 by Bertelsmann, a German media giant, in partnership with Vivendi, a French multinational company. Unlike their counterparts in the U.S. and in U.K., where book prices were free, French online bookstores couldn't offer significant bargains. A French law - the Lang law - regulated prices. (Jacques Lang was the ministry of culture who fathered the law to protect independent bookstores.) The 5% discount allowed by law for both traditional and online bookstores was offering little latitude to Amazon.fr, Fnac.com, and the likes, who were nevertheless optimistic about the prospects offered by the French-language international market. A significant number of orders was already coming from abroad, with 10% of orders for Fnac.com as early as 1997. Interviewed by AFP (Agence France-Presse) on the Lang Law and the meager 5% discount allowed for book prices, Denis Terrien, president of Amazon France (until May 2001), explained in August 2000: "Our experience in Germany, where book prices are also regulated, shows that prices are not the main factor for our customers to purchase books at Amazon. The main factor resides in the additional services we provide. We offer a whole bunch of services, beginning with a large choice in our catalog - we sell all the French cultural products. We have a powerful search engine. As for music, our site offers the only catalog searchable by song title. In addition to the editorial content of our site, which ranges from the one of a traditional bookstore to the one of a magazine, we have a customer service 24h/24 7days/7, something unique in the French market. Finally, an additional specificity of Amazon is our commitment for a fast delivery. We aim to have more than 90% of our products in stock (at our storage facility)." Amazon's economic model was already admired by many in Europe, but could hardly be considered a model too for staff management, with short-term labor contracts, low wages, and poor working conditions.