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Old 05-22-2014, 02:12 PM   #1
Rizla
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Amazon is destroying e-reader innovation

I was reading this article earlier: http://blog.the-ebook-reader.com/201...tablet-for-35/

It's main subject is using a Nook STR as an e-ink tablet, but it states at the start that:

Quote:
E Ink ebook readers have been on the decline for the past couple of years, and innovation has slowed to a crawl thanks to Amazon’s utter dominance of the ebook market.

If you happen to live in Europe or parts of Asia there are lots of choices for ebook readers, but in the United States the evolution of ereaders not named Kindle has come to a virtual standstill.
It seems true to me. There are a lot more different brands of e-readers in Europe and Asia. Even Sony pulled out of America.

In addition, not only are there more brands of readers, but those e-readers demonstrate more innovation than we are seeing in the American market. I am thinking particularly of e-readers that use an open Android OS, but also larger screens.

As it stands in America, it's pretty much 6" readers with a closed OS. This seems a shame to me. I would like to have a large e-ink e-reader that could double as an e-ink monitor that I could access via a PC and / or control via a keyboard. But in North America, we are going backwards. To access anything innovative, I would have to ship from Europe or Asia. It seems the market is reducing our choices, not increasing them. I blame Amazon's almost total monopoly for this situation.
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Old 05-22-2014, 02:32 PM   #2
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It's DRM that's destroying ereader inovation. Without propriatory DRM on ebooks any company could build an ereader that could buy from any store. And no forcing everyone to use epub and Adobe's DRM isn't the solution. DRM not only supresses ereader inovation, it surpresses format inovation and greatly harms small independent ebook sellers. With the exception of DRM on library ebooks DRM is utterly evil. And useless for it's stated purpose.
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Old 05-22-2014, 02:46 PM   #3
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Quote:
Originally Posted by crossi View Post
It's DRM that's destroying ereader inovation. Without propriatory DRM on ebooks any company could build an ereader that could buy from any store. And no forcing everyone to use epub and Adobe's DRM isn't the solution. DRM not only supresses ereader inovation, it surpresses format inovation and greatly harms small independent ebook sellers. With the exception of DRM on library ebooks DRM is utterly evil. And useless for it's stated purpose.
But Europe has DRM too, so that doesn't explain a difference between US and European ereaders.
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Old 05-22-2014, 02:46 PM   #4
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Quote:
Originally Posted by crossi View Post
It's DRM that's destroying ereader inovation. Without propriatory DRM on ebooks any company could build an ereader that could buy from any store. And no forcing everyone to use epub and Adobe's DRM isn't the solution. DRM not only supresses ereader inovation, it surpresses format inovation and greatly harms small independent ebook sellers. With the exception of DRM on library ebooks DRM is utterly evil. And useless for it's stated purpose.
There's a lot of truth to this, it happened in the mp3 music market. Eventually the labels realized that DRM was giving Apple a total stranglehold on the market and allowed Amazon to go DRM-free with their mp3 store. Not long after, iTunes did as well.

We'd probably see more competition in the e-book marketplace as well if DRM was dropped.

That said, I'm not sure it's all due to Amazon's monopoly. The market in the US overall seems to prefer tablets over dedicated e-readers now. So Amazon has a bit of the whole "last vendor willing to invest money in developing new e-readers" thing going on too.
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Old 05-22-2014, 03:02 PM   #5
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By all means, lets just ignore the possibility that not enough Americans are interested in buying eink devices (or rather, dedicated ereaders in general) to justify further R&D. It was a niche market that got saturated. The ereader market hasn't come to a standstill in the U.S., it's just migrated to software that runs on mobile multi-function platforms. Did we really believe a handful of hardcore stand-alone ereader aficionados could sustain an entire hardware industry indefinitely--Amazon or no Amazon?

Last edited by DiapDealer; 05-22-2014 at 03:13 PM.
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Old 05-22-2014, 03:24 PM   #6
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So what's different in Europe? Do people read more there? In the US there is that whole anti intellectual thing going on - who knows if it makes people read less.
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Old 05-22-2014, 03:31 PM   #7
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Quote:
Originally Posted by crossi View Post
It's DRM that's destroying ereader inovation.
No, it's lack of competition. Amazon is large in Europe, too, but there are alternatives. In Germany most of the other chain book stores got together and founded the "Tolino" alliance. They've been keeping Amazon on their toes ever since.
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Old 05-22-2014, 04:03 PM   #8
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It's the walled garden model. Sell the hardware at a loss because you count on making the money from selling the content later. There's no opportunity for competition to enter the market because even if you have a better product there's no profit in the hardware and it's too hard to get people to switch. Established players don't have to improve the hardware because there's no competition. It's get in early, establish your market share and collect the money from your locked in customers.

The American market bought into it though and I suspect the European and Asian markets will follow.
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Old 05-22-2014, 05:06 PM   #9
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Purple Lady View Post
So what's different in Europe?
Different?
Smaller, less mature markets, supported primarily by hobbyists and entusiasts. That means specialty hardware is valued more than low cost. Also, most specialty readers rely on Kobo and the generic ebookstores and in the US the price fix conspiracy mortally wounded most of the generics.

The UK is also a mature market where ebook sales have hit the mainstream and it closely resembles the US: low cost in hardware and ebooks rules. Which means Amazon's message of no muss, no fuss cheap reads drives the market there, too.

Basically, in the US, it's all about the books and the gadgets (and hobbyists) are an afterthought.
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Old 05-22-2014, 05:38 PM   #10
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The American market bought into it though and I suspect the European and Asian markets will follow.
I think the UK market is already there.

Mind you, I think at least Kobo is widely available there (unlike the US?).
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Old 05-22-2014, 05:40 PM   #11
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No, it's lack of competition. Amazon is large in Europe, too, but there are alternatives. In Germany most of the other chain book stores got together and founded the "Tolino" alliance. They've been keeping Amazon on their toes ever since.
I agree. It's simple product lock-in. Unfortunately Amazon has no interest in offering anything other than a 6" reader.
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Old 05-22-2014, 06:10 PM   #12
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No, it's lack of competition. Amazon is large in Europe, too, but there are alternatives. In Germany most of the other chain book stores got together and founded the "Tolino" alliance. They've been keeping Amazon on their toes ever since.
I think the problem is that Amazon has too little competition in the selling of any sort of books at all. Between them, Barnes and Noble, and Borders bought out most of the smaller book store chains and pretty much decimated the independent book stores even before ebooks became an item. That left the two giant booksellers easy targets for Amazon once online commerce got started.

Independent bookstores have always relied on developing a relationship with customers, something that the big chains never did. I personally know only a few people who feel any kind of relationship with any bookstore. Lacking that, most people buy their books on price and convenience alone. Personally, I feel like I have a relationship with an indie bookstore. I am unwilling to go on lugging a pile of paper books but I am willing (if not overeager) to pay a dollar or two extra to get my ebooks from my bookstore.

Kobo is America’s independent bookstore brand and they are still in the game. The latest Kobo hardware is much better than some readers of these forums would have you think. Sadly, America’s independent bookstores seem to have lost faith in their own survival and only halfheartedly support selling eBooks. (Or at times, even the paper ones.)

Amazon’s business model relies on their shareholders/board of directors allowing them to go on year after year without paying a single dollar in dividends. That works while their stock value keeps going up and their shareholders can take their profit in stock value, thus gaining the tax advantage of growing wealth over income. It seems to me that the model will max out someday when there is no longer anywhere for Amazon to expand so profitably, or alternatively, until Amazon becomes a true monopoly in the book business and are sued and broken up by the government’s regulators.
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Old 05-22-2014, 06:36 PM   #13
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Different?
Smaller, less mature markets, supported primarily by hobbyists and entusiasts. That means specialty hardware is valued more than low cost. Also, most specialty readers rely on Kobo and the generic ebookstores and in the US the price fix conspiracy mortally wounded most of the generics.

The UK is also a mature market where ebook sales have hit the mainstream and it closely resembles the US: low cost in hardware and ebooks rules. Which means Amazon's message of no muss, no fuss cheap reads drives the market there, too.

Basically, in the US, it's all about the books and the gadgets (and hobbyists) are an afterthought.
I forgot about how the price fixing killed the independents here. I think the US is all about the gadgets - just not for reading books though.
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Old 05-22-2014, 06:54 PM   #14
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Sigh, you people really need to get over your obsession with only reading on a one note machine. Ebooks and ereading is alive, well, and more than likely growing since most of us are reading on our phones, and tablets and we are reading more than ever before.

In your own way you people are just as much dinasaurs as the price fix BPH-5. You refuse to be flexible, you refuse to change, and you are the minority. So stick with your eink machines til they all die, the rest of us will continue marching on happily reading on whatever devices we have that can display ebooks, play music, make phone calls etc.

The only thing Amazon is guilty of is giving people what they want, all in one convenient place, at prices we are willing to pay. There is nothing illegal or destructive about that since we are the ones making the purchasing decisions.

Last edited by cfrizz; 05-22-2014 at 06:57 PM.
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Old 05-22-2014, 07:59 PM   #15
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Amazon has done nothing wrong. It's not their fault that people don't want to buy anything but a Kindle e-reader.
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