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Audible and audiobooks, the fastest growing part of publishing

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Re: Audible and audiobooks, the fastest growing part of publishing

#151

Post by Doubl »

powerapple wrote: post #118
Doubl wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the late 20th century I almost weekly got an audiobook in tape cassette form from my local public library to listen to in my car. As far as I can remember they cost me nothing. They had a room full of the things, so the selection was enormous. I have particular memories of listening to James Lee burke's books read by Mark Hammer. Later in the noughties I joined audible but it wasn't cheap and they had a couple of…

Scribd now offers unlimited audio books at cheaper price. Although the selection is smaller than audible, they offer books as well as music sheets.

Excellent, think I'll give them a go, thanks. Also they have time magazine and others included, looks very good

Re: Audible and audiobooks, the fastest growing part of publishing

#152

Post by rdl »

Audible (audiobooks generally, but generally just Audible) is my primary form of long-form media consumption. I don't watch TV, I don't watch movies, I don't listen to very much music. I probably consume 100-150 Audible books per year, on top of another ~50 Kindle books, and 20-30 pdf/paper books.

With promos and everything else, my average cost per Audible book is about $5. I guess I spend about $1k/yr on books, maybe a little more. Some people spend about that much for cable tv. I feel like I get a lot more value out of books.

Re: Audible and audiobooks, the fastest growing part of publishing

#153

Post by gnicholas »

rahimnathwani wrote: post #126
gnicholas wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think they said it was legally required, just that it would be very beneficial. They didn't offer a price, nor were they ever asked how much they'd pay. But I'm not aware of any platforms that charge extra for their accessibility features. Are there any? The reason there isn't much competition in the space is that OverDrive has a huge lead, and it is very complex on the back end. NYPL is doing good stuff with…

"But I'm not aware of any platforms that charge extra for their accessibility features. Are there any?" My point isn't that OverDrive should itemise their pricing, it's that market participants generally only invest money in R&D when it is expected to make them more money. And if customers signal that they value a feature at $0, then that feature is likely to go to the bottom of the list. If I buy a licence to a plat…

This has morphed into a big conversation that misses the point: OverDrive claims to care a ton about accessibility and publishes open letters proclaiming this. Then, when customers come to them with accessibility suggestions, they have zero interest in implementing them.

This wasn't based on difficulty of implementation (it was easy), and OverDrive never asked how much it would cost or whether libraries would pay extra to have the feature. They did not care enough to even have a conversation with the librarians about it.

Re: Audible and audiobooks, the fastest growing part of publishing

#154

Post by asdfasgasdgasdg »

r00fus wrote: post #113
Jagat wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a hidden 'silver' plan which is one credit every two months. The only way to get that is to talk to/chat with the customer service.

Wow - I would totally benefit from that. I need to talk with them. I do like to re-listen to some really good classics so I'd rather not cancel my Audible sub.

You don't lose your books when you cancel your sub. You just stop getting credits.

Re: Audible and audiobooks, the fastest growing part of publishing

#156

Post by rahimnathwani »

gnicholas wrote: post #153
rahimnathwani wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"But I'm not aware of any platforms that charge extra for their accessibility features. Are there any?" My point isn't that OverDrive should itemise their pricing, it's that market participants generally only invest money in R&D when it is expected to make them more money. And if customers signal that they value a feature at $0, then that feature is likely to go to the bottom of the list. If I buy a licence to a plat…

This has morphed into a big conversation that misses the point: OverDrive claims to care a ton about accessibility and publishes open letters proclaiming this. Then, when customers come to them with accessibility suggestions, they have zero interest in implementing them. This wasn't based on difficulty of implementation (it was easy), and OverDrive never asked how much it would cost or whether libraries would pay ext…

"This has morphed into a big conversation that misses the point"

That's the nature of conversations :)

Sometimes you make a point, and people say "That's a great point. I'd never thought of it like that before."

And sometimes people have different opinions. Sometimes what is 'the point' for one person, 'misses the point' from another person's perspective.

Re: Audible and audiobooks, the fastest growing part of publishing

#157

Post by HlessClaudesman »

xnyan wrote: post #148
HlessClaudesman wrote: post #124

I really enjoy audiobooks, but I dont think Audible is letting the medium flourish to its full potential. My main concern is that audible is missing the long tail which naturally forms in any price sensitive market, where older products tend to depreciate to the point where they find a buyer. With paper books I can find an old book for cheap and that is great for a lover of words. Audible distorts the audio-book mark…

There are often good deals to be had on Amazon for audiobooks, as others have mentioned older audiobooks can be found for as little as $2, though for moderately popular ones its more like $10-15. Very popular audiobooks don't go on sale as often, but even the complete set of Stephen Fry read Harry potter 7-book-series, hundreds of hours, can be had for as little as 20 bucks sometimes.

OK maybe that's my problem, I'm browsing solely through the audible app where I do see price difference, but I've never seen discounts signaled as such. Also I'm usually racing to spend credits before they expire, so price is less of a factor.

Re: Audible and audiobooks, the fastest growing part of publishing

#158

Post by loco5niner »

iofiiiiiiiii wrote: post #155

I am a real big fan of audiobooks but unfortunately am forced to pirate them because Audible only works with DRM. I would love to buy audiobooks legally but even if I consented on principle to DRM (I do not), my MP3 players do not support DRM.

Here you go: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19768543

No excuse now :-)

Re: Audible and audiobooks, the fastest growing part of publishing

#160

Post by dvlsg »

Tomte wrote: post #140
dvlsg wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do they have any artificial restrictions? Last time I tried a similar app (it's been a few years), I wasn't able to get an audiobook because someone else already had it "checked out".

Just like a regular book in a library.

That's what feels strange to me, though. It's not a physical book that can only be in one place at a time, so why are we holding ourselves back with artificial limitations?

I suspect it has something to do with licensing, but I don't know for sure.

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