Calibre Companion Praise thread

[kaufman]

Chaley,

I was going to send this to you as a PM, but I decided to post it instead so others could respond as well.

You have created - far and away - my favorite app on Android. I thought it was great when I first got it last year, but your updates since then have turned it from merely fantastic to really freaking fantastic. Having my whole library with me at all times is nice, but the abilities CC give me to slice it and dice it is just beyond compare. I've been an e-reader since the mid 1990s, and never have I had anything like the capabilities that your program gives me.

Your hard work and dedication to your users on an app that is IMO, criminally underpriced, is very much appreciated.

So, thanks again for everything.

Michael

[chaley]

When and where I grew up (50's/60's west USA), praise was to be avoided. I have never learned how to accept compliments other than to look at my feet, shuffle them around a bit, and mumble "thanks". So see me shuffling and mumbling.

My goal with CC is to make it trivial to use for a casual new user and to satisfy to the extent possible people who really use the app (power users). The two goals are probably mutually exclusive. In the end, the power users must pay a bit because the new users won't. Thank you and many others for your patience with this conundrum.

As for "criminally underpriced", that too is hard. Our current estimates are that some 40% of our users are running pirated versions of CC. Would they pay for the app if it was less expensive? Hard to say, but I suspect that those who pirate would never pay for an app no matter what the price, or can't pay for an app because of wherever they are. Would more people search out the pirate editions if we raise the price? Hard to say. If we offered a "donate" button, would people pay for the app and then donate more because it is so good? Hard to say, but I suspect that this number would be vanishingly small. But who knows? We will learn more when we release our free limited-to-10-books demo version that will remove the questions "what does it do?" and "will it work if I buy it?". I am not sure exactly what we will learn, but it will be more than what we know today.

[copyrite]

Hopefully I've made up for one of the pirates. I've paid for it twice, well really only once because the first time with Amazon 'coins' and the second time with $ in the Play store because it's truly an indispensible app for me... it's used daily. Have also reviewed the app on both platforms, too.

[kaufman]

Originally Posted by chaley

My goal with CC is to make it trivial to use for a casual new user and to satisfy to the extent possible people who really use the app (power users). The two goals are probably mutually exclusive. In the end, the power users must pay a bit because the new users won't. Thank you and many others for your patience with this conundrum.

I'm not sure what you mean by "pay a bit", since without fail, over the last 8 months, you have implemented every feature large and small that I have asked for (and there's a lot of them). Well, except for more information in list view, but I hear that's coming.

Originally Posted by chaley

Would more people search out the pirate editions if we raise the price? Hard to say.

Had to say, but I suspect that even if you raised it to $4.99, a lot of people who tried the free version would still buy it. I purchased it for $2.99 without ever trying it, but if I had tried if first, I would have gone a lot higher.

Originally Posted by chaley

If we offered a "donate" button, would people pay for the app and then donate more because it is so good? Hard to say, but I suspect that this number would be vanishingly small.

Maybe, but they say that the top couple
of percent of users pay for most of the IAP in games like Candy Crush, so if you attracted a couple of whales, you might do ok. Plus, it would help me assuage my guilt for getting so much for so little.

[gsparks2]

Calibre and Calibre Companion are wonderful. I have collected ebooks since the 90's and only this year have I organized them and cleaned up the library.

Thank you so much!

[thekidsmom]

CC is an app that I use everyday, without fail. I cannot imagine my reading life without it. I wish apps had user-based royalties like songs....every time someone uses it, the author gets $. Chaley would be living on a yacht somewhere.....

[chaley]

We have received queries from many users who want somehow to pay us more for CC than we charge. I continue to be surprised, one might say astounded, when this happens, but it has happened enough to push me to do something about it. I decided to accept "contributions" via PayPal using buttons on my personal web site. I put contributions in quotes because the buttons are really designed to purchase something, in this case our gratitude.

If you want to contribute but don't like PayPal then send us your good thoughts.

One reason I hesitated is that I don't want any appearance of pressure on or seeming ingratitude toward people who "merely" pay what we ask for our product. Purchasing CC is a vote of confidence in us. We will continue to develop CC and support our customers whether or not someone contributes.

Thank you all.

[NSILMike]

Originally Posted by chaley

When and where I grew up (50's/60's west USA), praise was to be avoided. I have never learned how to accept compliments other than to look at my feet, shuffle them around a bit, and mumble "thanks". So see me shuffling and mumbling.

My goal with CC is to make it trivial to use for a casual new user and to satisfy to the extent possible people who really use the app (power users). The two goals are probably mutually exclusive. In the end, the power users must pay a bit because the new users won't. Thank you and many others for your patience with this conundrum.

As for "criminally underpriced", that too is hard. Our current estimates are that some 40% of our users are running pirated versions of CC. Would they pay for the app if it was less expensive? Hard to say, but I suspect that those who pirate would never pay for an app no matter what the price, or can't pay for an app because of wherever they are. Would more people search out the pirate editions if we raise the price? Hard to say. If we offered a "donate" button, would people pay for the app and then donate more because it is so good? Hard to say, but I suspect that this number would be vanishingly small. But who knows? We will learn more when we release our free limited-to-10-books demo version that will remove the questions "what does it do?" and "will it work if I buy it?". I am not sure exactly what we will learn, but it will be more than what we know today.

We may be able to take a lesson from the music industry. At the introduction of mp3 files, of course a large amount of (illegal) file sharing began. The MPAA was livid. However, the revenues over time of the industry were not apparently damaged at all, and in fact growth accelerated. Not just music sales but also other forms of music income (concerts, etc.) The conclusion that most analysts (meaning independent, not MPAA analysts) came to was that exposure was increased, and that led to growth in demand. Of course, the pirates don't pay, and as you suggested, probably never would.
So, I think your ideas (free limited to 10 books demo) are useful and should help you figure out what is most likely to drive your own exposure.
One comment though- I don't use Calibre or Calibre companion for books- I use it strictly for news and magazines. I'm not sure how you would implement the 10 books demo in this case... do you mean 10 sync'd items, or...? My point is 10 items might be one days worth, and therefore wouldn't help. I'd suggest something like 10 'real' books (forever) and/or 10 newspapers/magazines for a set period of time... like 2 weeks or maybe a month.

[edit: for books I use the Kindle app on my nexux and PC. I am very fortunate to live in an area with a huge e-book online lending library that Amazon 'manages'.]

[chaley]

Originally Posted by NSILMike

One comment though- I don't use Calibre or Calibre companion for books- I use it strictly for news and magazines. I'm not sure how you would implement the 10 books demo in this case... do you mean 10 sync'd items, or...? My point is 10 items might be one days worth, and therefore wouldn't help. I'd suggest something like 10 'real' books (forever) and/or 10 newspapers/magazines for a set period of time... like 2 weeks or maybe a month.

Thanks for the comments.

Ten books is ten book files, the maximum that demo CC will permit on the device. If you delete them then you get ten more. Thus in your situation, to use the demo version long term you would need to delete enough "books" per day to make room for the next day's harvest.

Unfortunately I can't distinguish between periodicals and books, so I can't apply any special processing. I am also not convinced that I would want to. It would increase the work for me for maintaining the demo version for what seems to reduce the incentive of migrating from the demo version to the paid version. Remember that the demo version is intended to show what CC can do and to let someone ensure that it works on his or her network. I want the limit to be just high enough to do that, but no higher.

[NSILMike]

Originally Posted by chaley

Thanks for the comments.

Ten books is ten book files, the maximum that demo CC will permit on the device. If you delete them then you get ten more. Thus in your situation, to use the demo version long term you would need to delete enough "books" per day to make room for the next day's harvest.

Unfortunately I can't distinguish between periodicals and books, so I can't apply any special processing. I am also not convinced that I would want to. It would increase the work for me for maintaining the demo version for what seems to reduce the incentive of migrating from the demo version to the paid version. Remember that the demo version is intended to show what CC can do and to let someone ensure that it works on his or her network. I want the limit to be just high enough to do that, but no higher.

Then instead of (just?) a 10 book limit, you might want to consider a 10 day limit. Up to 10 books, and after 10 days (or however many days you think makes sense) you lose the ability to sync more books regardless of how many you remove. And, feedback from readers of this forum may help you a lot in figuring this out... if you constrain it too much, folks won't learn the value and of course if the constraints are meaningless, those folks have no need to buy. And, I of course, have no idea if my usage mode is rare or common.

[Kirtai]

I do love this app; I'm a great fan of automation and getting the computer to do all the grunt work of managing my media and this is a vital component of it.

I still have a long way to go with that though

[comox]

I love this app.

I made a recent switch from iOS only devices to an iOS/Android mix and CC was key to making me feel good about the Android experience.

In particular, the idea of managing a library of files and their metadata and then sending the file to a 3rd party viewer is brilliant. This means CC does not have to waste time re-inventing yet another viewing app, and it means I can have one library for all formats including pdf's.

An app like CC is badly needed in the iOS world and I hope you consider porting it.

Also, I encourage you to keep thinking about how to support Calibre's hierarchical tags.

Thanks!

[kaufman]

Originally Posted by comox

Also, I encourage you to keep thinking about how to support Calibre's hierarchical tags.

Have you tried the latest version?

It has support for two level hierarchical tags. Its not as good as unlimited level, but its pretty fantastic on its own.

I had updated my Hierarchy to a three level one, and it wasn't that big a deal to flatten it out a little bit.

[comox]

Yes, the latest version is a big step forward.

More comments in the original hierarchy thread...

[seacity1]

Calibre Companion is my favorite & most used app. I only wish you had a version I could use on my IPad. Any chance this might happen in the future? I know many Ipad users would love it too.