I am from China and registered today to say something from Chinese users' perspectives.
I'll try my best to make all the sentences are readable because English is my second language.
I used MobileRead a lot but did not register before. Today I find this interesting post and can't help to say something so I tried all the methods to register. The pain point is the random question: "What is Hannah's name?", I only heard Hannah Montana on US TV but it is wrong.
, finnally I figured it out, name does not equal to Full Name. This is not Chinese
I love the eBook idea. The kindle is portable and I can read anytime anywhere. I have just two Kindles and bought hundreds of ebooks. The reading experience is excellent except:
- slow response for any click on the screen (kindle pw 4 is better)
- unable to create folders in the library. This is a disaster when I tried to organize books.
- can't install other ebook software such as Wechat Reader. Kindle does not have all the ebooks, I have to buy them from other platform.
So from my point of view, why Kindle can not continue to run business in China?
1, Readers are fewer. the Z generations are spending all the time on their phones, Ticktok, Games, Wechat, etc. I can see only a handful people reading in the subway cabinate. All are pitching on their phone screens. So it is not the Amazon is nitch, the whole book/publishing market is shrinking in China.
2, Too many competitors. Kindle is the first launched ebook product in China and soon get many local competitors. They follow Amazon's business idea and find out their own advantage. For example, Jindong used to sell real books and soon launched its ebook store. Wenzu add many functions to the ebook reader and turned it into an office device. Xunfei is good at real-time recording voices and converting them to text. Wechat Read gains users through free books and earns money in Wechat advertising ecosystem. Consumers are distracted by other platforms so Amazon's market share drops.
3, Government Policy is not a problem because just like AlaVander said, Amazon is just a distributor. The publishers have to follow the government's rules.
China is a big market but Amazon does not survive. The same problems occurred in many West companies. Though they are mentioning diversity and localization on their websites, most of them do not trust Chinese managers. Amazon's main business can't compete with Jindong, Taobao, VIP.com, and so many other local eCommerce companies. I can receive the product on the same day but have to wait for 3 days from Amazon. Other platforms have all kinds of promotions but Amazon seldom does it. When considering purchasing online, Amazon does not come to my mind.