Freebie flash! Sweet, Unexpected, Comfort

 Freebie flash! Sweet, Unexpected, Comfort

As usual, I don’t vouch for these books, and they come from companies that are not (to my knowledge) blocking text-to-speech. As promotional titles, they may not be free for long. Note: these books are free in the USA: prices in other countries may vary.

Unexpected Comfort
by Kelly Ferjutz
Part of the Scintillating Samples series
published by Cerridwen Press (a publisher of “erotic romance for women”)

NOTE: this is short story

Spirit Lifter
by Debra Glass
Part of the Naughty Nooners series
published by Ellora’s Cave

This will be an erotic short story.

Sweet Valley Confidential: Ten Years Later (preview)
by Francine Pascal
published by St. Martin’s Press (a general interest publisher part of Macmillan)

Did you read the Sweet Valley High books when you were younger?  The author is back with this book intended for adults. 

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

The play’s the thing: Samuel French

The play’s the thing: Samuel French

If you’ve ever done theatre, even in school, there is a good chance you’ve used a script from

Samuel French

I think of them as having a thin, sort of cardboard, yellow cover with somewhat old-fashioned writing on it. 

I wrote to them recently to ask them about doing e-texts (a single play isn’t really a book, so I’m not using the term e-book). 

Plays would work wonderfully well on e-book, in my opinion.  Especially on the Kindle, thanks to the text-to-speech.  Memorizing your lines can be hard…it’s part of the challenge.  I used to be particularly good at it: I once learned 3 1/2 pages of dialogue in about forty-five minutes (someone was sick and didn’t show up).  That’s very unusual, though, and I didn’t remember any of it afterwards.  🙂

Usually, you get your script, and you learn it on your own time…often asking friends or family to “run lines” with you. 

Hearing the script aloud would give you another modality of learning.  Not only that, it would be a good way to test your knowledge of it…some directors want you to be exactly right.  You could speak along with the text-to-speech.

Another technique would be to do “sides”.   With a side, you only get one part and the cues…not everybody’s part.  Since there is no additional delivery cost, basically (although there would be development costs), Samuel French could put in the entire play, as well as sides for the principals.  Hmmm…you could also do it karaoke style…have everybody else’s lines, and then you would pause text-to-speech (the spacebar does that) to say your line.

Of course, it would be bad if you learned the inflection of the text-to-speech, but I don’t think that would happen.  😉

It would also work very well for the company.  It has to be complicated to have or produce on demand thousands of titles.  In many cases, I’m sure, there is a request for five copies of a play…and that’s it for the year for that title.  Do you keep all of the plays in stock?  Remember that storage costs.  Producing very short print runs is not very cost-effective either.

Digital solves both the storage and the short print run issue.

Now, I also knew there was another consideration.  When you buy a copy of a play, that does not give you the right to publicly perform it (if it’s not in the public domain).  That’s a different right, and you have to pay a royalty (as opposed to the purchase price of the play copy).  The royalty you pay may depend on the number of performances, the number of seats in the theatre, whether you are amateurs, and so on. 

However, digital distribution (with Digital Rights Management) isn’t any riskier on that, I believe, than paper copies.  I’m sure there have been people who have photocopied scripts…and gotten caught when they advertised their performances.  The same thing would happen if someone circumvented (“hacked”) the DRM.  Photocopying is easier than hacking, in my opinion.

Since I’ve seen the question about plays for the Kindle many times, and it came up again recently, I decided  to e-mail the company and see what their plans might be.

I was very pleased to get back a quick answer…two, actually.

The first one came from a Customer Service rep:

===

Hello,
 
Thank you for your enquiry. Unfortunately, we do not yet have our scripts available as e-texts. Right now we are focusing on adding our inventory to Google Books, so we may eventually make it to e-books in the future. Please let me know if I can be of any further assistance.

===

It’s important to note here that the reference isn’t to the future Google bookstore (which was formerly called Google Editions).  It’s to Google Books.  One big difference here is that Google Editions will have the books for sale in some manner.  Google Books may have the book online (mostly public domain works), but generally, there is a preview and you go somewhere else (like Amazon) to buy them.

The second response came from an editor:

===

Dear Bufo,

As an editor here, I’d like to jump in on this as well. As a Kindle-friendly company, I completely understand your desire for ePubs–and we are working on it.  Unfortunately, our situation is a little more complicated than most publishers as we are also actively licensing the works, which means (our) contacts are still fairly restrictive in terms of distribution.  Please know that we are actively exploring the issues.

For now, we have supplied preview versions on Google Books, thought they are in no way, representative of the whole play.  Your hunch is right; these are “teasers” that are designed to let our customers sample the work before purchase (it can also provide quick access to character pages and production requirement, which is helpful for initial season planning).  We are fairly open about this information, I do not see the harm of blogging about it, though I will say that using Google Books as a preview of a work is not really a ‘new’ thing—Many, many publishers and booksellers do this, to the point where Google has even created ways to embed their previews into publishers’ websites.

Please let me know if you have any other questions about this.

===

As you can tell, the second one was a nicely written personal response.  Of course, you don’t stay in business for more than 150 years without knowing something about public relations and customer service.  🙂

My guess?  They will do e-texts.  If I were them, I’d approach Amazon for an exclusive deal (even if it was limited to one or three years).  That would make a big news story.  Kindle store books can be read on iPads and tablets (and iPhones and Android devices and…).  That might be a little tricky with Google Editions coming, since they already have a relationship with Google.  However, my guess is they could get a good deal out of Amazon.  A lot of movers and shakers are going to have fond memories of Samuel French, and that’s valuable public relations….and even though Amazon has only been around about a decade and a half, they understand the value of that, too.  😉

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

WSJ: “Google Set to Launch E-Book Venture”

WSJ: “Google Set to Launch E-Book Venture”

“The Google model is going to drive a lot of sales. We think they could get 20% of the e-book market very fast.”
–Dominique Raccah, owner of Sourcebooks, Inc.

That remarkable statement comes from this recent

Wall Street Journal article

by Jeffrey A. Trachtenberg, Jessica A. Vascellaro, and Amir Efrati. 

I consider Trachtenberg one of the best mainstream writers on the e-book world, and I want to be clear that he is not suggesting this in the article.

What’s being discussed is the long-gestating Google online bookstore, formerly called Google Editions (although may not be the launch name).

This is another “ChupaKindle”, a mythological beast that will kill the Kindle.  😉

I like Google, and they do some things really, really well.  I use their maps.  I use their calendar.  I use Google Documents to create and share spreadsheets and word-processing documents.

However, I don’t see this as a Kindle killer.

The way it’s being reported around the net sounds great to many people, I’m sure.  It will have the mighty Google servers behind it.  Google is making deals with publishers now.  It will be device-independent: you can buy a Google edition, and read it on a NOOK or a Kindle (or a computer or a SmartPhone or…you name it).

That’s what many people want, right?

Well, there is a complication that might not please people.

My understanding of this is that you will only be able to read the books while connected to the server…you won’t download them and read offline.

UPDATE: In responding to a comment from one of my readers, Andrew, I found a Google page that does say you’l be able to read them on “supported partner devices”.  If that’s the case, this could do much better than this post originally indicated…depending on the devices.  Here’s that webpage: http://books.google.com/support/partner/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=167975 

That works for Google…it sometimes seems like they’d be fine if your life-support was run through Google.  😉 

However, I think serious readers may have both psychological and practical objections.

Let me address why I chose that group, first.

It’s the minority of people who read books at all.  It’s a much smaller minority than that  group that reads a lot of books.

If the majority of people will like it, that’s actually a red flag that it may not succeed in the book world.  🙂  Serious readers, those who buy lots of books, aren’t like the mainstream.  E Ink appeals to serious readers…so far, backlighting is not as appealing.  The mainstream doesn’t like the non-backlit, grayscale world of E Ink. 

If you want to sell a lot of books, you need to sell to this specialized group.  Yes, a book that sold to everybody else might make more money…but it’s a lot more work (and expense) to sell something to, say, 270 million people than to 30 million.

So, what practical objections are there to reading online (as opposed to from a local copy)?

Readers don’t want to be without a book.  Whether that’s whitewater rafting, going to the grocery store, or arctic exploring.  They used to carry a separate suitcase just for paperbooks.  It’s impractical to rely on an internet connection, whether 3G or wifi. 

Also, reading online takes a lot more battery charge.  Readers like that E Ink EBRs (E-Book Readers) could hypothetically last a month on a charge.  That’s going to go very much more quickly if you have to have the internet connected, and data downloaded every “page”.

Psychologically, there are a couple of barriers.  One is that you don’t have a copy.  Many Kindleers back up their files…even the ones stored for them by Amazon.  I recommend that: if, for example, you bought a book that was discovered to be unauthorized, Amazon will withdraw it from their servers.  They no longer (after a very bad PR situation) take it off the local Kindles.  Have a local copy, and you still have the book.  Don’t have it, and you don’t.  You might choose to get rid of it if it was unauthorized…but I think people want that choice.  Heck, some Kindleers are made that someone can send them an e-mail with a link to a gifted Kindle book…they consider that an invasion.

If Google went under or had a catastrophic failure, you would lose your books.  If you have a local copy of an Amazon you at least feel like there is a way you might be able to read it

Another thing (and this applies to Amazon to some extent as well) is Google being able to see everything you read.  They’ll know where you are in the book, which books you read, and so on.  That may be fine with you (it’s not a big deal to me), but a lot of people see that as the problem with Google…similar to what some people think about FaceBook. 

Do I think an online only model can work?  Yes.  People who are just as likely to play Angry Birds or watch YouTube as they are to read will be fine with it.  Can’t get to a book right now?  They’ll do something else.

Twenty percent seems unlikely, though.  I think they’d be happy with five. 

It sounds like this will launch in the US before the end of this year, and probably internationally after that. 

Oh, and how would you read it on your Kindle or NOOK?  By using the device’s browser.  That’s going to work better on a NOOKcolor than on a K3, and better on a K3 than a K2.

Summarizing, I think this will appeal most to people who read a few minutes at a time, and don’t want to carry around one more device.  People who don’t care if they can’t get to the book they are reading right now.  Casual readers, as opposed to serious ones.

Now, I could be totally wrong.  It could be this is the magic platform that gets people reading again.  It could be that a zero-cost entry point is going to be much more appealing than a $139 one.

I’ve been wrong on this stuff before. 

I’ve been right, too. 🙂

I don’t have a market on prognosticating, though…feel free to let me (and the readers of this blog) read your prediction.  You can leave a comment to this post.

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

Freebie flash! Viking warfare, Cuban cooking, a guide to Americans and more

 Freebie flash! Viking warfare, Cuban cooking, a guide to Americans and more

As usual, I don’t vouch for these books, and they come from companies that are not (to my knowledge) blocking text-to-speech. As promotional titles, they may not be free for long. Note: these books are free in the USA: prices in other countries may vary.

English-Hebrew Hebrew-English: Conversational Dictionary/Romanized
by David C. Gross
published by Hippocrene Books (a publisher of foreign-language reference books and ethnic cookbooks)

Old Havana Cookbook: Cuban Recipes in Spanish and English (Bilingual Cookbooks) 
by Rafael Marcos, illustrated by Rosemary Fox
published by Hippocrene Books (a publisher of foreign-language reference books and ethnic cookbooks)

Blood of the Wicked
by Leighton Gage
published by Soho Press (a publisher with a focus on “literary fiction” )

These are the same people who published Billy Boyle

The Great Secret
by L. Ron Hubbard
published by Galaxy Press (a publisher focusing on the fiction works of L. Ron Hubbard and related non-Scientology works)

Fine Filipino Food
by Karen Hulene Bartell
published by Hippocrene Books (a publisher of foreign-language reference books and ethnic cookbooks)

India: An Illustrated History
by Prem Kishore, Anuradha Kishore Ganpati
published by Hippocrene Books (a publisher of foreign-language reference books and ethnic cookbooks)

Norse Warfare: Unconventional Battle Strategies of the Ancient Viking
by Martina Sprague
published by Hippocrene Books (a publisher of foreign-language reference books and ethnic cookbooks)

Understanding the Americans: A Handbook for Visitors to the United States
by Yale Richmond
published by Hippocrene Books (a publisher of foreign-language reference books and ethnic cookbooks)

I’ll probably read this one for fun…I’m very curious what they think someone from outside the US needs to know about Americans…”Live long and prosper” counts, right?  🙂

Stupid Christmas
by Leland Gregory
published by Andrews McMeel (a general interest publisher)

Face of Betrayal
Triple Threat #1
by Lis Wiehl, April Henry
published by Thomas Nelson (a faith-based publisher)

Reaper
A novella in the Soul Screamers series
by Rachel Vincent
published by Harlequin Teen (a young adult part of Harlequin, a romance publisher)

Chess Cafe Puzzle Sampler
by Karsten Mueller
published by Russell Enterprises (a publisher of chess books)

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

Freebie flash! A Question of Upbringing, a Hippocrene cookbook, and more!

 Freebie flash! A Question of Upbringing, a Hippocrene cookbook, and more!

As usual, I don’t vouch for these books, and they come from companies that are not (to my knowledge) blocking text-to-speech. As promotional titles, they may not be free for long. Note: these books are free in the USA: prices in other countries may vary.

A Question of Upbringing
Book One of A Dance to the Music of Time
by Anthony Powell
published the University of Chicago Press

This is the first in a lauded series, originally published in 1951.  Interestingly, they are only being re-released as e-books.  This is definitely one to get.

The Judge Who Stole Christmas
by Randy Singer
published by Tyndale House (a faith-based publisher)

Allies and Enemies: How the World Depends on Bacteria
by Anne Maczulak
published by FT Press (a business publisher)

The Truth About Getting the Best From People
by Martha I. Finney
published by FT Press (a business publisher)

15 Ways to Take Control of Your Career Now 
published by FT Press (a business publisher)

Never Buy Another Stock Again: The Investing Portfolio That Will Preserve Your Wealth and Your Sanity
by David Gaffen
published by FT Press (a business publisher)

Lessons of a Brand Manager
 by Michael F. Golden
published by FT Press (a business publisher)

Huckleberry Finished
by Livia J. Washburn
published by Kensington Books (a genre and romance publisher)

This one was free last October as well.

Once Bitten
by Clare Willis
published by Zebra (part of Kensington)

Silent Screams
by C.E. Lawrence
published by Pinnacle, the “commercial fiction” (incl. thrillers and true crime), imprint of Kensington Books (a genre and romance publisher)

Troublesome Creek
Troublesome Creek #1
by Jan Watson
published by Tyndale House (a faith-based publisher)

The Case for Christmas: A Journalist Investigates the Identity of the Child in the Manger 
by Lee Strobel
published by Zondervan (a faith-based publisher)

The Christmas Story from the Family Reading Bible
by Jeannette Taylor
published by Zondervan (a faith-based publisher)

25 Days, 26 Ways to Make This Your Best Christmas Ever
by Ace Collins
published by Zondervan (a faith-based publisher)

A Horse to Love
by Marsha Hubler
published by Zondervan (a faith-based publisher)

Nile Style: Egyptian Cuisine and Culture: Ancient Festivals, Significant Ceremonies, and Modern Celebrations (Hippocrene Cookbook Library)
by Amy Riolo
published by Hippocrene Books  (a publisher of foreign-language books and ethnic cookbooks)

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

Flash! New MahJong Solitaire game for the Kindle

Flash! New MahJong Solitaire game for the Kindle

My readers have said they want to know about new games for the Kindle, even if you have to pay something for them.  🙂

MahJong Solitaire

When I managed a game store, there were some really serious Mahjong players.  Some of them wanted expensive sets…it was a bit like dominoes.  I’ve wondered how they feel about the popular computer versions.  It’s sort of like a car collector playing Pole Position, I guess.  😉

In the solitaire version, you see a lay-out of stacked “tiles”.  You are looking for matches…that sounds easy, but you can only match tiles that are free (uncovered), and you have to match all of them.  If you don’t do it in the right order, you won’t win.

The game ($3.99 at time of writing) gives you unlimited undos, which is great.  It seems to have pretty good options: ten layouts, hints, and shuffle.

I’ll warn you that this might be addictive…and unfortunately, no gifting of games in the Kinde store, I believe.

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

Washington Post: “Amazon charges Kindle users for free Project Gutenberg e-books”

Washington Post: “Amazon charges Kindle users for free Project Gutenberg e-books”

Stop the presses!  Publishers charge for books!

I’m sorry…I may be a bit under the influence of super-snark artist Mark Twain…who I am now nicknaming “Snarky Mark”.   There is a letter in his recently published autobiography where he rips somebody apart who edited an introduction he had written.  One sample:

“The next sentence—after your doctoring of it—has no meaning. The one succeeding it—after your doctoring of it—refers to nothing, wanders around in space, has no meaning and no reason for existing, and is by a shade or two more demented and twaddlesome than anything hitherto ground out of your strange and interesting editorial-mill.”
–Mark Twain
The Autobiography of Mark Twain 

Okay, wait…I think that got it out of my system.  That’s the value of the classics, right…to attune us to our higher selves?  😉

Let’s talk, then, in a civilized tone about the following article:

Amazon charges Kindle users for free Project Gutenberg e-books

This article appeared in The Washington Post’s Faster Forward column by Rob Pegoraro.

It’s since been picked up by other sources…and the outrage which seems to always lurk below our feet (rather like the sand sharks that threatened Adam West on Mars in The Invisible Enemy episode of The Outer Limits) has reared its ravenous head, ready to tear apart whatever rises into its vision at the slightest provocation. 

Ahem.

Sorry.

Hm…let me first present what happens.

Project Gutenberg is an amazingly valuable public service effort founded by Michael Hart in 1971.  It has been digitizing public domain works (those that are not under copyright protection) and making them available to the public for free.  Digitizing a work does not create a new copyright.  As Project Gutenberg makes clear, it can not control the use of that work. 

In the licensing section, they say it explictly, as this short excerpt shows:

“A Project Gutenberg ebook is made out of two parts: the public domain book and the non public domain Project Gutenberg trademark and license. If you strip the Project Gutenberg license and all references to Project Gutenberg from the ebook, you are left with a public domain ebook. You can do anything you want with that.”
Project Gutenberg License

“…anything you want with that.”

That includes, of course, making an edition of the book and selling it.

Publishers do just that.  It is completely legal for a publisher to take public domain material, publish it, and charge for it. 

That happens all the time.  When I managed a brick and mortar bookstore, we sold a lot of public domain material: Mark Twain, Charles Dickens, Shakespeare, and so on.  Some of it had new material, like notes, which garners its own copyright.  Some of it didn’t.

There is nothing controversial about that.  It is a non-controversy…um, a “nontroversy”.  😉

In fact, you’d be hard-pressed to walk into a non-specialized bookstore and not find public domain material for sale.

So, publishers take the public domain material on Project Gutenberg, and charge for their editions. 

Amazon carries those titles.  You can buy 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea or Pride and Prejudice.

For someone who is familiar with publishing or bookstores, there is nothing shocking about that.

That’s why I don’t understand why this is a story at all, and certainly not why it got picked up beyond the initial publication.

Pegoraro chose to include the quotation, “the worst offender” about Amazon.

There is no offence here, and Amazon is particularly not an offender in this case, in my opinion.

First, they allow you to sort by price, low to high.  Find a book at a price that seems too high?  Amazon will let you find other, cheaper (even free) editions.

Amazon has over 15,000 free public domain books in the Kindle store.  Those show up in the searches.

Amazon also directs you to free collections on the web…including Project Gutenberg.  The link to that is in the navigation on their main Kindle e-book page…not exactly hidden.

That’s right…Amazon tells people how to get free editions of books that are for sale on the site.

You can see that on this page:

Free eBook Collections

Amazon helps people find the free editions.

Another element of the story is a volunteer who appeared shocked to find a book for sale in the Kindle store that volunteer had reportedly prepared and donated to Project Gutenberg.

Apparently, that volunteer wasn’t aware of the Project Gutenberg license…and the fact that Project Gutenberg does not get a new copyright for digitizing a book…and neither does the person who digitized it.

If a publisher sold a book under copyright in the Kindle store without the rightsholder’s permission, that would be an infringement.  That’s not what is happening here, though.  The material is not protected by copyright.

That volunteer put considerable work into the digitization.  I’ve digitized books public domain books for a non-profit, and that’s a similar situation.  I admire the selfless work of those volunteers.  However, I know that people can take those digitized works that I’ve done and sell them.  Copyright exists for a limited time.  When that term expires, the book belongs to the public.

Is it wrong to charge people for something they can get for free?  If so, there are several bottled water companies that are doing something unethical.  😉

“But wait,” you say, “it’s convenient to have those bottles of water.”

Yes.  It’s convenient to be able to download a book from the Kindle store, too.

It is not the same to get a book from Project Gutenberg as it is to get one from the Kindle store.  I’ve written about the Kindle Service in a previous post.  Amazon backs up your purchases and your notes, for example.  That’s an argument to download a book from the Kindle store rather than from Project Gutenberg.  I like having easy access to my notes online.

In fact, I’ve read a free version from http://www.feedbooks.com and downloaded the same free version from Amazon.  Why?  Well, the FeedBooks version (which undoubtedly came from Project Gutenberg first) was better formatted.  It had an interactive table of contents, for one thing…but the punctuation was also (ironically) read better by the Kindle’s text-to-speech.  Why did I bother getting the Kindle version?  For that annotation back-up.  It makes it much easier to pull quotations out of it.

So, there is no controversy here.  Amazon carries books from publishers who charge for public domain material…which may have been made available to the public by Project Gutenberg.

Amazon even directs people to those free books, and lets them sort to find them…two things it wouldn’t need to do.  It could exclude free books from the sort, for example (although it would probably have to explain that).

However, I guess that isn’t as sexy a story. 

I did comment on the Washington Post article.  I don’t do that very often, and I try not to challenge people in their own homes, so to speak.  I think the author’s intent may very well have been for the public good.  My intuition is that the volunteer who was quoted honestly believes that the work that was digitized should be available to all people free at all times in all situations.

What do you think?  Is Amazon being deceptive?  Should digitizing a book be counted as a derivative work and generate a new copyright?  Do you feel ripped off if you pay for something you can get free somewhere else?  Feel free to let me know.

Want to contribute to Project Gutenberg?  You can do that here:

Project Gutenberg Needs Your Donation

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

Snapshot: December 1 2010

Snapshot: December 1 2010    

I generally run this information through Jungle-Search (it’s just easier than Amazon), and there are some vagaries in the searches (both there and on Amazon). I do try to run it the same way every time, so unless Amazon changes something, it should give you a pretty good idea.    

Titles in the Kindle Store      

Kindle Store Titles

 Kindle Store Titles

December 1, 2010: 768,865
November 1, 2010: 743,692
October 1, 2010: 714, 663
September 1, 2010: 687,246
August 1, 2010: 659,479
July 1 2010: 627,343
June 1 2010: 596,300
May 1 2010: 509,229
April 1 2010: 476,653
March 1 2010: 450,625
February 1 2010: 415,100
January 1 2010: 401,773
December 1 2009: 385,484
November 1 2009: 368,813
October 1 2009: 342,865
September 21 2009: 355,805
July 28 2009: 332,813
May 16 2009: 284,491     

Approximate average of titles added per day:      

December: 839
November:  968
October: 914
September: 896
August: 1,037
July: 1,035
May: 2,809 (may be affected by Penguin return)
April: 1,086
March: 840
February: 1,146
January: 430 (may be impacted by Macmillan removal)
December: 525
November: 556
October: 837     

Magazines:     

December 1, 2010:  83
November 1, 2010: 84
October 1, 2010: 80
September 1. 2010: 70
August 1, 2010: 64
July 1, 2010: 61
June 1, 2010: 60
May 1, 2010: 58
April 1, 2010: 53
March 1, 2010: 50
February 1, 2010: 46
January 1, 2010: 43
December 1, 2009: 40
November 1, 2009: 38     

Newspapers:     

December 1, 2010: 148
November 1, 2010: 145
October 1, 2010: 144
September 1, 2010: 138
August 1, 2010: 135
July 1, 2010: 136
June 1, 2010: 133
May 1, 2010: 128
April 1, 2010: 118
March 1, 2010: 107
February 1, 2010: 93
January 1, 2010: 89
December 1, 2009: 76
November 1, 2009: 58     

Blogs:     

December 1, 2010: 10,585
November 1, 2010: 10,255
October 1, 2010: 10,056
September 1, 2010: 10,036
August 1, 2010: 9,716
July 1, 2010: 9,429
June 1, 2010: 9,228
May 1, 2010: 9,094
April 1, 2010: 8,944
March 1, 2010: 8,754
February 1, 2010: 8,651
January 1, 2010: 7992
December 1, 2009: 7589
November 1, 2009: 7365     

Percentage of books priced from one penny to $50 that are under ten dollars     

November (taken December 1): 88.8% (639,676 of 720,179)
October: (taken November 1): 88.8% (617,133 of 695,278)
September (taken October 1): 93.0% (589,877 of 634,375)
August: 88.2% (565,260 of 640,936)
July: 87.7% (522,046 of 595,370)
June: 87.1% (479,793 of 563,436)
May: 86.8% (462,359 of 532,646)
April: 84.8% (377,624 of 445,421)
March: 83.9% (413,302 of 346,665)
February: 84.2% (328,597 of 390,178)
January: 83.4% (295,634 of 354,499)
December: 83.1% (283,497 of 341,112)
November: 82.8% (268,366 of 324,230)
October: 82.2% (252,511 of 307,241)
September: 82.0% (239,666 of 292318)
August: 83.2% (245,524 of 295,210)     

Percentage of books with a publication date of the previous month priced from one penny to $50 that are under ten dollars     

Books for November: 96.4% (28,189 of 29.251)
Books for October: 94.6% (22,005 of 23,268)
Books for September: 94.7% (22,338 of 23,592)
Books for August: 95.6% (24,514 of 25,638)
Books for July: 95.3% (24,375 of 25,579)
Books for June: 94.9% (21,774 of 22,945)
Books for May: 94.9% (24,436 of 25,737)
Books for April: 95.9% (23,695 of 24,714)
Books for March: 96.0% (23,703 of 24,699)
Books for February: 96.5% (26,850 of 27,815)
Books for January: 93.3% (11,857 of 12,704)
Books for December: 90.6% (8,948 of 9,879)
Books for November: 94.1% (11,520 of 12,239)
Books for October: 91.2% (6,789 of 7,445)
Books for September: 91.0% (5,104 of 5,608)
Books for August: 96.4% (20,239 of 21,079)     

Books in the Seventy Percent Royalty Range ($2.99 – $9.99)     

December 1: 66.9% (514,086 of  768,865)
November 1: 66.7% (493,644 of 743,692)
October 1: 68.2% (487,833 of 714,863)
September 1:  66% (453,408 of 687,246)
August 1: 58% (382,691 of 659,479)
July 1: 57.3% (359,361 of 627,343)
June 1: 57.1% (340,379 of 596,300)
May 1: 51.4% (261,869 of 509,229)
April 1: 51.1% (243,718 of 476,653)
March 1: 52.5% (236,418 of 450,625)
February 1: 50.8% (210,978 of 415,100)     

Books from one penny to $2.98     

December 1: 18.5%  (142,549 of 768,865)
November 1: 18.4% (136,964 of 743,692)
October 1: 17.9% (127,830 of 714,863)
September 1: 18.5% (127,165 of 687,246)
August 1: 21.1% (139,277 of 659,479)
July 1: 21% (131,432 of 627,343)
June 1: 20.5% (121,981 of 596,300)
May 1: 22.7% (115,756 of 509,229)
April 1: 21.6% (102,948 of 476,653)
March 1: 20.5% (92,180 of 450,625)
February 1: 20.4% (84,721 of 415,100)      

Price Point Analysis of New York Times Hardback Fiction Equivalents   

December 1, 2010:

	12/1/2010
	Price	Agency?
	N/A	N/A
	9.99	No
	9.99	No
	9.99	No
	9.99	No
	12.99	Yes
	12.99	Yes
	14.99	Yes
	12.99	Yes
	9.99	Yes
	19.99	Yes
	12.99	Yes
	12.99	Yes
	12.99	Yes
	12.99	Yes
	12.99	Yes
	12.99	Yes
	14.99	Yes
	12.99	Yes
	12.99	Yes
Avg	$   12.78
AM	$   13.52
NAM	$    9.99

November 1, 2010:

	11/1/2010
	Price	Agency?
	Unavailable	N/A
	9.99	No
	9.99	No
	9.99	No
	9.99	No
	14.99	Yes
	12.99	Yes
	19.99	Yes
	12.99	Yes
	12.99	Yes
	9.99	Yes
	12.99	Yes
	12.99	Yes
	12.99	Yes
	14.99	Yes
	12.99	Yes
	14.99	Yes
	12.99	Yes
	12.99	Yes
	11.99	Yes
Avg	$     12.83
AM	$     13.59
NAM	$      9.99

October 1, 2010:

10/1/2010
Price	Agency?
12.99	Yes
12.99	Yes
Unavailable	No
9.99	No
12.99	Yes
12.99	Yes
12.99	Yes
11.99	Yes
12.99	Yes
11.99	Yes
12.99	Yes
9.99	No
9.99	No
11.99	Yes
12.99	Yes
12.99	Yes
12.99	Yes
13.49	No
12.99	Yes
12.99	Yes

Avg $12.38
AM $12.79
NAM $10.87 

September 1, 2010:

9/1/2010
Price	Agency?
12.99	Yes
9.99	No
12.99	Yes
12.99	Yes
9.99	No
12.99	Yes
Unavailable	N/A
12.99	Yes
12.99	Yes
12.99	Yes
12.99	Yes
12.99	Yes
12.99	Yes
9.99	No
12.99	Yes
12.99	Yes
12.99	Yes
12.99	Yes
12.99	Yes
12.99	Yes

Avg $12.52
AM $12.99
NAM $9.99 

Textbooks in the Kindle Store     

December 1, 2010: 7,637
November 1, 2010: 7,355
October 1, 2010: 7, 162
September 1, 2010: 6,831
August 1, 2010: 6,661
July 1, 2010: 6,481
June 1, 2010: 6,249
May 1, 2010: 6,117
April 1, 2010: 5,973
March 1, 2010: 5,728
February 1, 2010: 5,673
January 1, 2010: 5,549
December 1, 2009: 4,892
November 1, 2009: 4,768
October 1, 2009: 4,633
September 24, 2009: 4,678
August 11, 2009: 4,381     

Free books (including public domain)      

December 1, 2010: 16,708
November 1, 2010: 16,703
October 1, 2010: 16,702
September 1, 2010: 16,726
August 1, 2010: 20,634
July 1, 2010: 20,628
June 1, 2010: 20,590
May 1, 2010: 20,601
April 1, 2010: 20,619
March 1, 2010: 20,143
February 1, 2010: 19788
January 1, 2010: 19,802
December 1, 2009: 19,895
November 1, 2009: 18,547
October 1, 2009: 7,428
February 28, 2009: 7,401      

Free books (without public domain)       

December 1, 2010: 183
November 1, 2010: 171
October 1, 2010: 161
September 1, 2010: 143
August 1, 2010: 621 (125 without Amazon Breakthrough nominees)
July 1, 2010: 599 (102 without Amazon Breakthrough nominees)
June 1, 2010: 559 (63 without Amazon Breakthrough nominees)
May 1, 2010: 556 (57 without Amazon Breakthrough nominees)
April 1, 2010: 560 (59 without Amazon Breakthrough nominees)
March 1, 2010: 67
February 1, 2010: 52
January 1, 2010: 53
December 1, 2009: 84
November 1, 2009: 64
October 1, 2009: 67     

Spanish edition books*     

December 1, 2010: 5,839
November 1, 2010: 5,286
October 1, 2010: 4,982
September 1, 2010: 4,723
August 1, 2010: 4,623
July 1, 2010: 4,398
June 1, 2010: 4,078
May 1, 2010: 3,735
April 1, 2010: 3,383
March 1, 2010: 2,841
February 1, 2010: 2,548
January 1, 2010: 2,363
December 1, 2009: 3,483     

Price Point Analysis     

April 1, 2010 was “Agency Day”, when the pricing system for some of the largest trade publishers in the US changed. I’ve started tracking price points, to see how that is affecting things. These are not ranges: it’s how many books are at a specific price point.

	4/1/2010
Total	476653
Prime	413032
Under $10	346665
	83.9%
Price Point	Count	Percentage	Diff
$ 0.99	43,993	9.17%	0.01%
$ 1.99	7,704	1.61%	0.00%
$ 2.99	14,560	3.03%	0.00%
$ 3.99	17,390	3.62%	-0.02%
$ 4.99	9,758	2.03%	-0.01%
$ 5.99	2,691	0.56%	0.00%
$ 6.99	1,800	0.38%	0.00%
$ 7.99	10,927	2.28%	-0.25%
$ 8.99	1,312	0.27%	0.00%
$ 9.99	51,857	10.80%	-0.26%
$ 10.99	191	0.04%	0.00%
$ 11.99	196	0.04%	0.00%
$ 12.99	308	0.06%	0.00%
$ 13.99	93	0.02%	0.00%
$ 14.99	806	0.17%	0.00%
$ 15.99	114	0.02%	0.00%
$ 16.99	67	0.01%	0.00%
$ 17.99	43	0.01%	0.00%
$ 18.99	21	0.00%	0.00%
$ 19.99	201	0.04%	0.00%
$ 20.99	11	0.00%	0.00%
$ 21.99	11	0.00%	0.00%
$ 22.99	21	0.00%	0.00%
$ 23.99	5	0.00%	0.00%
$ 24.99	50	0.01%	0.00%

—

5/1/2010
Total	509229
Prime	445421
Under $10	377624
	84.80%
Price Point	Count	Percentage	Diff
$ 0.99	58,853	11.56%	2.39%
$ 1.99	8,859	1.74%	0.13%
$ 2.99	16,168	3.17%	0.14%
$ 3.99	17,666	3.47%	-0.15%
$ 4.99	10,171	2.00%	-0.04%
$ 5.99	3,106	0.61%	0.05%
$ 6.99	2,400	0.47%	0.10%
$ 7.99	13,433	2.64%	0.36%
$ 8.99	1,521	0.30%	0.03%
$ 9.99	54,529	10.71%	-0.10%
$ 10.99	433	0.09%	0.05%
$ 11.99	607	0.12%	0.08%
$ 12.99	713	0.14%	0.08%
$ 13.99	88	0.02%	0.00%
$ 14.99	892	0.18%	0.01%
$ 15.99	121	0.02%	0.00%
$ 16.99	99	0.02%	0.01%
$ 17.99	71	0.01%	0.00%
$ 18.99	26	0.01%	0.00%
$ 19.99	214	0.04%	0.00%
$ 20.99	11	0.00%	0.00%
$ 21.99	14	0.00%	0.00%
$ 22.99	14	0.00%	0.00%
$ 23.99	5	0.00%	0.00%
$ 24.99	57	0.01%	0.00%

—

6/1/2010
Total	596300
Prime	532646
Under $10	462359
	86.80%
Price Point	Count	Percentage	Diff
$ 0.99	56,919	9.55%	-2.01%
$ 1.99	10,905	1.83%	0.09%
$ 2.99	17,693	2.97%	-0.21%
$ 3.99	18,512	3.10%	-0.36%
$ 4.99	10,462	1.75%	-0.24%
$ 5.99	3,435	0.58%	-0.03%
$ 6.99	2,438	0.41%	-0.06%
$ 7.99	13,536	2.27%	-0.37%
$ 8.99	1,606	0.27%	-0.03%
$ 9.99	57,914	9.71%	-1.00%
$ 10.99	450	0.08%	-0.01%
$ 11.99	698	0.12%	0.00%
$ 12.99	987	0.17%	0.03%
$ 13.99	107	0.02%	0.00%
$ 14.99	947	0.16%	-0.02%
$ 15.99	129	0.02%	0.00%
$ 16.99	109	0.02%	0.00%
$ 17.99	53	0.01%	-0.01%
$ 18.99	26	0.00%	0.00%
$ 19.99	239	0.04%	0.00%
$ 20.99	8	0.00%	0.00%
$ 21.99	12	0.00%	0.00%
$ 22.99	15	0.00%	0.00%
$ 23.99	7	0.00%	0.00%
$ 24.99	62	0.01%	0.00%

—

7/1/2010
Total	627343
Prime	563436
Under $10	479793
Price Point	Count	Percentage	Diff
$ 0.99	61,279	9.77%	0.22%
$ 1.99	13,292	2.12%	0.29%
$ 2.99	19,395	3.09%	0.12%
$ 3.99	19,259	3.07%	-0.03%
$ 4.99	11,276	1.80%	0.04%
$ 5.99	3,851	0.61%	0.04%
$ 6.99	2,784	0.44%	0.03%
$ 7.99	13,951	2.22%	-0.05%
$ 8.99	1,829	0.29%	0.02%
$ 9.99	61,332	9.78%	0.06%
$ 10.99	466	0.07%	0.00%
$ 11.99	730	0.12%	0.00%
$ 12.99	1,083	0.17%	0.01%
$ 13.99	119	0.02%	0.00%
$ 14.99	1,020	0.16%	0.00%
$ 15.99	140	0.02%	0.00%
$ 16.99	125	0.02%	0.00%
$ 17.99	47	0.01%	0.00%
$ 18.99	50	0.01%	0.00%
$ 19.99	274	0.04%	0.00%
$ 20.99	6	0.00%	0.00%
$ 21.99	14	0.00%	0.00%
$ 22.99	10	0.00%	0.00%
$ 23.99	11	0.00%	0.00%
$ 24.99	85	0.01%	0.00%

—

8/1/2010
Total	659479
Prime	595370
Under $10	522046
Price Point	Count	Percentage	Diff
$ 0.99	64,642	9.80%	0.03%
$ 1.99	13,578	2.06%	-0.06%
$ 2.99	23,430	3.55%	0.46%
$ 3.99	20,160	3.06%	-0.01%
$ 4.99	12,366	1.88%	0.08%
$ 5.99	4,452	0.68%	0.06%
$ 6.99	3,253	0.49%	0.05%
$ 7.99	14,841	2.25%	0.03%
$ 8.99	2,163	0.33%	0.04%
$ 9.99	66,398	10.07%	0.29%
$ 10.99	444	0.07%	-0.01%
$ 11.99	763	0.12%	0.00%
$ 12.99	1,159	0.18%	0.00%
$ 13.99	110	0.02%	0.00%
$ 14.99	1,163	0.18%	0.01%
$ 15.99	101	0.02%	-0.01%
$ 16.99	120	0.02%	0.00%
$ 17.99	40	0.01%	0.00%
$ 18.99	26	0.00%	0.00%
$ 19.99	283	0.04%	0.00%
$ 20.99	11	0.00%	0.00%
$ 21.99	14	0.00%	0.00%
$ 22.99	24	0.00%	0.00%
$ 23.99	12	0.00%	0.00%
$ 24.99	98	0.01%	0.00%

—

9/1/2010
Total	687246
Prime	640396
Under $10	565260
Price Point	Count	Percentage	Diff
$        0.99	60,807	8.85%	-0.95%
$        1.99	13,894	2.02%	-0.04%
$        2.99	16,288	2.37%	-1.18%
$        3.99	20,914	3.04%	-0.01%
$        4.99	12,872	1.87%	0.00%
$        5.99	4,690	0.68%	0.01%
$        6.99	3,024	0.44%	-0.05%
$        7.99	14,099	2.05%	-0.20%
$        8.99	2,159	0.31%	-0.01%
$        9.99	64,504	9.39%	-0.68%
$      10.99	437	0.06%	0.00%
$      11.99	889	0.13%	0.01%
$      12.99	1,136	0.17%	-0.01%
$      13.99	56	0.01%	-0.01%
$      14.99	1,467	0.21%	0.04%
$      15.99	106	0.02%	0.00%
$      16.99	109	0.02%	0.00%
$      17.99	77	0.01%	0.01%
$      18.99	32	0.00%	0.00%
$      19.99	319	0.05%	0.00%
$      20.99	8	0.00%	0.00%
$      21.99	17	0.00%	0.00%
$      22.99	41	0.01%	0.00%
$      23.99	15	0.00%	0.00%
$      24.99	153	0.02%	0.01%

—

10/1/2010
Total	714663
Prime	634375
Under $10	589877
Price Point	Count	Percentage	Diff
$        0.99	61,004	8.88%	0.03%
$        1.99	11,644	1.69%	-0.33%
$        2.99	23,527	3.42%	1.05%
$        3.99	20,686	3.01%	-0.03%
$        4.99	13,384	1.95%	0.07%
$        5.99	4,795	0.70%	0.02%
$        6.99	3,805	0.55%	0.11%
$        7.99	14,977	2.18%	0.13%
$        8.99	2,420	0.35%	0.04%
$        9.99	68,783	10.01%	0.62%
$      10.99	492	0.07%	0.01%
$      11.99	1,012	0.15%	0.02%
$      12.99	1,141	0.17%	0.00%
$      13.99	93	0.01%	0.01%
$      14.99	1,377	0.20%	-0.01%
$      15.99	119	0.02%	0.00%
$      16.99	155	0.02%	0.01%
$      17.99	73	0.01%	0.00%
$      18.99	28	0.00%	0.00%
$      19.99	338	0.05%	0.00%
$      20.99	10	0.00%	0.00%
$      21.99	12	0.00%	0.00%
$      22.99	30	0.00%	0.00%
$      23.99	17	0.00%	0.00%
$      24.99	196	0.03%	0.01%

—

11/1/2010
Total	743692
Prime	695278
Under $10	617133
Price Point	Count	Percentage	Diff
$        0.99	62,936	8.46%	-0.41%
$        1.99	12,463	1.68%	-0.02%
$        2.99	23,900	3.21%	-0.21%
$        3.99	23,972	3.22%	0.21%
$        4.99	13,771	1.85%	-0.10%
$        5.99	4,648	0.62%	-0.07%
$        6.99	4,372	0.59%	0.03%
$        7.99	15,925	2.14%	-0.04%
$        8.99	2,974	0.40%	0.05%
$        9.99	73,696	9.91%	-0.10%
$      10.99	512	0.07%	0.00%
$      11.99	1,149	0.15%	0.01%
$      12.99	1,264	0.17%	0.00%
$      13.99	95	0.01%	0.00%
$      14.99	1,482	0.20%	0.00%
$      15.99	90	0.01%	-0.01%
$      16.99	219	0.03%	0.01%
$      17.99	60	0.01%	0.00%
$      18.99	32	0.00%	0.00%
$      19.99	369	0.05%	0.00%
$      20.99	5	0.00%	0.00%
$      21.99	13	0.00%	0.00%
$      22.99	31	0.00%	0.00%
$      23.99	8	0.00%	0.00%
$      24.99	70	0.01%	-0.02%

—

12/1/2010
Total	768865
Prime	720179
Under $10	639676
Price Point	Count	Percentage	Diff
$        0.99	67,769	8.81%	0.35%
$        1.99	14,392	1.87%	0.20%
$        2.99	28,943	3.76%	0.55%
$        3.99	24,709	3.21%	-0.01%
$        4.99	13,807	1.80%	-0.06%
$        5.99	5,346	0.70%	0.07%
$        6.99	4,799	0.62%	0.04%
$        7.99	16,341	2.13%	-0.02%
$        8.99	3,159	0.41%	0.01%
$        9.99	77,071	10.02%	0.11%
$      10.99	465	0.06%	-0.01%
$      11.99	1,010	0.13%	-0.02%
$      12.99	1,235	0.16%	-0.01%
$      13.99	116	0.02%	0.00%
$      14.99	1,355	0.18%	-0.02%
$      15.99	100	0.01%	0.00%
$      16.99	146	0.02%	-0.01%
$      17.99	71	0.01%	0.00%
$      18.99	38	0.00%	0.00%
$      19.99	324	0.04%	-0.01%
$      20.99	10	0.00%	0.00%
$      21.99	19	0.00%	0.00%
$      22.99	50	0.01%	0.00%
$      23.99	19	0.00%	0.00%
$      24.99	80	0.01%	0.00%

Summary  

New York Times bestseller fiction hardback equivalents actually dropped a bit on average, as prices overall held steady in what I call the “Prime Range” (one penny to fifty dollars).  The number of books added to the US Kindle store slowed…it was the lowest add rate of the year.  I’m not too worried about that…there were still a lot added to the store.  There was one net loss in magazines…hm, who left?  That number will jump with the new payment plan, most likely, but it’s too soon for that.  Blogs continue to grow.   We have more promotional free books…but those public domain books that were removed have not returned.  We also haven’t seen those books from the British Library, I believe…I thought those 65,000 books would show up as public domain.  Spanish language books jumped up…but the number is still tiny.   The number of books at the low price end increased, but there wasn’t a whole lot of price shifting going on. 

• Data were typically drawn using Jungle-Search.com. There are a number of possible sources of errors (JS, Amazon, me), but these are probably pretty good.  The same people now do KindleIQ.com, and I may switch to that eventually.  However, I’m reluctant to change my methods in order to maintain consistency
• The free books referenced here are from the Kindle store: there are many other sources for free books
• My search for textbooks definitely has false positives (books that aren’t really textbooks). I search for -domain (to eliminate public domain titles, which would be older books, generall) textbook. That would find a book about textbooks, for example
• I searched for “Spanish edition” to find Spanish language books. That has some false positives as well
• I look at price percentages of books in the range of one penny to fifty dollars, to eliminate freebies and limit textbooks
• The price point analysis is for books at that specific price: it does not represent a range of prices
• I compared the percentage of price points in the Price Point Analysis when I showed the difference…not the number of books
• This information is based on what a United States customer sees

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

Eek! Stephen Hawking says there are no stars? ;)

Eek! Stephen Hawking says there are no stars? 😉

Okay, a lot of people learned a lot of physics from reading Stephen Hawking.  Now, the noted physicist says there are no stars!  It’s full dark!

Oh, wait…it’s just a mistake at Amazon.  On the bestseller list, they have Hawking listed as the author of Stephen King’s novel.

My bad.  😉

Just kidding…not about the mistake, but I thought that was hilarious.  I mean they aren’t very much alike…Stephen King couldn’t write a brief history of anything.  😉

Amazon NYT Bestsellers December 01 2010

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

Flash! B&N shares plunge 8% in 2 hours

Flash! B&N shares plunge 8% in 2 hours

“Wow, Jimmy!  You were getting Cs last year, and you got an A in English.  Unfortunately, we though you were going to get an A+…so you are grounded, young man!”

Is the e-book market overheated or what?  I congratulated Barnes & Noble on their 2nd Quarter report in this earlier post.

The switch from relying on brick and mortar (which is a predictably shrinking market) to digital on the company’s part has been bold required investment…but sales overall were up, and the NOOKcolor is the number one item at Barnes & Noble.  Yes, brick and mortar sales were down…but that’s the case for most stores.

Unfortunately for them, they “didn’t meet Wall Street expectations”.  That’s what I mean by my fictional quote at the beginning of this article.  There are lots of people like that: “Carol, it’s great that you cleaned your room…did you clean your bathroom?”  I expect B&N will recover a bit from this slide…I think this is a “mouse jerk” reaction, primarily.

However, don’t invest based on what I say.  🙂  I think they are making pretty good decisions right now, and Wall Street will now lower expectations, so it will be easier for them to look good in the third and fourth quarter.  If the digital part of the business split off from the brick and mortar part, it would look great..I’m not saying that will happen, though.  Oh, and toys are selling well…  😉

Forbes article

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