Quote:
Originally Posted by theonna
Problem with that logic is that market competition is won on a piece of paper with check marks. Meaning that if you put options that your device has together with other device on the paper, and yours has more check marks, you don't need to do more, you won. So it ends up having a lot of nobody ever cared to have options with none of "you actually need skill to implement", in case of Kobo- you end up with hardware design that seems to be top of the line, they succeeded with their engineers, with software that many cheap knock offs would be ashamed to wear, meaning they failed to use or hire qualified programmers.
|
I'd disagree with your ideas on design and market competition. Your design for market is done on paper. Success in the market depends on keeping your average customer happy. The average customer for the Kobo devices does not stuff 6500 books on a device with about 1GB of storage. The number that Kobo uses of 1000 ebooks on a Mini is being conservative, 1400-1500 epubs is more likely given the average size of the ebooks I have in my library.
Given the numbers I've seen on the web, it would appear that Kobo is succeeding in attracting customers around the world. I'd agree that they do not seem that interested in the US market. Why waste your time and money fighting Amazon and Barnes & Noble in their backyard? The world wide market numbers give Kobo around 25% of ereader sales with Amazon at 51%, Sony at 10% and B &N at 6%. Kobo is also one of the few ereader vendors who have increased their sales in a market where the analysts are claiming that total sales are dropping and will continue to drop.
Quote:
Originally Posted by theonna
People buy Kobo devices for hardware. They leave because of software and crappy customer service. It is that bad. So if people actually care that Kobo does not go belly up, they should embrace idea of improving soft, rather that chastising people for buying wrong devices, because "of course, you cant expect Kobo to ever add file manager or improve their book collection handling".
P.S. Of course Kobo logic might be, that they only need for people to be buying their product once, it should cover their costs, thus they don't feel they need to do anything more, at least Kobo passes check mark tests.
|
Kobo seems rather interested in improving their firmware, they release new versions quite regularly and regularly add new features. You may not agree with the direction they are taking their firmware in. Your opinion and you are entitled to it.
Their customer service, in my limited experience, seems to be pretty decent. My issues were dealt with speedily enough to keep me happy. My last complaint was when I purchased an ebook that was not as advertised -- The Compleat Traveler in Black has 5 short stories, the version that Kobo, Amazon and B&N have states Compleat on the cover image but only has the 4 short stories from the original Ace version. Took about 3 minutes in a chat including a break while Hernaldo checked on the ebook and a credit was issued. I would have preferred a refund but the store credit was good enough.
As for a file browser? I doubt we will ever see one in an official Kobo firmware. Do I miss a file browser? So far, the lack of a file browser has not caused me to feel any anguish so I'm rather doubtful. There are other issues that I would rather Kobo spent their developer time on. Will the lack of a file browser drive a large number of Kobo's customers and potential customers to other brands of ereader? Your guess is worth as much as mine. Mine being that the average customer is going to go "What's a file browser?".
As for buying the product once? In many ways the ereader market is like the old razor market. The razor/ereader is sold at a low cost, you make your money on the razor blades/ebooks.
Regards,
David