Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Amazon leaks Kindle Unlimited

webcache.googleusercontent.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 240 posts

Re: Amazon leaks Kindle Unlimited

#121

Post by WalterBright »

laurenbee wrote: post #85
JunkDNA wrote: post #51

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…

> Local libraries already lend ebooks as well. I'm not sure why more people don't take advantage of that. One would think that since ebooks are digital, any number of people could borrow the same book at once from a library. Alas, that is not the case. Just like libraries might only have one or two physical copies of a book, they might only have one or two copies of an ebook available to lend as well. If you want to…

I'm self-published on Amazon, and I'll be happy to make them available on this new service.

Re: Amazon leaks Kindle Unlimited

#122

Post by [deleted] »

WalterBright wrote: post #120
psykotic wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> owning your own books has significant advantages, which I hope need not be restated here. I had to get rid of several hundred of my books years ago when I went traveling. It was tough since I had a lot of attachment to my physical books, but upon examination I realized there were few advantages and in my case many disadvantages. Exceptions are books you habitually reread or reference, but most novels fail that test…

I have several thousand books. Many I've cut & scanned into pdf's. It is just marvelous to be able to take with me that library when I travel - I never lack for something to browse. I no longer have to read those wretched in-flight magazines. My bookshelves are still crammed with books, but they've all got a date with the slicer! Mua-ha-ha-ha-haaaa! BTW, for examples of books I've cut & scanned, see http://www.genera…

[deleted]

Re: Amazon leaks Kindle Unlimited

#123

Post by anigbrowl »

WalterBright wrote: post #120
psykotic wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> owning your own books has significant advantages, which I hope need not be restated here. I had to get rid of several hundred of my books years ago when I went traveling. It was tough since I had a lot of attachment to my physical books, but upon examination I realized there were few advantages and in my case many disadvantages. Exceptions are books you habitually reread or reference, but most novels fail that test…

I have several thousand books. Many I've cut & scanned into pdf's. It is just marvelous to be able to take with me that library when I travel - I never lack for something to browse. I no longer have to read those wretched in-flight magazines. My bookshelves are still crammed with books, but they've all got a date with the slicer! Mua-ha-ha-ha-haaaa! BTW, for examples of books I've cut & scanned, see http://www.genera…

This isn't about e-books vs physical books, but about the difference between subscription and purchase models.

Re: Amazon leaks Kindle Unlimited

#124

Post by ctdonath »

JunkDNA wrote: post #51

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…

[Going to a library] was more convenient for my family. We happened to live a few blocks from the library and didn't need to drive across town to the mall to get books in dingy little B. Dalton bookstore.

Yup. Remember that well. "Bookstores" were tiny places with fewer books than we had at home. If you really wanted a selection, you'd go to the library. Then came B&N, Borders, etc with vast holdings on par with the local library (or bigger), and - better yet - newer content: everything was new & content turnover was frequent, as contrasted with the library which was pretty much stuck with what well-thumbed old volumes they had. In-store coffeeshops just clinched the attraction.

Local libraries already lend ebooks as well. I'm not sure why more people don't take advantage of that.

Mostly that it's just a new option that hasn't normalized yet. 'til recently, the process was obnoxious enough that physical media and/or a CC# made it much easier to get what you wanted. I'm using Hoopla a lot now; it's improving fast but hasn't quite reached the UX needed for normalization.

Re: Amazon leaks Kindle Unlimited

#125

Post by [deleted] »

jobu wrote: post #52
cliveowen wrote: post #28

A few weeks ago Jon Evans of TechCrunch said this: "Despite my techie contempt for their business practices, I really do want traditional publishers to survive, because their employees — unlike, I suspect, Amazon’s — tend to genuinely love books in the same way that I do, and because good editors are worth their weight in gold. But it’s hard to see how they can thrive fighting like this. In the long run their only re…

That's a great quote from Jon Evans, and it fits well with Steve Yegge's perspective on Jeff Bezos: "I mean, imagine what it would be like to start off as an incredibly smart person, arguably a first-class genius, and then somehow wind up in a situation where you have a general’s view of the industry battlefield for ten years. Not only do you have more time than anyone else, and access to more information than anyone…

[deleted]

Re: Amazon leaks Kindle Unlimited

#126

Post by dfrey »

chudi wrote: post #72

I think the next step is all you can eat games, we already have movies, books, music, why not games? It seems easy with platforms like Steam

Future Gamer: "I have access to any game in the world, but all I ever play is a combat themed hat collection simulator".

Re: Amazon leaks Kindle Unlimited

#127

Post by ctdonath »

r00fus wrote: post #23
frio wrote: post #6

Interesting. I wonder what this implies for authors. Amazon might take a cut currently, but the lion's share ends up with the author -- a royalty based scheme significantly changes the playing field, and I worry that it could be for the worse ( http://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-25217353 ). EDIT -- and what it implies for publishers.

I don't imagine this is new territory in terms of licensing for music, but may be for books. Look at iTunes Match - you pay a monthly fee, what Apple does on the backend is likely royalty payments per song (there may be negotiation with labels as to iTunes match rates).

iBooks Match would be wonderful.

Re: Amazon leaks Kindle Unlimited

#128

Post by ctdonath »

dublinben wrote: post #53
dingaling wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Most of these books are available through your local library for free. All inter-library loans in my library board cost 1 UKP ( c. $1.40 ) which quickly mounts-up when there's very little on the shelf in the local branch. I could read 'Excel 2003 for Dummies' again, I suppose, but I'm a bit bored of it to be honest...

In the US, many libraries have a system called Overdrive that offers ebooks (and audiobooks) for borrowing. It's essentially a free version of this service, but with better selection.

Hoopla as well.

Re: Amazon leaks Kindle Unlimited

#129

Post by VLM »

blhack wrote: post #81
chubot wrote: post #78

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…

A lot of libraries are starting hackerspaces. You should see if you can mentor at one. I mentor at a program at my library every week, and it's been really awesome.

Maybe ease into makerspaces like my local library which hosts meetings, and hosts kids events put on by one of the local makerspaces, but isn't technically "The Makerspace" probably because there is zero permanent storage, although makerspace people are there seemingly every day.

Once you're all there all the time anyway, then ease into the "now we want/need/demand permanent storage" And machine tools. And a pony.

The concept of a "Hackerspace-Lite" is interesting. No permanent stuff onsite. Carry in and carry out. The library is already full of meeting and presentation rooms and ours finally caved into to sell coffee and junk food for fundraising.

The biggest problem locally is the whole "A library is also a day care, right?" situation. Up to and including police taking abandoned kids into protective custody after a couple hours, which is weird.

Re: Amazon leaks Kindle Unlimited

#130

Post by TeMPOraL »

cstross wrote: post #108
dublinben wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>How much do people read? Nobody's too sure We actually have a pretty good idea. According to Gallup/Pew research[0], the median American reads 8 books a year. Slightly less than a third read more than one book a month. I doubt any customer who reads less than one ebook (let alone a physical book) per month would find it worth signing up for this service. That leaves the service with mostly heavy consumers of books,…

The problem is, those figures aren't granular enough to use for marketing purposes. For example, it's known that about 50% of genre SF/F book sales go to about 20% of customers -- and about 45% go to less than 10% of customers! Some folks are reading over 100 books/year. (I know plenty of them.) We know there's a curve; we just don't really know it's shape in enough detail to predict how an all-you-can-eat book buffe…

> We know there's a curve; we just don't really know it's shape in enough detail to predict how an all-you-can-eat book buffet will pay for itself.

The thing is, Amazon might. They can read the distribution of books bought per unique user annually straight out their database, and them being the size they are, that seems like quite a good proxy for how many books are read per year by people.

Post reply on HN