171–180 of 240 posts
"I feel like there’s an opportunity here for Amazon to provide a all-you-can-consume digital lifestyle at a fixed subscription price. If we could subscribe to one single service and forget about every pay-as-you-go service, it would be quite an attractive proposition."
This is becoming all too real really fast.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm a regular user of the local library, but I notice that most people in my "class" (i.e. tech people earning a lot) don't go there. It's easier to buy it on your Kindle for $10-$15 than to make a trip to the library. I'm gonna be a jerk and say that most people also like to hang out in expensive coffee shops with other members of their class, and not in the library where there are lots of poor people. It's a little…
It's unpopular but I really enjoy reading on my phone. It's small, it's always with me, it's much more convenient than lugging around a physical book(and I love physical books). But that's why I buy ebooks(they're just expensive which sucks). It's interesting to listen to the cascading excuses when bringing up books with friends. "Why not use a kindle?" "I like holding the physical book." "Oh, then why not go to the…
I'm quite specific about what I want to read. My local library (that happens to be just round the corner) never has what I want. I often don't even seem to be able to order in what I want. So I gave up and just buy books on a Kindle instead.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
For ebooks, Amazon already has one free "rental" per month of select books, for Prime members. There are other good sources of free books include this blog: http://www.sfsignal.com/archives/category/books/free-fiction...
I was not aware of this. Do you get to chose the book?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> So no Penguin Random House, the market leader in print and audio The market leader in print and audio fiction . Fiction is ephemeral - mostly read and then discarded. The awesome potential for this service is in factual and reference books that are used hundreds or thousands of time each in their lifetime. The 1.5 books per month metric is diluted in that case when it's possible to dip into 100 books per month just…
I think Safari Books Online has been doing well
Lots of people in this thread are talking about this being scary for authors. When I was a kid, I got to read a ton of books any time I wanted. I got them at this place called a "library" where they let people come in and take books home with them to read for free . People have always had the option to read books without buying them. In those days, going to the library was effectively the same effort as going to a bo…
paid by taxes.
nothing is free.
Most people don't spend $9.99 on books every month on average. If Amazon encourages people who are infrequent readers to devote more of their time/entertainment-dollars on reading, then this service will be a win-win for Amazon and authors. Also, if my service is all-you-can-eat, I'm definitely going to take more risks with authors I haven't heard about. That is a definite win for unknown and unpromoted authors. Some…
Totally. I'm one of those people and right smack in the middle of the crosshairs for this. I'm the kind of person that is always willing to overpay in order to have "unlimited" anything, even if it doesn't make direct financial sense. I'm not sure why, but I guess it's because I don't like having limits or having or budget, etc. Part of the reason I happily pay $9.99/month for Spotify when, if I really think about it, I wouldn't really buy 7-9 new songs a month every month on iTunes. But I don't care -- I'd still rather know I could stream 20 entire albums if I want for that same $9.99.
And same goes with Kindle -- I probably (actually, certainly) don't buy a book a month, but knowing I have a catalog of 600k titles at my disposal for $10 will be a no-brainer.
/psyched
Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's unpopular but I really enjoy reading on my phone. It's small, it's always with me, it's much more convenient than lugging around a physical book(and I love physical books). But that's why I buy ebooks(they're just expensive which sucks). It's interesting to listen to the cascading excuses when bringing up books with friends. "Why not use a kindle?" "I like holding the physical book." "Oh, then why not go to the…
> You can save a ton of money using your local library though. I'm quite specific about what I want to read. My local library (that happens to be just round the corner) never has what I want. I often don't even seem to be able to order in what I want. So I gave up and just buy books on a Kindle instead.
how was this leaked?
How this came to be I don't know; leaks are bad. They're unintentional (by the company) and contain unfinished/unspun/out of context information that can possibly be detrimental to the company.
Yet people keep using it to mean "press release"
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I buy physical books because they're cheaper than ebooks. I'll usually pay about $.50 to a buck for them. Sometimes my friends just give me a box of books they're done with. The local thrift store often has bestsellers for a buck. The usual price for a used book on Amazon is $.01, which with shipping comes out to still far less than the ebook.
For ebooks, Amazon already has one free "rental" per month of select books, for Prime members. There are other good sources of free books include this blog: http://www.sfsignal.com/archives/category/books/free-fiction...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
When I was a kid I got books from the library too. Then, like most people who enjoy reading, I began buying books of my own. Libraries are fine when you just want to find some books you haven't read before but owning your own books has significant advantages, which I hope need not be restated here. How this goes for authors depends on how Amazon are purchasing the rights to the ebooks. Having seen what streaming has…
Just like the music industry, I think more writers are going to become acclimated to the book-signing aspect of the industry in order to support their themselves financially. Subscription based models and piracy that originated from the disruptive nature of new technology sounds like it would discencetivize writers from creating new works, but I think if you model the economics of future distributions, it will eventu…