Round up #168: Kindle 3D phone, geeky Moms

Round up #168: Kindle 3D phone, geeky Moms

The ILMK Round ups are short pieces which may or may not be expanded later.

Interesting mix at KDD for Mothers’ Day

I’m sure (or at least I strongly hope) that Amazon chooses the Kindle Daily Deals with promotional tie-in value in mind.

That’s why I was impressed with today’s Kindle Daily Deals.

Okay, sure…the featured (and Gold Box) deal is on any one of a number of highly-rated romances.

However, the science fiction & fantasy deal is

2001: A Space Odyssey (Arthur C. Clarke Collection: The Odyssey)

for $1.99.

That’s really making a solid choice for those geeky Moms.

It has an interesting developmental history. Essentially, Stanly Kubrick bought the rights to some short stories from Arthur C. Clarke…and they jointly wrote the screenplay. However, at the same time, Clarke (with Kubrick’s knowledge, and, I think, encouragement) wrote the novel.

The novel took elements from a few Clarke stories, as did the movie. It isn’t that the movie was written without Clarke and then Clarke adapted the movie.

The Teens daily choice is also one I could see being a sharing between mother and child…but it isn’t one I would think would be read aloud:

The Dark Is Rising (Dark Is Rising Sequence, The)

That’s a Newberry and Carnegie Medal honored book. It is, however, what I call a “Discovered Destiny” book: the protagonist finds out that they aren’t really who they always thought they were, or that they have some secret mission to perform (that they didn’t know about previously). While in some cases that can be “anti-parent”, I could certainly see how a mother and child could have some very interesting discussions if the mother had read the book when young and then gave it to her own child. That’s certainly possible in this case…the book originally came out in the mid 1960s.

Smashwords: “How Data-Driven Decisions *Might* Help Indie Ebook Authors Reach More Readers”

This

presentation

by Mark Coker of Smashwords is the result of some really heavy lifting in data analysis, and has some great insights for e-book authors and publishers.

While this is a single source of data, I’d suggest that it is one of the most significant analyses you’ll read this year, and I highly recommend it.

They do say we can share it with our friends, but I don’t want to take too much away from it. Let me note a few highlights:

• Longer books sell better (60% of the bestsellers were more than 100,000 words)
• Free books are most downloaded, but low-priced ($0.99 and $1.99) are not downloaded as much as somewhat higher priced books…some publishers are underpricing their books
• Sales are not distributed evenly…in other words, just like with print books, some bestsellers really dominate the market. That might be a surprise for e-books for some, who want to see them as more “democratic”

Note that I’m really summarizing: there are 71 slides in the presentation. Yes, the presenter has an agenda, but I did find the data valuable (even if collection of data across all outlets could not be done evenly).

James Patterson explains why his books sell

This is a really insightful

The Guardian article

from mega-successful author James Patterson.

It talks about how the author’s background in advertising made the first big book a success, and about collaborating and producing around ten books a year.

This is one of those stories about “finding a better way”, and worth reading.

CBC: “Writers’ Union of Canada to vote on admitting self-published authors”

CBC article

Sometimes, it feels like the USA is really good at making stuff (like the Kindle), but slower than some other countries at changing behavior (which, as a trainer, is what I do for a living).

The Writers Union of Canada is scheduled to vote at the end of May as to whether or not to allow independently publishing authors into the group.

Generally, traditionally published authors have balked at that. They wanted to recognize the hurdles that were passed to become tradpubbed…it was certainly different from paying a “vanity press” to publish something.

That idea has really changed, though, and will continue to change.

People shrink at the term “self-published”, although that’s often what is happening…the preferred term is now “independently published”…even though that’s a bit mushy to me.

The simple fact is that there are now many “hybrid authors”. They are both traditionally published and independently published. Many very successful tradpubbed authors are now going their own way, and that’s likely to increase.

It then challenges you: why do we accept this author when they do things one way, and we would reject the same author when they do things a different way?

I think it’s possible to set a certain level of success as the barrier to entry. Having a single title on a “recognized” bestseller list (you can create a modifiable list) for at least three weeks (an arbitrary number…I don’t want it to be just one appearance on the list at a retailer, because those can be manipulated by buying a bunch of copies yourself…even at particular times of the day when competition is lower.).

I suspect it will be a while before the Authors Guild in the USA seriously considers the same question, but I could be wrong…and would be happy to be wrong.

WSJ:”Amazon Is Developing Smartphone With 3-D Screen”

This
Wall Street Journal article

talks about an array of possible gadgets from Amazon this year, including a phone with a 3D holographic display…no glasses needed.

Others mentioned include a cheap audio-only streamer, and a set-top box (like a Roku).

I’ve suggested that this will be a year without huge technological breakthroughs in the EBR (E-Book Reader) market, and a 10-inch Kindle Fire doesn’t count.

It’s interesting that EBRs aren’t mentioned.

Here’s the thing. Amazon can be a hardware manufacturer that doesn’t make money on hardware. That works if they use your loyalty to the hardware to get you to buy other profitable items (we are back to my “diapers and windshield wipers” line).

It’s hard for anybody to compete with that.

For me, though, I’d love to see all of this as one device eventually. Why give me a set-top box if my Kindle Fire could easily wirelessly transmit to a TV? Of course, that’s what the set top box could be…just seen as an “accessory” for a Kindle Fire.

How much cheaper could an audio streamer be than a tablet? Sure, you could probably make something for $10…but can’t you just make the Fire do the same thing?

I’ve said before that, if it’s a choice between carrying a tablet that makes decent phone calls and a phone with a relatively small screen that shows movies decently, I think people will go with the tablet. Tablets are small enough to carry reasonably easily, but the bigger screen makes a difference in a lot of functions. Until we get morphable devices (which can change shape), I think the tablet will win.

That said, Amazon can make a lot of money (er…sales, not profit…they aren’t that good at profit) with an array of devices. Those devices have to get people to sign up for Prime, and Prime has to get people to buy physical items.

I think that’s the winning strategy.

I have to admit, I’d be a little afraid to get a “Kindle phone”. My Samsung is very reliable, even it’s a bit outdated now perhaps. It’s a real workhorse. I can’t say that about my Kindle Fire: like an early model PC, it does “crash” a lot, but not so it’s really irritating. Flipboard may stop responding, for example. I wouldn’t want that to happen with my phone…

What do you think? Should authors’ groups accept independently published authors? How do you determine for yourself who is “an author”? Would you buy a Kindle phone? Do you have a geeky Mom? Are you more likely to buy a book for $2.99 than for $1.99? Feel free to let me and my readers know what you think by commenting on this post.

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

Microsoft to buy NOOK division?

Microsoft to buy NOOK division?

This

TechCrunch article

by Eric Eldon and Ingrid Lunden has gotten a lot of play, and understandably so.

They claim to have seen documents about a proposed Microsoft buy-out of the NOOK part of Barnes & Noble for $1 billion.

That would include the NOOK tablets, NOOK reflective screen devices, and the college bookstore part.

Those elements were effectively separated from the brick-and-mortar Barnes & Noble trade bookstore (what most people think of when they think of Barnes & Noble) not that long ago.

The article (which I recommend you read) also suggests that B&N would be out of the tablet business by the end of next year (2014).

“Tab-tab-tablet, good-bye! Tab-tab-tablet, don’t cry!”

Or perhaps…

“Don’t cry for me, Barnes & Noble!
The tablet was just bad business
Although the screen was bright
The timing wasn’t right
We’re still a bookstore…
Until that’s no more”

One of the interesting things is that I think many people liked their NOOK tablets, and of course, they’ve just added the Google Play store (which, as I wrote earlier, puts the NOOK tablets into a hardware business instead of a content business).

That’s really the heart of the problem.

Barnes & Noble and Amazon have clearly been seen as competitors as online bookstores.

When Amazon introduced the Kindle, and later the Kindle Fire, Barnes & Noble, like one of the blind people encountering the elephant in the old story, processed just through the book lens.

They thought that to compete with Amazon, they’d have to also introduce e-book hardware. Honestly, they did a very good with it (eventually). They even led in a few important points (like frontlighting the screen and peer-to-peer book lending).

However, the Kindle Fire was never, in my opinion, about e-books. I’ve always said that the device is there to get you to buy physical goods through Amazon (diapers and windshield wipers).

It’s a little bit like…let’s see. You are challenged to a sword-fighting duel. You train and train and get a really good sword. However, you find out that your opponent has jet aircraft…so you figure you’d better get them. You put all your time and energy into getting jet aircraft…even though, as it turns out, your opponent isn’t going to use those jet aircraft during the duel at all.

That doesn’t mean Amazon doesn’t want to sell e-books…I think they do. I think the money, though, is in getting you to buy the physical stuff (they also do a lot business providing services, like fulfillment and web storage, but that’s another story).

So, while Barnes & Noble was competing with Amazon on tablets, they were doing it to sell books (and apps…digital stuff). Amazon was using them as a gateway to something else. Maybe that’s a better analogy. Amazon built a nice door. Barnes & Noble built a nice door…but B&N didn’t have a store behind their door.

I do think it could happen. Microsoft could buy the NOOK business…and shut down the NOOK tablet part of it (which underperformed in the last holiday season) a year from now (maybe a bit more than a year…one more holiday season).

The question is, why would they do that? Why buy the NOOK tablet business and then shut it down?

It’s not, I think, because it is a competitor for Microsoft hardware.

I think they aren’t really buying the tablet business…they are buying the NOOK customers.

This deal would include the NOOK reflective screen devices, and it didn’t say what they might eventually do with those (if this story is all accurate).

I think for Microsoft, they want retail customers…and this would give them to them.

They could then sell Windows tablets to those customers.

I haven’t seen this in many stories, but Microsoft had an e-book business before…and eventually abandoned it. Those people who bought into .lit might be a bit wary of this.

Barnes & Noble’s investors aren’t wary, though. Take a look at this

CNN.Money stock chart

for B&N…up more than 25% in two days.

Does that mean people are saying, “Yay! Microsoft is going to buy B&N and then Barnes & Noble will make a lot of money as I stick with it through retirement?”

No, for many of them it means, “Good! I can get a better price for this turkey before I dump it.”

What would happen to the brick-and-mortar Barnes & Noble stores?

I think Leonard Riggio, the B&N founder who has made an offer for them, would get them.

Microsoft would own the NOOK hardware, NOOK Books, really all the digital content, and the college bookstores.

Riggio would own, and try to re-invent, the brick-and-mortar bookstores.

Going farther out, Microsoft would dump the NOOK hardware (including the reflective screen devices, eventually). NOOK would basically just become an app that was part of Windows. You’d have access to your NOOK books, and it would come on Microsoft devices. They might continue to sell digital content online.

Riggio…might figure something out, but I think the stores would look very different than they do today. I do think it’s still possible to make brick-and-mortar bookstores work, but you need them to be destinations. You need the shopping experience to be vastly superior to what it is online…otherwise, as Amazon gets same day delivery going, there’s not going to be much point in going to one.

We’ll see how this all plays out. If this was a leak, I don’t think the players are upset about it. They are getting valuable feedback about how the public sees the idea…and I’d say it’s been generally positive.

Could we lose Barnes & Noble as a chain trade bookstore? I think so…at least in the current configuration of it.

We’ll see what happens.

I’m interested to know what you think…you can let me and my readers know by commenting on this post.

P.S. Thanks for all the well wishes about my surgery! I’m doing pretty well…my Significant Other has been very supportive, and I think my surgeon did a great job. Thanks also to those who gave me a heads-up on this story…even if I’ve already seen something, I appreciate those!

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

Just in case…

Just in case…

I’m writing this one ahead, to post the day after I have a minor surgery.

There is always a risk when you have general anesthesia. Of course, there is always a risk when you walk across the street or drive to work. Every morning you wake up, there was a chance that you weren’t going to.

People have always found that a bit of an odd attitude on my part. They know I’m generally optimistic about the world, and I tend to think that people are usually good.

However, I also mentally prepare myself for the worst.

Every day, I think there is a chance I’ll be fired.

I have awakened on thousands of mornings, and checked first thing to see if the pets were still alive.

That might seem morbid. I’m not really expecting those things to happen. Logically, I know I’m a good employee. I understand the odds.

I think I’m just…rehearsing the situation, so I can respond to it in the best way possible.

In an emergency, I want to be the one who reacts logically, who gets the best outcome by not reacting out of blind fear.

I immunize my emotions against the disaster by exposing them bit by bit, while the threat isn’t real.

In this case, I wanted to write something to you, my readers, in case something goes wrong.

Don’t worry, this isn’t going to be all sad and sappy. Obviously, I’ve had an incredible time with you, and hope that continues for many years. I do think about Amazon ending the blog program in the Kindle store, or just kicking me out of it for some reason. There are all kinds of things that could happen, but nothing could negate the great things that have happened so far.

I thank you for that.

I thank you for disagreeing with me and showing me new perspectives. Every time I’ve gotten a respectfully written comment from someone who had a different opinion, I learned something and became a better person.

I thank you for thanking me. Kind words matter in the world, and yours have mattered in mine.

I thank you for accepting my quirkiness. For example, people have rarely pushed me for things I don’t choose to reveal. I don’t think that’s because I”m particularly boring. I think most people naturally are curious about certain things about anyone they meet…not asking about them is a conscious courtesy.

I also wanted to talk a little bit about the books I own.

When I was a brick and mortar bookstore employee (I eventually became a manager), I was told we could take home paperbacks where the cover had been torn off to return to the publisher for credit (showing we hadn’t sold it). We couldn’t donate those “strips”, or sell them, or give them away…just own them and read them.

I have a lot of those. When I’m gone, my guess is that the ethical thing is to recycle them. That feels like the contractual thing to do. I hate seeing any book anywhere destroyed, but this wouldn’t be destroying the book…just a copy of it already accounted for as out of circulation. I don’t think any of those are going to be rare…they tended to be popular books. Those are the ones where you would have gotten more than you could sell. You wouldn’t have widely overestimated demand on an obscure first time novelist, for example.

I have a few real rarities that I’d like to see get into good hands. One is

The Lake Worth monster [of Greer Island, Ft. Worth, Texas]

That one is definitely in the category of ephemera…something people don’t expect to last. I guess I’d want to see if Loren Coleman wanted that copy for the museum. We’ve never met, but we’ve had some correspondence, and I’d be sure Loren would treat it with respect.

Ideally, of course, I’d like to see it digitized and made legally available to the public…along with every other book copy I own. That one may still be under copyright protection, but I want them preserved…I want everything and everybody preserved, if possible.

Another one I have is the

Reference Guide to Fantastic Films: Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror

That one is the result of a truly geeky…er…academic…no, I’m going with “geeky” labor of love. I think my edition is rare, although it appears it may not be highly sought after.

Those are probably the two stand-outs, although I have a lot of other rarities.

People shouldn’t live forever, and I don’t expect to do that. I know that the odds are very, very high I’ll be around to write something on May 11th (although I may not feel much like doing it…this is ambulatory surgery, meaning that I don’t stay in the hospital, but I’m not supposed to drive for 24 hours…I don’t think that driving a keyboard counts, though).

Books, though, should live forever.

They should be here now and forever, and we should be able to reach into the past and retrieve them, and into the future and read books which haven’t been written yet.

Books are what we are as a species. They represent what we think and how we feel. They are the purest form of the formless. They take what separates us from simply mechanical flesh and blood and presents it to other people.

I’d much rather that a future alien race find our books than our bodies…that would tell them who we were, not just what we were.

I expect that you’ll hear from me again soon…that’s the logical expectation, and it’s certainly the bet I would place. If you don’t, let this be the last thing I say to you:

Thank you.

Update: I’m home recovering. Yes, those were the odds, and what I expected. I’m a bit frustrated by not being able to do my normal routine (no exercising today), but my Significant Other has been here supporting me, and it’s all good.

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

Author Profile: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

Author Profile: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

This is one in a series of posts where I focus on a particular author.

Sherlock Holmes would have sneered at Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

It’s ironic, really…almost like Daddy issues.

There are few clearer illustrations of an author’s ability to create a character who is in many ways superior, but certainly different, than themselves.

Can you imagine how Holmes would have approached a case where two young girls claimed to have taken photographs of fairies? It certainly wouldn’t have been with the generosity with which Conan Doyle championed it…even writing a book supporting it.

No, the detective and the author are two very different people.

No question, Holmes is one of the most popular literary characters of all time, and is repeatedly adapted into other media (not just the Basil Rathbone movies, but several TV series).

I would guess, though, that that is all that most people know of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. It would certainly be enough, but it’s just the beginning.

This

Kindle store search for Arthur Conan Doyle

has 1,408 results at the time of writing. Certainly many of them are duplicates…since most of the work is in the public domain, it can be adapted, and reworked without obtaining permission (although that is arguably not true of all of it…that gets into a bit of a tricky situation).

You can find all of the Holmes books individually for free…or save yourself some trouble and for ninety-nine cents get this one:

THE COMPLETE SHERLOCK HOLMES and THE COMPLETE TALES OF TERROR AND MYSTERY (All Sherlock Holmes Stories and All 12 Tales of Mystery in a Single Volume!) … Conan Doyle | The Complete Works Collection)

It says its authorized by the estate, and it has enough reviews that I would guess it would have been pulled down by now if that wasn’t true. The estate does defend the copyright.

I’d say the next series to go to after Holmes is Professor Challenger. Bombastic and egotistical, most people know the adventuring Prof from The Lost World, but there are actually three novels in that series. Again, you can get them individually for free, or buy a one volume set:

Complete Professor Challenger Lost World Series (Pulp Lost Worlds)

In particular, The Poison Belt has somewhat of the feel for me of a Doctor Who episode…although Professor Challenger is certainly very little like Matt Smith’s Doctor Who! It’s more the reaction to an epic scale event.

As to the other works, this is a good collection:

Works of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (Illustrated)

For $2.99 at the time of writing, you get a wide selection of works, including Holmes and Challenger, but also plays, poetry, military history, and Spiritualism.

That last one is something that many Holmes readers may find incongruous about Doyle. That’s due in part, I think, to a misunderstanding of Spiritualism. At the time, many saw it as a scientific attempt to prove life after death (and/or communication with other non-corporeal entities). People did experiments (some of the quite bizarre): it wasn’t just a matter of “believing in ghosts”.

Now, certainly, this wasn’t anything accepted by the mainstream, and there was fraud involved in some of it.

That’s a place where Arthur Conan Doyle and Harry Houdini, who had a personal relationship, disagreed.

Houdini was an adamant anti-Spiritualist, on a campaign to expose what the escape artist saw as fakes exploiting the bereaved.

Conan Doyle was a supporter of the existence of the  supernatural.

There has been more than one book about this odd clash of celebrities, each with a larger than life mythos. Here is a recent and well-reviewed one:

Masters of Mystery: The Strange Friendship of Arthur Conan Doyle and Harry Houdini

While many people nowadays would laugh it all off, thanks to Holmes, Conan Doyle was an influential figure. When test footage of the 1925 version of The Lost World was shown to The Society of American Magicians, the New York Times reported it as uncertain as to whether it was merely a fictional movie (with amazing effects) or real pictures of real dinosaurs (perhaps obtained through psychic influence…they linked them to the Cottingley Fairies):

NYT article pdf

“Whether these pictures were intended by the famous author and champion of spiritism as a joke on the magicians or as a genuine picture like his photographs of fairies was not revealed. Sir Arthurs said they were ‘psychic’ and also that they were ‘imaginative,’ and announced in a firm tone, before they were shown, that he would submit to no questions on the subject of their origin.”

That certainly says something about Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Was he just being a merry prankster (the author clearly knew that these were special effects)? Was the point to prove the fallibility of  the magicians, and thereby call into doubt their criticism of Spiritualism? Was all of Conan Doyle’s advocacy of Spiritualism perhaps done in a similar tone?

That’s a mystery…and the game’s afoot!

Update: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle reading list

I wanted to give you a few more specific recommendations…

Sherlock Holmes novel: Sign of Four

I normally like to start at the beginning of a series and go straight through, but honestly, the first Holmes book (A Study in Scarlet) has such a quirky story structure that some people think the copy they got is in error. There’s a long flashback that people think is a different story. I’d skip it and start with the second. The Hound of the Baskervilles may be the most famous, but until you know Holmes, it doesn’t work as well.

Sherlock Holmes short story collection: The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

I’d say that this really cemented the idea of Holmes, and there are some great stories in this one. A Scandal in Bohemia is important in understanding Holmes, and The Adventure of the Red-Headed League and The Adventure of the Engineer’s Thumb will stick with you.

Professor Challenger novel: The Lost World

This is just flat-out a rollicking adventure novel. It’s one of the most universally enjoyable of Conan Doyle’s works.

Standalone novel: The Maracot Deep

This one is philosophical…more fantasy than science fiction in feel. Holmes would hate it.

History: The Great Boer War

This was non-fiction revised repeatedly…it was actually published before the war was over. You can sort of think of it as investigative journalism, with Conan Doyle actually interviewing people involved in this conflict between colonial powers in Africa.

Paranormal: The Coming of the Fairies

How could you not? Sir Arthur Conan Doyle arguing for the reality of pictures that little kids took of dancing “fairies in their garden”.

Of special interest to readers: Through the Magic Door

Conan Doyle writes about the books in his library. That can be a bit like having somebody tell you their dreams, because they never mean the same to you that they mean to someone else. Here’s the opening:

“I care not how humble your bookshelf may be, nor how lowly the room which it adorns. Close the door of that room behind you, shut off with it all the cares of the outer world, plunge back into the soothing company of the great dead, and then you are through the magic portal into that fair land whither worry and  vexation  can follow you no more.”

Autobiography: Dangerous Work: Diary of an Arctic Adventure

I haven’t read this one, but Conan Doyle served as the “surgeon” (which didn’t have quite the meaning it does today) on a whaling ship.

Special note: I chose Sir Arthur Conan Doyle for today partially because I wanted an author who was also a doctor to tie into my having a minor surgery today. Should be fine…it is done under general  anesthesia, though. I might be a tad less responsive for the next few days.

Update: I’m home from the surgery…everything seems to have gone well, although of course, it’s a bit too soon to be able to tell much. I’m going to be careful writing this…might say something even sillier than usual.

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

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.

Does Amazon need DRM?

Does Amazon need DRM?

Why do people buy e-books at Amazon? Will they continue to do so in the future?

Let’s take the latter question first: I think they will, and I’m going to explain why. That should also answer the first question (although I’m going to ask you why you buy them also).

What got me thinking about this was a nice

iReaderReview article

I saw it in my morning Flipboard read, although I have some correspondence with the author of that blog. Some of us Kindle bloggers do correspond some, but we don’t send each other a heads-up on every article we write. We probably all read each other pretty much, but reasonably assume that we’ll look at the blogs.

The article explains about gatekeepers, and breaks it all down with bullet points and speculation.

I’ve written about the idea of flattening the market, of consumer buying directly from creators, notable in this article:

A Tale of Two Middles

However…

I think Amazon has an appeal to people that will survive the removal of apparent competitive advantages. This is a key short excerpt from switch11′s post linked above:

“It’s all a House of Cards. The New Gatekeepers lording over Authors and Readers and Publishers. Pretending they are indispensable. Using everyone’s fears to exploit them and gain power.

What’s going to happen if DRM is eliminated and Authors, Readers and Publishers (especially Publishers) realize that Amazon and B&N are 100% redundant and replaceable by hot air.”

In the status quo, people obviously buy e-books from Amazon.

The status quo isn’t going to continue, though.

There is a chance that equal collection legislation will pass, and internet companies will collect sales tax at the point of sale the same way that brick and mortar stores do. That wouldn’t affect me on e-books (California doesn’t currently charge sales tax on e-books sold electronically…they are treated like contracts, not like objects). Some other states apparently do, since I see a lot of people commenting on sales tax on their e-book purchases.

That’s a change.

Another potential change, addressed by the article that sparked this, is the possible end of DRM (Digital Rights Management). Basically, that is electronic code inserted into content by the publisher to control the use of the content.

As I wrote about yesterday, Tor (part of Macmillan) has been DRM-free through Amazon for over a year, and they aren’t reporting adverse effects from it.

DRM is part of what keys your file to your device, meaning that you can’t just copy your e-book file from one Kindle to another and read it. It also limits your ability to copy and convert the file…you can’t simply take your Kindle e-book file and turn it into a file which can be read by a NOOK.

The article (which I recommend) suggests that if DRM was gone, people would have no reason to buy e-books from Amazon or Barnes & Noble.

I just don’t think that’s the case.

Equal access doesn’t mean equal trust.

Equal access doesn’t mean equal convenience.

Equal access doesn’t mean equal service.

I want to get my content from Amazon because I trust them, because I can centralize everything in one place, and because of their service.

Let’s say that five different publishers start making their books available broadly from their own sites.

Even if the prices are equivalent, I don’t want to have to go to five individual sites to get those books…and I don’t want to have to go back to them to retrieve them (if they’ll even archive them for me for free, like Amazon does).

We use the term “one-stop shopping” to describe all sorts of things…it’s a shorthand for convenience, for not having to go several places to do several things.

That’s one of the big appeals of Amazon.

My life is my life…it’s not a whole bunch of separate transactions. I might want to know if I bought a household product at the same time I bought a food or an e-book. I want to be able to look at my purchases for a month sometimes…not just my e-book purchases, but all of them.

I can’t do all that from Amazon right now…but I can do a lot of it.

There are times I want to browse for something…I want to see all of the e-books on one subject. If I was at publisher A’s site, I wouldn’t see publisher B’s books. The publishers are trying to address that with Bookish.com. Bookish, though, isn’t going to show me independently publisher books. It’s also not likely to show me critical reviews of books by other readers, like Amazon does.

Hey, I might also want to browse for movies, games, t-shirts, and toys related to that topic…not as likely from a publishers’ site.

So, centralization is key. It’s like the internet: can you imagine logging into separate networks for each of the sites you visit?

Trust is another issue.

The “middle-less market” imagines that I’ll see a tweet from somebody with a link in it for a book. I’ll click on that link, and end up directly on the author’s website. I would then presumably give my credit card (or Paypal, or Bitcoin) information to this person that I have maybe never heard of before. I’m going to trust them with my information.

I’m also going to trust them to send me a good quality copy of the e-book. I’m going to trust them to deal with any problems I might have.

Look, if there is something I find unacceptable about an e-book I buy from Amazon (whatever it is…I don’t have to give a reason), I can “return” it myself within seven days of purchase for a refund. I can do that just by going to

http://www.amazon.com/manageyourkindle

and click or tap

Actions…

Is every author going to have that reassurance and convenience for me?

It’s like when I managed a brick-and-mortar bookstore, and an independent would come in ask me to put a book on the shelf “on consignment”. I wouldn’t pay them unless the book sold.

One of my first questions to them would be, “If I wanted a thousand copies of this tomorrow, could you get it to me?” A traditional publisher typically could (or nearly that quickly). That indie didn’t have those resources. In a physical store, shelf space costs you money, because you are paying rent on it. It’s advertising space…I couldn’t have something sitting there that couldn’t result in more sales if I needed it.

What was our arrangement if the book was shoplifted (surprisingly  common in bookstores)? What if I wanted to get rid of the book? How would I return it to them? How did I know the book wasn’t defective, and if it was, how would that get remedied for my customer?

As a manager, I had to go with the people who could best service the store.

As a customer, it’s similar.

One more major point: Amazon not only stores all those books for  me (and my annotations, if I want): I can share them easily with other people on my account. Amazon knows me. If somebody has a device registered to my account, they are fine with it being downloaded to that device (as long as it is compatible, and we don’t go over the simultaneous device limit the publisher has set).

How is an author with a website selling maybe one book going to know that someone else is on my account? Are they going to let me have unlimited devices on my account, the way Amazon does? Will I even have an account, or will it be one purchase and “see ya”?

Does DRM help Amazon lock in a customer base? Sure. If it was gone, would that mean people would stop shopping at Amazon? I don’t think so. You can already get DRM free books at Amazon (Amazon gives that option to publishers using their Kindle Direct Publishing, and there are those Tor books), and people still buy them from Amazon.

So, let me ask you…

While I think “middle-less” will certainly grow, I also think Amazon will still hold their “end” up in the future.

What do you think? Do you feel trapped into buying from Amazon, or are you doing it entirely by choice and preference? If you could buy your e-books from a thousand different sources, would that be better or worse? Can you envision some other system besides either retail or “island suppliers” (everyone is independent) that would work as well as what we have now? Maybe some central rating and payment site for indies…and why wouldn’t that be Amazon? Feel free to let me and my readers know what you think by commenting on this post.

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

Round up #167: no DRM doesn’t increase piracy for Tor, Mothers’ Day specials

Round up #167: no DRM doesn’t increase piracy for Tor, Mothers’ Day specials

The ILMK Round ups are short pieces which may or may not be expanded later.

Mothers’ Day specials

Oh, how the pace of commerce has changed! Mothers’ Day is this Sunday in the USA, and you can still get deals on line and get the item in time. Whether you are buying for a Mom or not, I thought I’d mention a couple.

First, there’s the deal on the Kindle Fire HD 7″ models directly from Amazon (this doesn’t appear to apply to the 8.9″). You have to enter this code at checkout:

FIRE4MOM

Note that entering it a checkout means you will not get the opportunity to enter it if you use 1-click. This deal is good through May 12th, and only for USA customers. Here is a link to the rest of the

Kindle Fire HD 7″ deal details

Second, DecalGirl has a deal on skins. Skins are really a way to personalize a device, including Kindles and Kindle Fires. It’s like a super duper sticker you put on it. You can even do customized ones by uploading a photo. They have a promotional code for 25% off through May 13th…I guess they even have the late folks covered…so to speak. Of course, you could also let Mom pick her skin.

You can shop here:

DecalGirl Mothers’ Day skins

At checkout, enter the code

THANKSMOM

I assume it’s okay to post this, since they sent me an e-mail they said I could forward to friends…you’re my friends, right?

Senate passes equal collection legislation

I’ve written about this a lot before, and I’m happy to see it moving along (even though it isn’t law yet).

There’s nice coverage of the vote by the Senate to pass equal collection legislation in this

Money.CNN.com article

Just to summarize, it would mean that large internet retailers would collect sales tax at the point of sale on online purchases, similar to what happens in a brick-and-mortar store.

This is key: it is not a new tax.

If people think of it as a new tax, it probably won’t pass the House of Representatives, despite the bipartisan support it has had.

Nobody will owe a penny more of sales tax if this passes…but the vast majority of people will pay more.

That’s because you are probably expected to pay sales/use tax in your state on your annual taxes when you buy things from out of state retailers…but most people just don’t. We do in my family, and it’s a bear…if this does pass, it will simplify things for me.

Can you imagine figuring out your own sales tax on your brick-and-mortar purchases, and then paying it as one lump sum once a year?

I’m not convinced it will pass the House, although there are certainly  motivations  to do so. Amazon and Wal-Mart both support it. More importantly, the Federal government might be able to send less money to the states if the states were able to collect the sales tax they were already owed. However we all know that “logic” isn’t spelled “lawgic” for a reason…the two don’t have a whole lot to do with each other.

Tor going DRM-free has not increased piracy

There’s a fascinating

Tor.com post

that talks about how things are going after a year of being DRM (Digital Rights Mangement) free. Tor is a major publisher (part of Macmillan), and I reported on their decision.

DRM is code inserted into digital content by the publisher to control the use of that material.

When you download an e-book that is DRM-free, there is nothing it that technically stops you from copying it or altering it.

That doesn’t mean that you have the right to do anything you want: you could still do things (like distributing it freely over the internet without permission) which would be illegal infringement.

However, if you want to convert it from an e-book you can read on a Kindle to an e-book you can read on a NOOK, that is apparently okay.

Here’s the key line in a short excerpt:

“As it is, we’ve seen no discernible increase in piracy on any of our titles, despite them being DRM-free for nearly a year.”

That doesn’t mean there has been no piracy (there can even be piracy of DRM-protected files…it’s just harder), but that releasing without DRM hasn’t meant that there was any more or it (as far as they can tell).

As they note, their success doesn’t mean it would be equally successful for all books, but you can bet other tradpubs (traditional publishers) are looking at this carefully.

Taking a Kindle for a test drive…really

My Significant Other and I knew that it was getting to be time to buy a new car (I had a Scion XB with over 150,000 miles on it…it was still doing fine, but you start thinking about maintenance costs at that range).

For me, tech in the car is a big thing. I’ve been listening now to text-to-speech in the car for years.

In the Scion, that was with an FM transmitter, playing through the radio.

We wanted a hybrid. We’d been driving Toyotas (I did like the Scion a lot) and had pretty much settled on a Prius.

Then, we drove a Ford Fusion over the weekend…and bought it.

For us, the drive was just so much better…the feel of it, and especially the visibility.

The tech was fine: it’s practically like having gotten a new computer, which is a fun day for me. I’m not that big on driving, but I really enjoyed it today. I have a touchscreen in the car, but I can also talk to it. The Kindle Fire (and my phone and my Blackberry and my Significant Other’s phone) paired to the Bluetooth with no problem. I start the book on the Kindle (before I start driving), and tell it to play Bluetooth audio…and I’m off and running. It also has two USB charging ports, so I don’t need a car adapter with this one.

Unrelated to the Kindle, the back-up camera is crazy cool. I haven’t had a new car for about nine years, so this all new to me. I really like that it shows me two virtual reality lines for where the car is going to go…and if you turn the steering wheel (even before you start moving), it shows you the projected path. It’s going to take quite a while before it feels natural to look forward (at the screen) when backing up, but I can clearly see the advantages.

That “taking a while” thing happens, though. I had a funny one the other day. The clock in our bathroom died, and I’m often reading on my Kindle Fire in there while I exercise and brush my teeth (I take a long time doing the latter). However, I did have a paper magazine up on the towel rack where I normally put my Fire. I caught myself reaching up to push something on the paper magazine to see what time it was. I didn’t get very far, but that’s clearly become a habit for me.

Some people ask why an RSK (Reflective Screen Kindle…anything but a Kindle Fire) doesn’t show a clock all the time. One reason why their batteries last so long is that they do very little when you are reading. They redraw the “page”, and that’s about it unless you tell it to do something. If there was a clock, they’d have to redraw the page at least every minute…that would eat up battery charge life.

What do you think? Will equal collection legislation pass the House? How will it affect Amazon if it does? Did you buy any more books from Tor because they went DRM-free? How do you use your Kindle in the car? Feel free to let me and my readers know by commenting on this post.

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

Things keep getting better #1

Things keep getting better #1

I’m an optimist.

Really…is it that obvious?

While there are certainly terrible things that happen in the world, and we have the increasing problem of individuals who want to do bad things being able to hurt more people in more ways more quickly at the same time, generally, I think the world is good and getting better.

Even when we look specifically at the Kindle and e-books overall, we can see it.

One way is to look at things people about which people have complained in the past, and see if they have been changed.

In many cases, they have.

That doesn’t mean everything, of course…there are a lot of things which haven’t been remedied…yet.

I’m also not somebody who says something is bad just because it isn’t everything I want. I figure if I’m hungry and somebody gives me a third of a meal, that’s a third I didn’t have before. I don’t get mad because I didn’t get that full meal.

That said, let’s take a look at some of these improvements.

First, generally…Kindles are cheaper and do much more than they used to do. When the Kindle was introduced on November 19, 2007, it cost $399, and held about 200 books. There were only about 80,000 books available in the USA Kindle store (which was the only Kindle store there was).

Now, the least expensive Kindle is $69 in the USA (you can buy more than five of them for the price of one of the original Kindles), holds about 1,000 books (five times as many), and we are closing in on two million titles in the USA Kindle store.

Next, let’s look at some of the big improvements in chronological order:

Text-to-speech (February 9, 2009)

I don’t think people had really been asking for this: it came as a surprise to me and many others. This has been a long and bumpy road: initially, it was for all books, than Amazon allowed rightsholders to block it, and some did so…big time. However, it appears to me that has been reduced over time, and Amazon encourages independent publishers not to block the access.

SmartPhone access (March 4, 2009)

While this ability to read e-books without carrying an EBR (E-Book Reader) with you was originally just for the iPhone and iPod touch, free apps eventually let you read on Android devices, Blackberrys, Windows Phones…a wide variety.

Kindle Publishing for Blogs (May 13, 2009)

Amazon has given creative people many ways to make money with their art. This was one of them that was relatively simple. While you might not consider every blog “art”, it does allow people to get their ideas out there and get some compensation for it.

USA Today includes e-books in its bestsellers’ list (July 23, 2009)

There was a lot of talk about when the mainstream media would start recognizing e-books, giving readers of that format more information and authors more exposure. This is really when it happened.

Kindles go international (October 7, 2009)

People outside the US get Kindles, and this is when the announcement was made. Oh yeah, they also lowered the price on the US-only model with this announcement.

Kindle for PC released (October 22, 2009)

This greatly expanded access…in 2009, not everybody had a SmartPhone.

Kindles come to Canada (November 17, 2009)

I’m not going to mention every time the Kindle began selling through a region-specific Kindle site, but people had been clamoring for this…well, perhaps asking nicely for it repeatedly.

PDF support and landscape mode (November 25, 2009)

I wonder how many people remember that these weren’t available initially? It part of a free update…those have brought us so many features!

Barnes & Noble introduces the NOOK (November 30, 2009)

Yes, I consider this an improvement for the Kindle…the competition has been good for us Kindleers.

Permanent delete from the archives (December 9 ((?)), 2009)

That’s right…for the first two years, we could not delete books from our Kindle accounts (we could delete them from our devices). People had really wanted that!

Add to Wishlist button added to Kindle book product pages (December 11 ((?)), 2009)

Many people use this functionality for tracking, and they had been asking for it.

International rightsholders get Kindle publishing (January 15, 2010)

It was called the “Digital Text Platform” at that point…it became Kindle Direct Publishing later.

Amazon doubles the possible royalty rate for indie publishers (January 20, 2010)

It goes up to 70% from 35%.

Kindles become available in brick and mortar stores (April 25, 2010)

This was in Target…they were the first.

Collections (book “folders’) come to the Kindle (June 14, 2010)

In another free update, we get one of the most requested features…a way to organize our books on our Kindles.

Active content (games and apps) come to the Kindle (August 3, 2010)

The first two games were Every Word and Shuffled Row. There had been hidden games on the Kindle before that, but these were actual downloadable titles.

Gifting of Kindle books (November 19, 2010)

Wow, did people want to give Kindle e-books to people! Before this, you could do gift certificates, but this was a huge improvement.

Lending books to friends (December 30, 2010)

People wanted to lend e-books, just like they could p-books (paperbooks).  Sure, it’s limited, just as it was for the NOOK, but that’s an improvement.

Ad-supported Kindles (April 11, 2011)

Okay, okay…nobody was walking around with a sign saying, “Please put advertising on my Kindle!” However, this did lower the prices, and the ad-supported versions tended to outsell the full price ones, showing a preference.

Reading e-books in a browser (August 10, 2011)

The Cloud Reader was announced on this date, which would lead to the ability to read your Kindle store books without downloading and special software.

Borrowing books from public libraries (September 21, 2011)

There still is work to go on this, but we can now borrow e-books from public libraries for our Kindles. The Big Six publishers have all at least announced plans for some representation in public libraries.

I’m gong to stop there in this post…the next big era comes with the release of the Kindle Fire. That doesn’t mean improvements stopped at that point, though! They just keep coming. I fully expect to get comments pointing out the things that haven’t happened yet, and maybe I’ll address those myself in another post. I just wanted to leave you with this list of improvements, often at a lower cost.

See? Things are getting better.

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

Round up #166: Harper Lee sues, Star Wars Day

Round up #166: Harper Lee sues, Star Wars Day

The ILMK Round ups are short pieces which may or may not be expanded later.

“May the Fourth be with you!”

Ath you probably…wait, that thould be…that’th thilly! Drat, once you say “May the Fourth be with you”, it’s hard to stop using the TH’s for S’s.

May the Fourth has become Star Wars Day, due to the above pun. Amazon is getting in the spirit, with discounts over the weekend on Star Wars stuff…check out the

Star Wars store at Amazon

One of today’s Kindle Daily Deals is

10 Star Wars books

for $1.99 each.

That is quite a few options…you might want to start with Heir to the Empire: Star Wars (The Thrawn Trilogy): Star Wars, Volume I by Timothy Zahn. That one is rated 4.4 with over 500 stars, which is impressive…most impressive. Is it a Jedi yet? That’s your call…

As always, check the price before you buy…it may not apply in your country, and I know I’m getting this out pretty late in the day.

You can also get

40 Star Wars Dark Horse Graphic Novels for $3.99 each

Note that graphic novels often have the text as part of an image, which can’t be read by text-to-speech. That doesn’t mean that the publisher has blocked it, just that it is unavailable to the software.

Edgar Award Winners

The Edgar Awards, given by the Mystery Writers of America, is sort of like the Oscars for mysteries.

The winners were announced on May 2nd, and here is a list:

http://www.theedgars.com/nominees.html

This may not have been updated yet, but Amazon maintains a list of Edgar-winning Kindle books here:

Kindle Store › Award Winners › Edgar Awards

You can also go from that page to award winners in other categories, including: Nebular and Hugo (science fiction); RITA (romance); Newberry (children’s books); Nobel; Pulitzer; and more!

Sign up for the Kindle Daily Deals e-mail and get a selected e-book free

You have to be signing up for the first time for this marketing e-mail from Amazon, but this is a nice incentive:

Kindle Delivers Daily Deals: Sign Up and Get a Selected Kindle Book for Free

AP: “‘MOCKINGBIRD’ AUTHOR LEE SUES OVER COPYRIGHT IN NY”

This was an interesting

AP article

I would guess that To Kill a Mockingbird is the most desired book to have Kindleized.

It’s often been stated that Harper Lee, the author, doesn’t want to deal with e-books, but this article suggests it may be more complicated than that.

A lawsuit filed by Lee alleges that Samuel Pinkus, Lee’s agent, took advantage of infirmity and got Lee to assign the copyright to Pinkus.

If that’s the case, that could certainly have complicated the sale of the e-book rights.

How would you like to be in court defending yourself against Harper Lee? It’s going to be very difficult to not look like the bad guy…even if Atticus Finch isn’t presenting the author’s case.

Digital Book World: “Public Libraries, Corporate Publishers and eBooks”

Well, this is a round up , so I want to make sure everybody is caught up on tradpubs (traditional publishers) and libraries.

The tradpubs had not been universally making e-book available to public libraries…and they still aren’t all doing it 100%.

However, this

DBW article

by Jack W (sic) Perry gives you a nice timeline. All of the tradpubs are now doing something with public libraries. That’s nice to see, although it’s not everything yet without restriction.

Well, I don’t want to wait too long before I send this out, so the deals are available to more people…enjoy!

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.