Tag Archives: amazon

Two Free Audiobooks — Hurry!

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Go the Amazon Home Page and check out the offer. When you sign up for an Audible account, you’ll get two free audiobook downloads. You can make Audible.com purchases using your Amazon.com account (because Audible is owned by Amazon). Here’s the fine print about this offer:

Audible® Free Trial Details
Get your first 30 days of the AudibleListener® Gold membership plan free, which includes one audiobook credit, plus a bonus credit. After your 30 day trial, your membership will renew each month for just $14.95 per month so you can continue to receive one audiobook credit per month plus members-only discounts on all audio purchases. A very small number of titles are more than one credit. Cancel your membership before your free trial period is up and you will not be charged. Thereafter, cancel anytime, effective the next billing cycle. Any unused audiobook credits will be lost at cancellation.

Dr. Seuss Book Sales

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Dr.Suess

Dr.Suess

Border’s is running a sale on Dr. Seuss books now through 12/28. They are all Buy 2, Get 3rd free. Also, if you’re a Border’s Rewards member, the prices are knocked down a bit from the list price. I’m not sure if Borders does this every year, but I recall seeing this deal in a Border’s in Washington a couple years ago. I’m not usually big on sales where you have to buy multiple things to get a deal, but this one is definitely worth while.

Barnes&Noble is also running the exact same deal and so is Amazon.

No one can have too many Dr. Seuss books in their home. (I think that’s been scientifically proven…)

I’m all for supporting Indy Bookstores, but I always watch the sales at Borders, Amazon, and Barnes & Noble. Sometimes they’re too good to pass up. Because this is a popular sale at this time of year, you might want to check IndieBound to find some local stores who might be doing it. Your corner bookstore may very well be running the same deal (or a sweeter one), so give them a call.

Sony Reader Goes ePub and Lowers Prices

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Sony Pocket Reader

Sony Pocket Reader

Sony is stepping up its efforts to compete with Amazon’s Kindle. In fact, they’ve made some significant changes lately that might have Kindle users wondering whether they should switch. By the end of this year, Sony will be offering all their digital books in ePub format instead of Reader format. Developed by IDPF and now used for Google’s public domain books, the format is compatible with Sony readers, iPhones, Android handsets, and quite a list of other readers. Actually, Sony provides a link to Google’s books on their website. Sony’s also ditching its own anti-copy software and picking up Adobe software instead. The new software limits how often e-books can be shared and copied, so when you buy from Sony’s store, you can use your purchases on other supported readers, like your iPhone.

Sony’s goal is not only to compete with Kindle , but to keep a one-company domination of the e-book industry from happening (re: Apple iPod with digital music). By attempting to standardize e-publishing and reader platforms, they might accomplish their goal…and win over some Kindle users. They aren’t scrapping anti-piracy software completely, but they seem to have a much firmer grasp of what people want and what methods don’t work than does Amazon.

Just this month Sony announced price cuts on its e-books from 11.99 to 9.99, now matching Amazon’s. They launched two new readers priced at $199 and $299. I’ve got to admit that their new readers are definitely sleek and attractive (anyone else thinking iPod when they see those?). This piece from the New Yorks Times expounds the price wars and the future concerns for authors caught in the middle.

Amazon Fail All Over Again?

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I recently recieved an email from Simon Owens of Bloggasm about his latest post regarding Amazon. “Amazon Continue to Tighten Restrictions on AmazonConnect Bloggers” is a post about recent changes to the AmazonConnect user agreement. Owens spoke with Steve Weber, an author and AmazonConnect blogger, about this new user agreement.

It’s hard to say whether the new agreement is that much of a big deal. As with any user agreement, it will all depend on who’s making the decisions and how well they do so. Weber’s gripe stemmed from this addition to the agreement, “We … have no obligation to use, post or distribute your Submitted Materials. We may monitor and, in our discretion, remove your Submitted Materials at any time.” While this gives Amazon an awful lot of power, it doesn’t necessarily mean bad things (IMO).

Frankly, Amazon may well just want to clean up some of the garbage that’s been collecting around AmazonConnect blogs. Also, the new user agreement came around the same time that Amazon made the switch from “AmazonConnect” to “Author Central.” AmazonConnect no longer exists. Author Central allows authors access and editing capabilities for their published work available from Amazon. An author can edit their own bibliography, add photos, enroll their work in Kindle and Search Inside This Book programs, as well as create and maintain their own blog. New program, new rules.

I mentioned my take on #AmazonFail before, but didn’t dive into it. It was a real hot topic for a while and, for some, still is. I don’t believe Amazon’s excuses, but I also don’t believe the company was trying to spread homophobia around the globe either. People made their voices heard and Amazon addressed the problem. As far as I can tell, so far Amazon has work more efficiently than the US government. I can’t complain too much about that.

My take on the new Author Central user agreement? AC bloggers should make their voices heard by Amazon about exactly what changes they want to see made. Oh and use Twitter because, as history seem to prove, Amazon listens intently to hashtags.

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Amazon+Shelfari

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It’s official. Shelfari has been acquired by Amazon. So far, there seems to be no big changes that will be hurdled at Shelfari users immediately. It’s likely that this acquisition will make for some big usability changes within Shelfari. I’m also going to predict that eventually all of us with both Amazon.com and Shelfari accounts will be able to add books to our Shelfari shelf from Amazon and probably display our shelf right in our Amazon profile page. I’m interested to see how this plays out.

With Google Booksearch being in Beta and Google gearing up to push it’s own (currently functional) library, this Amazon acquisition will at least help Shelfari hold its own against the giant GoogleMonster.