Kindle Pricing, Business Models and Source Code 156
narramissic writes "A trifecta of Kindle-related news surfaced this week, with Jeff Bezos speaking at Wired's 'Disruptive by Design' conference on topics including Kindle pricing and business models. And yesterday, reports blogger Peter Smith, 'there was a flurry of blogging activity yesterday stating that Amazon had released the Kindle source code. Once everyone caught their breath, it became apparent that the files in question were just some open source libraries that Amazon had modified (they're being good open source citizens and releasing mods they've made to open source code — good for them!), not the complete source code.' Now, back to the Kindle pricing: According to a post at Wired, Bezos said Amazon opted to sell the Kindle for 'something akin to the actual cost for hardware,' rather than subsidizing the hardware costs and requiring a monthly subscription or requiring the buyer to purchase a certain number of books per month because 'fees and minimum purchase requirements create friction.' Smith has a different take: 'If I'm buying a Kindle from Amazon that enables me to buy books from Amazon, I'm broadcasting a desire to buy Kindle books. I would welcome some subsidization of the hardware since I'm going to be buying content anyway. No, I really think Amazon priced the Kindle the way they did because they thought they could get away with doing so (and they were right, it would seem).' Meanwhile, over at the New York Times, Bezos said 'that he sees Kindle-the-device and Kindle-the-book-format as two separate business models, and that the Kindle iPhone App won't be the last software reader to appear.'"
Re:Kindle 1 owner (Score:3, Informative)
This isn't true, at least not 100%.
I have one book in Topaz (not a statistically significant sample, but it's all I have), and it renders fine.
Of course, you have to remember that the purpose of Topaz is to embed your own fonts. Most author/publishers will use this feature because they "don't like" the default font. My Topaz book has used the embedded fonts to display foreign characters (Chinese, Arabic, Japanese, Linear B, the whole lot of em) inline, without having to resort to using images. It all displays fine, both in terms of actual artifacts, and in terms of the foreign characters themselves.
Without seeing the specs for the file format itself, I am disinclined to term it broken or bad. Rather, it's a tool that is used more often used badly, incorrectly, and for the wrong purposes. Is the FONT tag in HTML inherently evil (CSS aside) because people misuse it more often than not? (FONT is debatable, but MARQUEE and BLINK are the devil's work for sure)
The book in question is: http://www.amazon.com/Writing-Systems-A-Linguistic-Approach/dp/B000VSSG9S/ref=ed_oe_k [amazon.com]
Re:Don't subsidise the hardware - subsidise the bo (Score:4, Informative)
Digital content has no intrinsic cost, so it's not much of a subsidy on their behalf.
While I'm a huge fan of free stuff, I would like to point out that they still have to pay the authors and publishers for use of the copyrighted material.
Re:End of print periodical? (Score:4, Informative)
Found it! http://kindlefeeder.com/ [kindlefeeder.com]
Amazon didn't shut them down, someone just noted that it could be construed as against the TOS, but efforts at contacting Amazon for legal clarification have not been returned.
Not buying Kindle books for my Kindle... (Score:5, Informative)
I have a Kindle. I love it. But I'm not buying books from the Kindle store for my Kindle, because they're DRM-encrusted. I'm buying my ebooks from another legitimate source which sells them to me in formats I can convert, and I convert them into Mobi and put them on my Kindle using Calibre.
So, buying a Kindle does not automatically signal a desire to buy Kindle books. Some of us just like the hardware.
Mobipocket and DRM (Score:4, Informative)
First: the DRM has been broken - AZW is the Mobipocket file-format with just one byte changed so a Mobipocket reader software won't accept it. So to break Amazons DRM google for "MobiDeDRM" and "Kindle Mobipocket conversion" - it will be the #1 hit ;-).
Now having said that you might notice something: Mobipocket has free to download readers for just about 12 different devices. So if Amazon wanted what you suggest all they had to to is not change that one byte. So in changing that one byte it is a clear signal that that they want there books to be read on Kindle and Kindle alone. And iPhone is just a special exception.
Before you wonder: Amazon owns Mobipocket [1] - so no they won't change there reader to accept Kindle books. In fact Mobipocket has stopped producing new reader software all together.
It is not difficult see the evil masterplan behind: The typical Embrace, Extend, Extinguish plan which is now in the last phase: Mobipocket to be extinguished by not creating new software for todays devices. Amazon even got as far as stopping the finished Mobipocktet iPhone reader. And last not least: not licensing the Mobipocket file format to Sony.
For those who own Mobipocket books - ahh sorry mate you loose. Only by now Amazon has pissed of European customers [2] big time. After all we can't buy Kindle and feel the Mobipocket demise double. And we found out about Sony.
Martin
[1] http://www.mobipocket.com/ [mobipocket.com]
[2] http://www.mobipocket.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=15520 [mobipocket.com]
Re:Kindle 1 owner (Score:3, Informative)
You email/call customer service within 7 days of purchase. They don't even ask for a reason, although if you provide one they will attempt to address it. For example, when they process a return based on formatting errors, they will include in the refund notification that they have informed the publisher of the problem (it's the publishers problem to fix, not Amazon's.)
When I tried to get a refund for a 7 month old book based on TTS disabling, I got a) a refusal because it had been quite a bit longer than 7 days, and b) a rather large description of why TTS had been implemented. In addition, I was notified that any books purchased BEFORE TTS was disabled on that book will remain TTS enabled, and I have observed this to be true.
Re:Don't subsidise the hardware - subsidise the bo (Score:3, Informative)
If you notice, though, newer books with paperback editions, typically the Kindle version is $9.99 and the paperback less.
You have to get to much older books for Kindle prices to be lower than paperback prices, and even with old sci-fi novels, its typically 5% less.
Re:Don't subsidise the hardware - subsidise the bo (Score:3, Informative)
That is just not true. Amazon guarantees that the Kindle price will always be less than the dead tree edition. I've never seen the kindle edition of a book which has begun selling trade paperbacks be $9.99. Occasionally the price at Borders or Barnes & Noble will be cheaper because they have the hardcover on sale for 40% off, and the Kindle price is only 30% off the listed hardcover price, though if you can wait a week or two for new releases the price goes down from the price on the release date.