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Audiblegate

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Re: Audiblegate

#31

Post by jsnell »

axxl wrote: post #22
jsnell wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The site has more details in other articles. They're not worth reading. There's no substance just a lot of charged language. And I'm really annoyed at spending any time at all on reading this. The narrators don't get paid by the retail price (and the contract doesn't suggest they would). Basically Audible splits the money spent on credits among the books that the credits were spent on in proportion to the number of c…

> there's no substance just a lot of charged language. Yeah, this was my issue with all I could find so far. It seems like 'working as designed'. Perhaps those who publish on audible would like to be able to opt in or out of various sales/credits etc but as a customer I prefer that I can get anything with a credit. > Basically Audible splits the money spent on credits among the books that the credits were spent on, e…

Across the system, not per-user.

The only funky thing is that IIUC the computation of the total income across the whole system is done based on credits sold that month, rather than deferring the income from selling a credit to the month in which the credit is spent.

Re: Audiblegate

#32

Post by tehwebguy »

jsnell wrote: post #31
axxl wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> there's no substance just a lot of charged language. Yeah, this was my issue with all I could find so far. It seems like 'working as designed'. Perhaps those who publish on audible would like to be able to opt in or out of various sales/credits etc but as a customer I prefer that I can get anything with a credit. > Basically Audible splits the money spent on credits among the books that the credits were spent on, e…

Across the system, not per-user. The only funky thing is that IIUC the computation of the total income across the whole system is done based on credits sold that month, rather than deferring the income from selling a credit to the month in which the credit is spent.

I wonder if authors are the ones who pay for the free Audible subscriptions that American Express Platinum card holders get now?

There is a huge a “Hollywood accounting” problem that never really went away (it’s how Warner Brothers markets HBO Max for free, how bands on major labels & even indies never recoup, and now possibly know how Amazon grows audible at no cost to themselves).

Re: Audiblegate

#34

Post by TheAceOfHearts »

I find Audible really easy and convenient, but it's frustrating to hear that authors get shafted. Some independent authors I follow have been banned from Amazon's platforms and they were forced to create their own platforms and self-host. The downside is that the audiobooks are more expensive. The upside is that they're DRM-free and the creators receive a much higher percentage of sales, so they can get by with fewer sales.

Re: Audiblegate

#35

Post by vasachi »

You’d think a simple report of all sales of a book within a period would solve all the issues. A simple table of:

Timestamp, book, price

Then author could simply calculate and verify royalties.

Re: Audiblegate

#36

Post by lotophage »

ALittleLight wrote: post #27

I worked on a tool at Amazon once that incorrectly calculated royalties, not because Amazon was greedily trying to steal from publishers, but just because of general incompetence (or, lack of sufficient competence maybe). Basically, of the people who wrote the tool, tested the tool, and used the tool, none of them knew exactly how royalties should be calculated and none of them could tell whether or not they were bei…

The nature of these kinds of errors is that when the error favors Amazon (or whatever company), it's "keep the lights on" mode. If it's the company losing money then alarm bells ring, and it's "all hands on deck" to fix the issue.

Re: Audiblegate

#37

Post by duped »

ALittleLight wrote: post #27

I worked on a tool at Amazon once that incorrectly calculated royalties, not because Amazon was greedily trying to steal from publishers, but just because of general incompetence (or, lack of sufficient competence maybe). Basically, of the people who wrote the tool, tested the tool, and used the tool, none of them knew exactly how royalties should be calculated and none of them could tell whether or not they were bei…

Why was this not defined in a spec document and checked in a unit test?

Everywhere I've worked where there were defined formulae (or formulae to be defined) this kind of thing was meticulously checked for correctness. No one should have shipped the service without knowing if the calculations were correct!

Re: Audiblegate

#38

Post by scrooched_moose »

Regardless of whether the underpaying allegations are true, Amazon keeping 60-75% of the sales price is absolutely egregious. People were absolutely up in arms about Apple's 30% app store cut a year ago.

Re: Audiblegate

#39

Post by weird-eye-issue »

I was recently looking at the financials of a FBA business (a business that sells on Amazon and stores their inventory with Amazon)

The fees that Amazon took was DOUBLE what it cost the seller to actually buy the product and have it shipped from China

Once you factor in advertising costs, Amazon is taking something like 75% of the cost of the product

Re: Audiblegate

#40

Post by falcolas »

axxl wrote: post #11

The twitter thread and the accompanying website don't quite tell me what's going on besides 'not as much money as expected'. But I can't quite see what the 'Net Sales' problem is, it's just stated as "less money" for no reason? Although I am tired so maybe something just isn't clicking. I don't doubt that the terms of the deal are poor though. I had wondered for a while how the credit system worked, and if the increa…

I haven’t dug into it too deeply myself, but here’s some numbers from late last year. Note that this as a producer sharing that 40% with the writer half and half (royalty share contract). One month saw 21 sales of a $19.99 audiobook. Amazon reported net sales of $76, so I made around $11.

EDIT: looking closer, 17 of the sales occurred in a market/purchase combination that resulted in no royalties at all. The invoice is less than clear on why those markets have 0% royalty rates. The US market is split in two, one with the expected rate, one with 0. No guesses on how the counts lined up.

So, around 2% real royalty rates, or 10x less than the contract stipulated.

It’s not something worth fighting against for me right now, I’m using it to build a resume. But between this and the rampant fraud they do nothing to curb, it’s not a stretch to call it a scam, both for the producer and the author.

But it’s Audible. What choice is there?

EDIT2: Going to bed. Its not that I don’t like you.

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