Has Amazon cracked the subscription puzzle?

[stonetools]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

Huge non sequitur.

I don't want/support ANY subscription model. How does that say anything about my support for indies?

OK, OK. So you can support indie writers while disliking subscriptions. May I ask:

1. Why do you dislike subscriptions.
2. What would it tale for you to sign up for a subscription .

[stonetools]

Originally Posted by J. Strnad

With movies, we have a number of ways to see the movie we want. Go to the theater, buy a DVD or Blu-Ray, pay-per-view, through a subscription to HBO or NetFlix, wait for a free viewing (with commercials), even buy a used DVD at a yard sale.

I think that'll happen with ebooks, where you'll be able to buy it, or borrow it through a subscription plan with subscription plans competing for exclusive content the way HBO and Cinemax compete (or used to...I don't have either anymore so I don't really know).

That's what I'm talking about.

As an indie writer, what changes should Amazon make in its current setup in order to make it a no brainer for you to participate?

[J. Strnad]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

I can't buy Risen. J. Strnad doesn't want my business. What I was thinking of doing was buying some eBooks (that interested me) from authors on MR once I finsihed my holiday shopping and depending on how much I had left over. Now I can't buy this one. I can never buy this one. He's gone exclusive with Amazon. That means it's not available in the format I want. I'm not buying from Amazon. If I cannot buy in ePub, too bad. That's another sale lost.

Plus, it means he doesn't care about me, so I don't care if he tanks.

Actually, I've gone exclusive for 90 days, so maybe after that time it'll be available in epub format again. We'll see.

If you really want to read Risen in the next three months, maybe somebody here at MR will be kind enough to send you an epub. I don't mind a little pass-around circulation.

[elemenoP]

Originally Posted by Ntsimp

Yes, you have the right to give away things you own.

You try giving your Amazon DRM-ed ebook to someone else, and see how that goes for you. You don't really own an ebook, you have licensed it under the terms of wherever you bought it from.

eP

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by stonetools

OK, OK. So you can support indie writers while disliking subscriptions. May I ask:

1. Why do you dislike subscriptions.
2. What would it tale for you to sign up for a subscription .

1) For the same reason reason I don't join a bowling league: I'm not going to commit to paying for something in advance that I may not ultimately enjoy. Each book I buy represents enough of a risk of that, as it is. I don't pay for premium channels, I don't have a netflix account and I don't subscribe to magazines. I simply pay for my entertainment piecemeal... always have. There's no ugly surprises that way ("Oh I'm sorry. We assumed you would want to automatically renew your subscription"). In short: subscriptions infringe upon my need to be able to change my mind any ol' time I want to.

2) If it were sooo cheap that I'd have to be literally brain-dead not to sign up. Otherwise, nothing. Pricing isn't a huge factor in my book purchases.

[RainingLemur]

Originally Posted by J. Strnad

I think that'll happen with ebooks, where you'll be able to buy it, or borrow it through a subscription plan with subscription plans competing for exclusive content the way HBO and Cinemax compete (or used to...I don't have either anymore so I don't really know).

I could see something like this happening. Instead of Gamefly (for video games), you could have Bookworm (for books, duh).

[apbschmitz]

Excuse the negativity, but in my view Amazon's lending plan is a way to create another undifferentiated mountain of eInk. The problem isn't that a book costs all of $2.99 or $3.99. It's that it's so daunting to sort the jewels from the junk, especially with the indie books that I would most like to support. To me Amazon's scheme seems less like a solution than a variation of the same old problem.

[Harmon]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

It might not be legal. Does Amazon have the right to gift eBooks that the right holders says no? I think Amazon is looking to be part a law suit.

If that is actually how Amazon structured it, i.e., treating each "lend" as a "sale" for which the publisher/author gets its standard cut, Amazon has purchased the book and is now lending its copy at a profit. Clearly, the purchaser cannot at one & the same time be the person to whom the book is being lent, because, well, Amazon is lending it to him. So Amazon more or less has to be the purchaser, doncha think?

So. Does this not put Amazon in the position of having to agree that we can, each of us purchasers of ebooks, "lend" copies of our purchased ebooks, at a profit? And if we can lend it once, why not twice? And why can't some entrepreneurial soul establish a webstore to facilitate the "lending?"

In short, has Amazondora opened an ebook box?

I look forward to the brouhaha, in which my portion will be to haha a lot.

[Harmon]

Originally Posted by pwalker8

Getting back to the original point of the thread, I don't really think that Amazon has cracked the subscription model. In a broad sense, I would break people who read books into two camps, one camp buys and keeps books, the other camp reads a book and then discards it (return it to the library or sale at a used book store) and moves on to the next book. I don't see where this model suits either camp. A subscription model where you read one book at a time and then return it and pick another one would be more suitable for many people. On the other hand, I don't know how many best sellers would be willing to go that route.

I have a foot in both camps. I try to buy my "read & move on" books as ebooks, or used books in a pinch. I usually buy my "read & keeps" as hardbacks, or paperbacks in a pinch.

Were I an author or publisher, my approach would be to NEVER fight any innovation in book distribution. I'd look for the positives in the situation, & try to exploit them.

So this lending model would work quite well for my RMO reading. Speaking to the specific 12 books a year model Amazon is currently using, I can see using the monthly book as a tryout of an author or series. In fact, that is exactly what happened to me on my second borrowing - got a book in a series, read it, liked it, & bought the rest of the trilogy. Plus paid for the first book in the series so I could pass it around to my family.

[Harmon]

Originally Posted by elemenoP

You try giving your Amazon DRM-ed ebook to someone else, and see how that goes for you. You don't really own an ebook, you have licensed it under the terms of wherever you bought it from.

Without going into the legal details, that is not a correct characterization of the transaction between the customer and Amazon. It is, to a high degree of probability, a sale, no matter what Amazon tries to tell you. (Most lawyers will tell you that, although some won't, because, after all, we need a controversy to make a living...)

But your comment highlights something about the Amazon "lending" program - that is, that Amazon seems to be talking out of both sides of its mouth. It apparently is telling the publishers "here's your cut on the "sale" of the book to our customer" while at the same time saying to the customer "here's your free bennie for joining Amazon Prime."

This Will Not Stand! (Though who it sits down on remains to be seen.)

[stonetools]

I decided to revive this thread because I saw tghis intersting prediction about a possible subscription plan built on KDP Select:

I have a 2012 prediction.

I think if the Prime program is successful at all for the Fire, it will be tiered at some point this year and that folk will get a base level of service (most likely what they're getting now with the free shipping and single book download), but will also be able to upgrade for $10 more to a Prime Plus status where subscribers get a couple of movie downloads and 2 books per month, and a Prime Gold program for an additional $20 where they get 3 streamed movies and 4 books per month.

Because, you know, the status quo has precious little status in it anymore, and the only thing holding Amazon back from offering such a tiered subscription program last month was lack of content since a lot of the big publishers aren't playing. With 50K+ titles now in the Lending Library, Amazon will have enough of a pool to collate data and make decisions about volume, velocity and costs -- by May is my prediction.

LINK