Top of the line #1

Top of the line #1

“You just won the Powerball!”

What’s your biggest problem?

Trying to figure out how to spend all that money, right?

Naturally, you’d want to run right out and find the most expensive things there are and buy those…

Actually, that probably isn’t what I’d do. Yes, we would want to put in a chlorine-free pool (I’m a former competitive swimmer who now has a really severe problem with chlorine). We’d give people we know money, we’d give some causes money…and okay, I’d like to get some fancy way to convert public domain books I have to digital files…non-destructively.

Ooh, and we’d probably invest in some creative things! I have this idea for an amusement park/hotel I think could really work…but the Powerball probably isn’t enough money to do that, and…where was I? Oh, yeah…top of the line stuff.

I wanted to take a look in the Kindle store and find the most expensive item of various types…just for fun.

E-book

Collier on Bankruptcy, Volume 8

Price: $6,399.20 (discounted from $7,999.00) (all prices will be for the USA Kindle store at the time of writing)

We have a new winnah! For quite a while, there were some physics books at the top of this list, but they have been surpassed.  More than the first twenty-five most expensive e-books are all in this Collier bankruptcy series, and they are similarly prices.

Hmm…maybe the first step to avoid bankruptcy is not to spend more than $150,000 on e-books about bankruptcy…

Magazine

Old Cars Weekly

$79.98 per year

Since it’s a weekly, that’s not really a bad deal…it’s $1.48 per issue. I suppose if you are a dealer, you might need to see what changes every week. There are other magazines that are a lot more expensive per issue…I saw several quarterlies that are about $10 per issue.

Newspaper

Leagle Daily Tax Wire

$42.50 per month

Of course, that’s not even counting what it would cost to have a lawyer read it for you! Let’s see…$250 an hour, average reading speed of a lawyer is…

Blog

Google Public Policy Blog

$1.99 a month

Amazon sets the prices for blogs in the Kindle store…I think they are either $1.99 or $0.99 (like this one). The more popular ones, oddly enough, usually have the lower price. This blog was top ten when I just rechecked, for example. That’s what happens to supply and demand with infinite demand, I guess.

Kindle Active Content (games and apps not for the Fire)

eReviewBook MBE

$49.99

The price of this one surprised me! Active content is usually inexpensive. This is a study book for the Bar exam…apparently, they want to teach the low value of money even before they become lawyers.

Cover

kate spade new york Pebbled Leather Case for Kindle Fire HD, Green (only fits Kindle Fire HD 7″)

$99.00

Honestly, I thought I’d find covers that were a lot more expensive than this (I’m looking at you, Oberon). I guess they don’t sell through the Kindle store.

Now, let’s look at a few things you might use on your RSK (Reflective Screen Kindle…anything but a Kindle Fire) or on your Kindle, but aren’t exactly in the Kindle store.

Audiobook

Russian Phase 3, Units 1-30: Learn to Speak and Understand Russian with Pimsleur Language Programs [Unabridged]

$129.95

Actually, there are 80 (!) of these different Pimsleur courses at that price. I haven’t dug deeper in other categories, but I did want to see what was past the Pimsleurs…and this was it:

Our Mutual Friend

$91.95

David Timson portrays fifty-eight characters. They make the point that you could get this one free when you first join Audible (which is also owned by Amazon).

Apps for Fires

The most expensive one was actually right about $1,000, but wasn’t available to me as a USA customer…so I’m going with the next one:

Country and Wood animals

$354.55

That’s right…more than $350 for an app! For kids! It appears to be a memory-type game…gee, at that price point, I’d expect it be holographic.

Amazon Instant Video

Tom, Tom, The Piper’s Son (Institutional Use)

$600.00

Well, there you go! I guess you’d know you are really Richie Rich if you buy these…which might be why people do it. Actually, some of these have specialized uses which might justify the prices.

The lowest priced items? Well, for e-books, it is zero…and lots and lots of them at that price.

I guess I should say…I’ve paid $100 and more for books, although those were collectors’ items.

Just to make this fun, what about you? What’s the most that you’ve spent for a book? I know, if we include encyclopedias and such, it will get much higher. Let’s limit it to a single volume. Do you regret the purchase? Why did you buy it? Feel free to let me and my readers know by commenting on this post.

Bonus tip: Amazon Giveaway of Streaming Devices

Amazon’s really been promoting their new TV pilots…they want people to watch and vote.

So, in conjunction with that, we have this:

Amazon Pilots: So Many Ways to Watch Giveaway

They are giving away these prizes:

• One First Prize winner will win a Samsung UN46F6300 46-Inch 1080p 120Hz Slim Smart LED HDTV [approximate retail value (“ARV”) $899.09].
• One Second Prize winner will win an Xbox 360 4GB Console with Kinect and an Xbox LIVE 12 Month Gold Membership [Online Game Code] (total ARV $359.98).
• One Third Prize winner will win a Nintendo Wii U Deluxe Console (32 GB) (ARV $349.99).
• One Fourth Prize winner will win a Kindle Fire HD 8.9″ Tablet (16 GB) (ARV $269.00).
• One Fifth Prize winner will win a Sony BDP-S590 3D Blu-ray Disc Player with Wi-Fi (ARV $149.99).
• One Sixth Prize winner will win a Roku 3 Streaming Player (ARV $99.99).

Those are cool (and hot) gadgets!

One drawback…you can only enter if you are on Facebook…they don’t even give you a way to mail in an entry. Still, many of you probably are Facebookers, so then this seems like one of those “why not?” situations.

You have to be 18 years old, a US resident, and enter by May 17th…good luck!

This post by Bufo Calvin originally appeared in the I Love My Kindle blog.

Thousands of ILMK posts

Thousands of ILMK posts

This the 2,000th post in the I Love My Kindle blog, so I can now officially say I’ve done thousands of posts.

The first one appeared on August 28, 2009…that means I’ve averaged very close to 1.5 posts a day. If I average 1,000 words a day (and I’m confident it’s more than that), that’s the traditional equivalent of a book that’s about 5,376 pages (at 250 words a page)…gee, that puts me in Stephen King territory.

I’ll do more of an analysis when we actually get to the next birthday of the blog at the end of August, but I did want to celebrate…and to thank you, subscribers and readers, who keep this going.

Since this is the 2,000th post, I’m going to give away 20 licenses (that’s what you get when you buy something in the Kindle store…if these were paperbooks, I’d say “20 copies”) of my Kindle store titles.

You can get one by commenting on this post…I’ll give one away to each of the first twenty people to comment and request one. I think twenty will make it enough to give my international readers a chance at it.

You can request which one you want…I’ll list them below. If you don’t specify one, I’ll probably send you The Mind Boggles, since that’s the most recent title.

Please do not include contact information in your comment…your e-mail address already appears to me (but not to my other readers), and that’s where I’ll send the request.

For those who are curious about the mechanics here, I’ll be gifting the books to the requesters through the Kindle store. I don’t get a discount on that, but I do get a royalty, just like I would if somebody else bought them.

Thanks again, whether you’ve been with me from the beginning, or are just starting down the road with me!

• Free Books for Your Kindle
• Frequently Asked Kindle Questions
• ILMK! (I Love My Kindle!) (not the blog )
• Love Your First Generation Kindle Fire: The ILMK Guide to Amazon’s Entertablet
• The Collected I Love My Kindle Blog Volume 1
• The Disabled Deserve to Read: The Controversy Over the Amazon Kindle’s Voice
• The Kindle Kollection: Three Early Books about the Kindle
• The Mind Boggles: A Unique Book of Quotations

This post by Bufo Calvin originally appeared in the I Love My Kindle blog.

Thanks for your patience: last chance on 3 free books!

Thanks for your patience: last chance on 3 free books!

Regular readers might have been expecting this, although I’m not going to do it every time I go away.

I’ve been away for a few days, and although I wrote ahead so you’d still get a post every day (and believe, me that’s not easy), I appreciate you being patient if my responses have been a bit slower. I really make an effort to respond to questions and most comments made to this blog in a timely manner, and think I typically do a pretty good job.

So, to make up for my absence, I am going to make a couple of my books free.

There is a bit of a twist this time.

I’ve decided to pull some books from the Kindle store.

Now, you might reasonably wonder why that it is. It seems like it would make sense to just always keep every book available there…after all, I’m not having to store the copies somewhere. Amazon just fills the order digitally.

I sort of figure any book I ever see in the Kindle store will be there forever, even though I know from personal experience that isn’t true.

In this case, the three books have become outdated. That’s an issue with writing guidebooks to technology…it changes, and it can be more work to update something than it is to do something new.

So, what I did a while ago was combine the three books into one volume, which I could offer for ninety-nine cents.

That volume hasn’t been a big hit, but keeping that one there keeps the books “in print”, so to speak.

The other ones? The individual books?

I could just leave them…but why have a ninety-nine cent version and three things that are the same for $2.97?

More importantly, I get returns on my first book, the one about free book for you Kindle.

Now, that’s always been true. I think people have gotten it, got the information out of it, and then taken advantage of Amazon’s generous seven-day “return” policy* on Kindle books.

I suspect, now, that some of them are being returned because they are unsatisfactory.

I don’t like that.

Therefore, this will be the last hurrah! It’s your last chance (for the foreseeable future) to get those three books as individual volumes…and it won’t cost you anything.

It’s honestly hard for me to do this…I am still getting some sales and borrows from them, and it feels…almost disrespectful to them. I know that’s silly, though. I’m keeping the door open: I could put them back on sale at some point.

Oh, and if you download one and then I pull it from the store (which is the plan), you can still download it from your archives to new devices: my pulling it doesn’t affect that.

Please check that the book is free before you download it. To make it easier for my international readers, I’m making the free period go for two days (Sunday, 28/4 and Monday 29/4).  However, that depends on Amazon doing it, and you might see this after that point.

One other thing before I give you the links. I know some of you might be worried about downloading free books, because of Amazon’s change in the policy on that.

I don’t think I’ll have 20,000 downloads this month, so I think I’m safe.

For more information on that, see my post in The Writers’ Guide to E-Publishing, Not so freely free: Amazon’s 20K/80% vision.

Here are the books:

Free Books for Your Kindle

This was the first book I published in the Kindle store, way back on March 11, 2008! It does still show you how to get free books, but I’m sure some of it is obsolete, and it doesn’t have all of the current options.

Frequently Asked Kindle Questions (June 20th, 2009)

Again, the issue here is that much of the information has changed. There are still some general conceptual things that are worthwhile.

ILMK! (I Love My Kindle!): Being an Appreciation of Amazon’s E-Book Reader, with Tips, Explanations, and Humor (Revised Edition) (May 30th, 2009)

This one has a lot of fun stuff in it, including The Happy Little Bookworm.

Well, I have to admit…I’m having second thoughts already, and this won’t even post for a week. I think it’s the right thing to do, though, and I do want to show my appreciation to you.

If you are interested in getting the three in one version for ninety-nine cents (or borrowing it from the Kindle Owners’ Lending Library), that’s here: The Kindle Kollection: Three Early Books about the Kindle.

Enjoy!

* You can “return” any Kindle store book within seven days of purchase for a refund. That’s one of the reasons I recommend the Kindle over other devices: last time I checked, neither Barnes & Noble nor Sony allowed returns of e-books at any time for any reason. You can even do the return yourself, by going to http://www.amazon.com/manageyourkindle. Find the book there, then click or tap “Actions…” If you are within seven days of purchase, you’ll see the option to return it.

This post by Bufo Calvin originally appeared in the I Love My Kindle blog.

Happy my birthday, 2013!

Happy my birthday, 2013!

February 12th is my birthday, along with

• Charles Darwin
• Abraham Lincoln
• Cotton Mather
• George Meredith
• R.F. Delderfield
• Judy Blume
• Darren Aronofsky

among many others (I’ve tried to stick mostly with writers in this listing).

I decided I wanted to celebrate by giving you something. 

After all, you readers (and especially the subscribers…hello, subscribers!) give me so much.

Part of KDP Select (the program through which uses of Amazon’s Kindle Direct Publishing make books available for eligible Prime members to borrow through the KOLL…Kindle Owners’ Lending Library) is the ability to make books free for five days (they need not be consecutive) in a ninety-day period.

Please check that a title is free for you before buying it.

I have asked Amazon to make them free on February 13 (that’s the day after my birthday), but I can’t say exactly when it will happen. I think they will also only be free to customers in the USA.

Some might be fun to give as a little Valentine’s Day present…you can buy it today as a gift, and schedule delivery for the 14th.

So, you can click on the titles before, but please make sure it is free when you click the 1-click buy button.

The Mind Boggles: A Unique Book of Quotations

When this one was first published in December of last year, it was the number one bestselling book of quotations at Amazon…including paper! That didn’t last long, but it was fun while it did.

Love Your Kindle Fire: The ILMK Guide to Amazon’s Entertablet

This one has been a bestseller. It was written before the Kindle Fire HDs, so it doesn’t match up exactly with those. If you do have the first generation Fire, though, I think you’ll find it useful.

The Kindle Kollection: Three Early Books about the Kindle

This one combines three of the below into one volume:

* ILMK! (I Love My Kindle): Being an Appreciation of Amazon’s E-Book Reader, with Tips, Explanations, and Humor
* Free Books for Your Kindle
* Frequently Asked Kindle Questions

You may or may not prefer it as one volume. You can do it either way…or both.:)

ILMK! (I Love My Kindle!): Being an Appreciation of Amazon’s E-Book Reader, with Tips, Explanations, and Humor (Revised Edition)

This has some fun stuff…and other things that are out of date. If you want The Happy Little Bookworm, this one has it. 

Free Books for Your Kindle (revised edition)

This one has some value for locating sites, although it isn’t up to date…it doesn’t discuss the Kindle Owners’ Lending Library (KOLL), for example.

Bufo’s Frequently Asked Kindle Questions

Again, somewhat outdated…

The Collected I Love My Kindle Blog Volume 1

This is the first 101 posts in this blog.  I did 101 posts so I wouldn’t cut off Doctor Watson’s Blog: A Kindle Abandoned (which is a four-part story).

Remember, double-check that they are  free to make sure before buying.

Happy birthday! 

This post by Bufo Calvin originally appeared in the I Love My Kindle blog.

Giveaway: my new book, The Mind Boggles

Giveaway: my new book, The Mind Boggles

I’ve just published my first non-Kindle related book in the Kindle store:

The Mind Boggles: A Unique Book of Quotations

It’s not unrelated to books and publishing, though, since it does have quotations from many books in it, as well as from other sources.

These are all quotations I’ve personally collected over decades. It’s only a couple of hundred quotations, but they aren’t the “usual suspects”. If you like quotations, I think you’ll find this unique.

I love quotations! I especially like ones that come from unexpected sources, and say things beyond what you would expect.

It’s a bit like my post recently on Can a popular book be a good book?, but with a twist: can a bad book have a good quote? I don’t think I’ve ever read a completely bad book, or seen a completely bad movie. I think some genres are simply disqualified out of hand by some people, and that’s certainly not my case. Classic or kitsch, eternal or ephemeral, I’ve enjoyed them.

I always like to thank you for being readers, so I’m going to give away ten copies to the first ten people who comment on this post and ask for one. Please do not include contact information in your comment: I can see your e-mail address in the unpublished information. I will not use your e-mail address for any purpose except to send you the gift.

I did make the book available in the Kindle Owners’ Lending Library, so you can borrow it for free if you are an eligible Prime member with a hardware Kindle. The weird thing is that I make a lot more money if you borrow than if you buy it.

The economics on that is that I get about thirty-five cents when you buy a ninety-nine cent title (which this is).

When someone borrows a book, we split a pool of money. It doesn’t matter what the list price of your book is, you get an equal share for each borrow. That share has been running a bit over $2.

I’d have to sell five copies to make the same amount as one borrow.

That shows you how the economics are changing in publishing.

By the way, I do think this is going to be a good little gift at the holidays.

If you’d like a copy, just be one of the first ten to comment on this post and request it.

One other thing: I’m going to try to gift copies to people who are quoted. If you know you are quoted in it, just let me know and I’ll send you one. I’m going to try to be proactive on that, but I know I won’t find everybody.

Update: The Mind Boggles is the number one bestselling book of quotations in the Kindle store! I would have thought that was pretty narrow, but there are 897 titles in that group! Thanks, everybody!

This post by Bufo Calvin originally appeared in the I Love My Kindle blog.

It’s ILMK’s third birthday!

It’s ILMK’s third birthday!

The first post in this blog was published on August 28th, 2009.

It’s been a wonderful journey so far, and I’ve really enjoyed writing for you and all the great exchanges I’ve had with the commenters!

I thought you might be interested in some statistics, but before I do, I want to especially thank those of you who subscribe through the Kindle store. Even though it’s only ninety-nine cents a month, it’s the combined royalties from those subscriptions that really make it possible for me to devote the time and energy to writing ILMK. Certainly, it’s a lot of fun and rewarding in other ways, but it would be harder to justify devoting this big a chunk of my life to it if it wasn’t providing for my family (which comes first for me) in some way.

For those of you who don’t subscribe, you’re still absolutely welcome! I don’t expect everybody to subscribe through the Kindle store…certainly, some of you can’t for various reasons (like being outside the USA and the UK, or having an app, rather than a hardware Kindle, that doesn’t support Kindle store blog subscriptions). I feel especially gratified when someone takes the time to comment and tell me that something I wrote helped them, or amused them, or that they respectfully disagreed with it.

If you click on a link here, or retweet, or mention the blog, thank you.

If you just read the blog and it makes your world brighter in some way, you don’t need to tell me or anybody else about it…just the sense that it happens makes me a happier person.

To thank you all, I’m giving away

The Collected I Love My Kindle Blog Volume 1

today only, August 28th, 2012.

Note: check that the price is free before buying the book. There may be a mismatch between when you read this post and when Amazon makes it free based on my request.

Now for some statistics:

• All time views per WordPress: 818,482
• Number of posts: 1,710
• Number of comments: 8,763
• Busiest day: December 27, 2010
• Highest rank in Kindle store blogs & newsfeeds: #1*
• Days in the top 100: 1,085
• This morning’s rank: #8

Ten most popular posts/pages:

• Home page / Archives
• What to do if your Kindle is lost or stolen
• Word up! Using the Kindle’s dictionary
• Which Kindle 3 should you get?
• Flash! My Kindle 3′s screen fails
• Flash! Some Kindle owners report freezing/rebooting problems with K3s
• Kindle trouble-shooting #1
• Flash! Sleep mode pictures (screensavers) on the K3
• Which Kindle do you have?
• Frequently Asked Kindle Questions: special Collections edition

Top recent commenters (based on the past 1,000 comments):

• Bufo Calvin
• Edward Boyhan
• Lady Galaxy
• Zebras
• rogerknights
• Pam

Top views by country since February 25, 2012:

• United States 102,662
• United Kingdom 6,784
• Canada 2,444
• Australia 2,056
• Germany 791
• India 712
• Saudi Arabia 652
• Brazil 585
• Spain 519
• Russian Federation 426
• Ireland 422
• France 378
• Philippines 370
• Italy 359
• Slovakia 351
• Japan 324
• New Zealand 323
• Czech Republic 309
• Poland 295
• Singapore 285
• Taiwan 278
• South Africa 276
• Switzerland 259
• Hong Kong 233
• Mexico 213
• Romania 211
• Netherlands 196
• Ukraine 179
• Colombia 175
• Hungary 171
• Republic of Korea 166
• Turkey 164
• Israel 155
• Thailand 153
• Malaysia 152
• Viet Nam 150
• Belgium 140
• Argentina 129
• Portugal 125
• Austria 116
• Sweden 115
• Indonesia 112
• Bulgaria 103
• Pakistan 95
• Bahrain 94
• Denmark 92
• Norway 89
• Iceland 85
• Dominican Republic 76
• Greece 75
• Egypt 75
• United Arab Emirates 68
• Croatia 64
• Finland 64
• Chile 58
• Trinidad and Tobago 58
• Peru 56
• Serbia 53
• Venezuela 49
• Slovenia 47
• Costa Rica 45
• British Virgin Islands 43
• Puerto Rico 40
• Georgia 33
• Lithuania 32
• Ecuador 31
• Malta 29
• Belarus 29
• Kenya 29
• Barbados 27
• Nigeria 25
• Estonia 25
• Bahamas 24
• Latvia 24
• Jamaica 23
• Guatemala 21
• Bangladesh 19
• Qatar 19
• Cyprus 17
• Sri Lanka 15
• Netherlands Antilles 15
• Ghana 14
• Bosnia and Herzegovina 14
• Paraguay 13
• Kuwait 13
• Nepal 12
• Lebanon 11
• Panama 10
• Cayman Islands 9
• Cambodia 9
• Guam 9
• Macao 8
• Honduras 8
• Luxembourg 8
• Bolivia 8
• Cuba 8
• Angola 8
• Jordan 8
• Mauritius 8
• Macedonia 8
• Morocco 8
• Nicaragua 8
• Isle of Man 7
• Moldova 7
• Uruguay 7
• Albania 7
• Saint Lucia 7
• Virgin Islands 7
• Anguilla 7
• Mongolia 6
• Oman 6
• Belize 6
• Azerbaijan 6
• Algeria 6
• United Republic of Tanzania 6
• Iraq 6
• Guyana 6
• Benin 6
• Tunisia 5
• Dominica 5
• Rwanda 5
• American Samoa 5
• Jersey 5
• Bermuda 5
• Sudan 4
• El Salvador 4
• Andorra 4
• Namibia 4
• Afghanistan 4
• China 4
• Zimbabwe 4
• Gibraltar 4
• Armenia 4
• Syrian Arab Republic 4
• Myanmar 3
• Fiji 3
• Kyrgyzstan 3
• Northern Mariana Islands 3
• Libyan Arab Jamahiriya 3
• Brunei Darussalam 3
• Lao People’s Democratic Republic 3
• Cape Verde 3
• Vatican City 3
• Uganda 3
• Kazakhstan 2
• Djibouti 2
• Senegal 2
• Turks and Caicos Islands 2
• Mozambique 2
• Montenegro 2
• Antigua and Barbuda 2
• Gambia 2
• Vanuatu 2
• Papua New Guinea 2
• Palestinian Territory, Occupied 2
• Ethiopia 2
• Suriname 2
• Grenada 2
• Palau 2
• Aruba 2
• Maldives 1
• Swaziland 1
• Malawi 1
• Liechtenstein 1
• Saint Vincent and the Grenadines 1
• Zambia 1
• French Polynesia 1
• Guernsey 1
• Côte d’Ivoire 1
• Haiti 1
• Botswana 1
• Cameroon 1
• Yemen 1
• Sierra Leone 1
• Eritrea 1

*I always like to tell people about when I passed both the Huffington Post and The Onion Blog on the same day.

This post by Bufo Calvin originally appeared in the I Love My Kindle blog.

Author D.D. Scott is giving away a boxed set, a Kindle Fire…and has scheduled a “bubble twead’

Author D.D. Scott is giving away a boxed set, a Kindle Fire…and has scheduled a “bubble twead’

I know that this is sort of two Kindle Fire posts in a row, but this one has a big benefit whether or not you have a Kindle Fire, and the opportunity won’t last long.

As regular readers know, I contribute a post once a month to The Writer’s Guide to E-Publishing blog. For disclosure, I am not materially compensated for that.

I wrote over there, as I have here, about the Kindle Fire’s new in-book chat. I think it’s an amazing feature, and I suggested that authors might use it to connect with their readers by scheduling times that the former will be “in the book”. That allows for a live conversation.

Well, D.D. Scott has now done that!

The author of Bootscootin’ Blahniks (and many other books) has scheduled what Scott calls a “Bubble Twead” for this Thursday, April 12th, at 7:00 PM Central time.

To participate, you need two things (besides the time…that can be tough, I know): the book Scott will be in and a Kindle Fire.

Well, here’s the benefit for all Kindle owners (and Kindle app users), whether or not you have a Kindle Fire.

If you go to this

WG2E post

and ask for a copy of

Bootscootin’ and Cozy Cash Mysteries Boxed Set (Books 1-6) (D. D. Scott Special Edition Boxed Sets)

D.D. is giving away 50 “copies”!

No requirement to attend the “bubble twead” or have a Kindle Fire.

I should mention, I came up with the term “twead” (for “tweeting” and “reading”…I’ve been informed it’s the worst portmanteau ever) , and D.D. added “bubble”. That does it make it sound more fun, and not being a very visual person, I didn’t think about the icon looking like a bubble.

You can also enter to win a Kindle Fire! D.D. regularly gives an EBR (E-Book Reader) as part of the Reader’s Guide to E-Publishing. You can enter here:

http://ddscottville.blogspot.com/p/rg2e-ereader-giveaways.html

You wouldn’t have it in time for Thursday, but they do have other uses. I also expect that D.D. may do more of these.

Anyway, I wanted to get this out before the fifty boxed sets were gone. Enjoy!

In other news…

I haven’t had a chance to go through it yet, but thanks to Surveyah in the

Amazon Kindle community

who posted a link to this Salon article:

http://www.salon.com/2012/04/08/amazons_1_million_slush_fund/

I’ll wait until I’ve had time to read it all, but even the headline puts an interesting spin on Amazon giving money to small publishers and nonprofits…

I also wrote a review recently in my blog, The Measured Circle, of Aliens in America: A UFO Hunter’s Guide to Extraterrestrial Hotpspots Across the U.S.. I debated whether to put it in that blog or this one, but I decided to do it there and just link from here for those who are interested. One of the main reasons is that the topic fits in well there, not so well here…and I write a lot less often on that blog, so I thought there was more value for subscribers in putting it there.

This post by Bufo Calvin originally appeared in the I Love My Kindle blog.

Thanks for your patience: free books for you!

Thanks for your patience: free books for you!

As you may know, I’ve been on vacation this week, so you’ve been (at least partially) reading posts I wrote before I left.

I don’t think that means they are necessarily worse, and knowing me, I may have written some posts while I was gone.

Still, I wanted to thank you for your continued loyalty…especially to those who subscribe for the Kindle (thanks, subscribers!).

To do that, I’m making some of my titles free today, March 15!

Please check that a title is free for you before buying it.

I have asked Amazon to make them free on March 15, but I can’t say exactly when it will happen. I think they will also only be free to customers in the USA.

So, you can click on the titles below, but please make sure it is free when you click the 1-click buy button.

For the first time, I’m giving away

Love Your Kindle Fire: The ILMK Guide to Amazon’s Entertablet

This has been a number one seller, although as I write this, it has dropped down some.

If you have a Kindle Fire, I think you’ll find this interesting. If you don’t, I’ll point out that I have enabled lending.

I’m also making some of my earlier titles free, as I did on my birthday.

I ran into an interesting problem when I was setting up the promotion: two of my titles would not let me schedule them for a future date. I’ve asked Amazon about that, and hopefully, that will be resolved before March 15.

The Kindle Kollection: Three Early Books about the Kindle

This one combines three of the below into one volume:

* ILMK! (I Love My Kindle): Being an Appreciation of Amazon’s E-Book Reader, with Tips, Explanations, and Humor
* Free Books for Your Kindle
* Frequently Asked Kindle Questions

You may or may not prefer it as one volume. You can do it either way…or both.:)

ILMK! (I Love My Kindle!): Being an Appreciation of Amazon’s E-Book Reader, with Tips, Explanations, and Humor (Revised Edition)

This has some fun stuff…and other things that are out of date. If you want The Happy Little Bookworm, this one has it. 

Free Books for Your Kindle (revised edition)

This one has some value for locating sites, although it isn’t up to date…it doesn’t discuss the Kindle Owners’ Lending Library (KOLL), for example.

Bufo’s Frequently Asked Kindle Questions

Again, somewhat outdated…

The Collected I Love My Kindle Blog Volume 1

This is the first 101 posts in this blog.  I did 101 posts so I wouldn’t cut off Doctor Watson’s Blog: A Kindle Abandoned (which is a four-part story).

Remember, double-check that they are free to make sure before buying.

Some of you may be wondering why I haven’t offered The Disabled Deserve to Read: The Controversy Over the Amazon Kindle’s Voice (revised) for free on these two promo days. It’s because it is available for free as a post in this blog

http://ilmk.wordpress.com/2009/10/11/the-disabled-deserve-to-read/

I can’t offer it through KDP Select if it’s offered anywhere else. Since I want that one to always be available for free, I don’t remove it from the blog to put it in KDP Select.

I will be paying attention to what happens, but it’s funny to me, I don’t get all wrapped up in what makes the sales change. I am curious about it, though.

Thanks again! It’s been a real challenge trying to write this much this far ahead…I’ve pretty much had to double my output recently. Hopefully, you’ve enjoyed the results…and I’ve enjoyed my trip.

This post by Bufo Calvin originally appeared in the I Love My Kindle blog.

Enter to win a Kindle Fire and a $2000 Amazon gift card

Enter to win a Kindle Fire and a $2000 Amazon gift card

Here’s an official Amazon

Lorax promotion

that I’d missed earlier.

You can enter on that page to win a Kindle Fire and a $2,000 Amazon gift card!

Don’t want a Fire? If you win, you can donate it…that $2,000 will still come in handy.

Hurry up! You have to enter by Sunday, March 4 at 11:59:59 Pacific time.

If you win, let me know.

This post by Bufo Calvin originally appeared in the I Love My Kindle blog.