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I've just heard back from one of our readers that they can't get Kindles or Kindle books in Malaysia. I know we can't manage to get books delivered by Amazon or Book Depository to some countries in that part of the world. The problem is actually that they don't arrive with the customer, so the online sellers have stopped delivering. We have to try to get them delivered ourselves.
The problem has mainly been in Cambodia for us, where one of our novels is set, but we still haven't ever managed to deliver a book! We have to carry them over personally or they vanish en route. I can understand they're tempting, and I suppose a Kindle is more tempting - we're going to be running a competition with a Kindle as a prize but it seems they can't be delivered to a lot of places. I will follow up with other ereaders as prizes too. I do want to help boost interest in ebooks.
This does mean there's a big gap that a competitor to Amazon could fill. A lot of the countries that want ebooks can't get the Kindle ones. They read on iPads and other gadgets. I do think their dominance is short term. I just hope their competitors don't go a proprietary route or demand exclusivity like them.
It's in the interest of publishers to set as competitive a price as they can manage, so even when I can't see the reason other publishers have had to set a high price, I know there must be one.
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