Quote:
Originally Posted by SolRaven
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Amazon won't have a monopoly forever, but we all owe them a little gratitude for making ebooks and ereaders competitive and for all the publicity of ebooks in any form. My Sony would probably still be $300 if Kindle hadn't dropped down to $179 last year, and there would not likely be as many books available digitally if it weren't for Amazon's push to do so.
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In general I am very impressed with Amazon, and will purchase almost any product from them,
EXCEPT ebooks.
For ALL other products, Amazon competes head to head with other suppliers that they list on their site. So WHY is it that when I want a book for Kindle, I don't have the option to buy competitively from B&N, Borders, Kobo, Google Books, etc. ?
They are one of the BEST web sellers for head to head competitive listings on other products, but they are WORST for restrictive practices for the Kindle and Kindle Store.
Let's review -
Broders/Kobo/Sony/Google Books
(+) Their Readers work with Adobe compatible EPUB titles from other ebook sellers.
(+) Their Online Ebook Store will sell you a book compatible with other Readers (Nook, Kobo, Sony, Android Tablets are all Adobe EPUB compatible)
Barnes and Nobel
(+) Their Nook Readers work with Adobe compatible EPUB titles from other ebook sellers.
(-) Currently their Online Ebook Store only supports their own Nook Reader (though they have Nook Apps for some other non-ebook platforms)
Amazon
(-) Kindle can only buy DRM protected titles from Amazon.
(-) Currently their Kindle Store only supports their own Kindle Reader (though they have Kindle Apps for some other non-ebook platforms)
So Amazon has pretty much the worst-in-class restrictive policies.
I am not sure how much credit to give them for dropping the cost of ereaders because -
A) Prices were going to drop ANYWAY due to heavy competition from lots of slick Android based tablet devices.
B) Given how they have locked down and restricted their Kindle and Kindle Store, THEY SHOULD BE PRACTICALLY GIVING THE READERS AWAY. (after all, when a cell phone company has you locked into their network they will GIVE you a phone)
Of course, Amazon doesn't make you sign a contract, but for most folks who are not savvy enough to deal with the intricacies of DRM removal and ebook conversions, they are locked in just as effectively as if they had.
Given a choice, I will not buy from B&N or Amazon's Ebook Store until they support EPUB formatted titles for my Sony reader and have the same head-to-head competition for my business as the rest of the sites.