Anti-Muslim Bias to the International Kindle

[ahi]

Originally Posted by Phogg

Yep, pointing out the discarding of relevant information which hurts a cause, bolsters the assertion in Ahi world, where facts don't matter and leveling of unsupportable accusations against people in spite of the relevant information on hand is a virtue.

Why not.

Edit: Oh, and Amazon is not a person but a corporation, Phogg.

- Ahi

[neilmarr]

I think this might be a stock reply because other folks have noticed an apparent anomaly. Certainly reads like a form letter, and that might explain the unnecessarily quoted words, which might have been used in response the first of several incoming emails, but not in Luc's. Pretty bland, eh? So much like the kiss off line in a newspaper tale: "Amazon would neither confirm nor deny claims that ..." Hoots. Neil

[ahi]

Originally Posted by neilmarr

I think this might be a stock reply because other folks have noticed an apparent anomaly. Certainly reads like a form letter, and that might explain the unnecessarily quoted words, which might have been used in response the first of several incoming emails, but not in Luc's. Pretty bland, eh? So much like the kiss off line in a newspaper tale: "Amazon would neither confirm nor deny claims that ..." Hoots. Neil

You're probably right, Neil. That explains the uncalled for quotation.

- Ahi

[DixieGal]

Prejudice of any sort just doesn't happen when it comes to getting money. Don't you think Amazon is biting at the lease to get a foot into the door of all of those RICH RICH RICH middle easterners? Was Dubai on the sell or no-sell list? (I skipped a lot because reading is painful to my eyes. Mostly read first lines of paragraphs.)

If they do not go there, it is because they can not yet go there. They are up against the possibility of some home-grown electronics company bringing its own reader to the local markets. Again, I'm sure Amazon is sweating this one out also, hoping to get in there and corner the market.

And I wonder what sort of hoops to jump and costs to lay out are involved in getting copyright permissions and licenses to sell, etc, in those countries not included? Could it be that the possibility of profit is less than the probability of destabilization of gvts, infrastructures, and economies, threatening a loss for Amazon in the near future?

And finally, well, we all know Amazon. They could announce before the close of business today that they will be expanding into more countries. They are set on world domination via Kindle, but it might take more than a year or two to accomplish this goal. Give 'em another year and see how widespread the Kindle6 (Global Edition, in both pocket and briefcase size) will become.

Hugs to all!

[ahi]

Originally Posted by DixieGal

Prejudice of any sort just doesn't happen when it comes to getting money. Don't you think Amazon is biting at the lease to get a foot into the door of all of those RICH RICH RICH middle easterners? Was Dubai on the sell or no-sell list? (I skipped a lot because reading is painful to my eyes. Mostly read first lines of paragraphs.)

You are probably right, DixieGal. However--as perhaps you mean to acknowledge by responding respectfully, unlike many others including some moderators have--the list of countries is such that it's understandable that other possible explanations can occur to some people.

I'm sure we will not learn with any certainty the "why" of it, but I rather expect that Amazon would indeed start offering books in Muslim countries also in the future. Even if at first only in the same sort of isolated basis that they offer books in China (I believe English/foreign books are not included on their Chinese website).

I'm still left puzzled though why some people take personal offense to a corporation they have nothing to do with being weakly accused of wrongdoing... a corporation that is by no means known as a champion of morality and customer rights, at that. Doesn't seem healthy.

- Ahi

[luqmaninbmore]

Originally Posted by DixieGal

Was Dubai on the sell or no-sell list? (I skipped a lot because reading is painful to my eyes. Mostly read first lines of paragraphs.)

If they do not go there, it is because they can not yet go there. They are up against the possibility of some home-grown electronics company bringing its own reader to the local markets. Again, I'm sure Amazon is sweating this one out also, hoping to get in there and corner the market.

EDIT: And it's not available in Dubai, unfortunately.

I hope you are correct. I am certainly doing my part to spread the word about ebooks around Muslim community here and I would like to be able to tell my fellows about a device that can offer full wireless when they go back east to visit family. My inlaws are mostly in India and the Phillipines, so worries for me, but alot of my friends are from Pakistan or the Middle East. Of course, I am somewhat annoyed that there isn't going to be an international DX, but what can you do?

[Lemurion]

I looked at the list - and the more I look at it, the more I think there isn't a single overriding reason - but more likely a collection of reasons. I think we can all agree that Cuba and North Korea are probably for political reasons, and Canada is probably a special case. (I think Canadian rights issues are part of it, but I don't know for sure.)

AT&T's roaming agreements don't wash as a general reason, as the lack of a roaming agreement wouldn't preclude selling it without wireless access. I do know that some of the countries that do have it without wireless are ones that AT&T doesn't have data roaming agreements with (or at least didn't when I worked their International Wireless desk), and their international data roaming rates don't vary anywhere near as much as voice rates do.

So put me down on the wait and see side.

[DixieGal]

Originally Posted by luqmaninbmore

EDIT: And it's not available in Dubai, unfortunately.

Originally Posted by luqmaninbmore

......
My inlaws are mostly in India and the Phillipines, so worries for me .....

I saw on the news all of the devastation in the Phillipines in the past week. Thoughts and prayers for the safety of your family and all of the Filipino members and their families during this terrible crisis.

[neilmarr]

Whatever ... Why get in a tizz? I guess if potential customers in any excluded countries realise that they're not in the Kindle Club and feel strongly enough about that to complain in large numbers to Amazon and their local servers and demand their reader rights, everyone on the selling end will take notice and act as best and as swiftly as they commercially and technologically can. For interest earlier today, I wrote to an author pal of mine in Saudi this morning about the situation. Not only did he not give a damn as a writer or a reader ... he'd never even heard of Kindle. Meanwhile, my wife has just come back from work in Monaco (couple of miles away from where we live) and, it appears, some of the folks there she talked to today are miffed that, although they can buy Kindles as of Oct 19, they will not have wireless connectivity, unlike the rest of France. Neil

[luqmaninbmore]

Originally Posted by DixieGal

I saw on the news all of the devastation in the Phillipines in the past week. Thoughts and prayers for the safety of your family and all of the Filipino members and their families during this terrible crisis.

Thank you very much. My inlaws who live there were on a trip to India to visit family during the recent Eid al-Fitr holiday, so they were spared being caught in the tragedy.

[Patricia]

Thanks for posting Amazon's response, Luqmaninbmore. It does look like a standard reply, and it's disappointing that they aren't able to supply reasons for their current marketing strategy. But perhaps these are confidential.
However, I'm sure that they have logged your comment. We also have reason to believe that their staff visit this forum occasionally. So they should now be aware of your hypothesis. Hopefully, Amazon may see that there is an unmet demand for their Kindles, which they would be foolish to ignore.

[JayCeeEll]

It would be very interesting to see a list of the top 110 countries by sales and how this compares with the list of countries now supported by the "International Kindle".

I also wonder what percentage of US customers buy a Kindle and how this would be projected to international sales, given a fixed future supply of units.

[pshrynk]

Originally Posted by JayCeeEll

It would be very interesting to see a list of the top 110 countries by sales and how this compares with the list of countries now supported by the "International Kindle".

I also wonder what percentage of US customers buy a Kindle and how this would be projected to international sales, given a fixed future supply of units.

Amazon is notoriously silent on sales figures of the Kindle and books. It would be interesting, I just don't expect that we'll hear any time soon.

[bminata]

Oh, please..

Yes it's not available in Indonesia and Malaysia (both muslim countries) but it's not available in the neighboring Singapore or Thailand (NOT muslim countries) either.

Please stop being such a paranoid.. I live in Indonesia - the country with the largest muslim population in the world, yet there are lots of people here who whenever something happened here (including the captures of terrorists) the first thing that enters their mind is "muslims are being opressed" - so I'm quite familiar with this kind of thought..

I tell ya: IT'S NOT TRUE :P

Originally Posted by luqmaninbmore

Greetings All,

I'm not trying to sound paranoid or anything, but I did notice that one thing that seems to bind together many of the countries in which the international Kindle will not be sold is that they are Muslim countries. The only Muslim dominated countries that I could find that could receive the Kindle are Albania and Bosnia, which are within Europe, and Tanzania which is in eastern Africa. It is not available for sale within the entire Arab world, even in countries with well-developed infrastructure such as the United Arab Emirates. India, Sri Lanka, Nepal, and even Bhutan can receive it, but Pakistan and Bangladesh are excluded. Ethiopians can buy it, but their Muslim neighbours in Eritrea cannot. It is available in Russia and Mongolia, but not in the Central Asian Republics. It is available in Cambodia, Viet Nam and Laos, but not Indonesia or Malaysia (to be fair, Thailand and Korea are excluded as well). I don't think this is due to potential censorship, given that it can be purchased in Myanmar, Bhutan (which has strict policies regarding external media), Russia, India, Sri Lanka, and Zimbabwe all of which have issues with censorship. Am I rushing to judgement? I find it hard to believe that Pakistani telecoms are harder to deal with than those in India or Sri Lanka, or that the infrastructure of Morocco is lagging behind that of Mongolia. What do you all think?

[GeoffC]

Originally Posted by pshrynk

Amazon is notoriously silent on sales figures of the Kindle and books. It would be interesting, I just don't expect that we'll hear any time soon.

According to the Times newspaper (Thursday 8th October)

Kindle is Amazon's best-selling product.
Bezos expects sales of e-books to exceed those of physical books ; currently selling 48 kindle copies for every 100 equivalent pbook (5 months ago it was 35 per 100).
US e-reader sales 60% Amazon against 35% Sony.
e-book sales increased from $29.8m (jan-jun 2008) to $81.5m (jan-jun 2009) [world-wide or US not made clear].

Booksellers world-wide noticed e-versions of "The Lost Symbol" began to outstrip p-books within days.

In last paragraphs points made are :
format of books needs to be sorted (ePub v azw/prc - etc) confusing and frustrating customers.
Price of readers needs to reduce by at least half or they will remain a niche product.
Signs of tablet PC market developing (especially Apple) with more functionality and hence appeal.