Round up #194: New products, Prime Early Access Sale
Prime Early Access Sale
We’ve already had Prime Day this year (12 July to 13 July) & Black Friday isn’t until 25 November, but this year, Amazon is giving us another sale in-between the two:
Prime Early Access Sale (at AmazonSmile*)
They are advertising this a lot! I’ve seen actual commercials for it, as well as a splash every time I open the Amazon app. It’s a sale for
Amazon Prime (at AmazonSmile: benefit a non-profit of your choice by shopping*)
members. As has been the case with other sales, even though it isn’t the official day yet, there are sales now that will likely continue through that day. For example, even though they aren’t found when you filter for Prime Early Access deals, Amazon devices are on sale and I’d be suprised if they aren’t on PEAS (gee, is all they are asking is for you to give PEAS a chance? 😉 ). Here are the
Here is a filter for the PEAS deals…interesting to see, and you can “watch the deal” to get alerts on them:
Expect there to be more deals! I’d especially recommend looking for deals on subscriptions…”channels” for Prime Video (on Prime Day, I did Paramount+ for $0.99 a month for a limited time, then I’ll cancel…I got to see Star Trek: Strange New Worlds that way), for Prime itself, for Kindle Unlimited, for Audible…
Good luck!
Major change to Kindle book return policy by end of year?
One of the best sources for news on EBRs (E-Book Readers), GOODEREADER, reports in an
that, by the end of 2022, the policy will change from a return of an e-book within 7 days for pretty much any reason (if Amazon thinks you are abusing the return policy, they can change the way you ask for refunds), even if yu’ve read the whole book, to making you defend the return if you’ve read more than 10% of it. Kozlowski links to an Authors Guild page where they are taking credit for the change.
This is major, if it happens.
For authors/publishers (that can be the same thing nowadays), that places even more emphasis on what you put in the front of the book. I’ve generally recommended putting the actual content as close to the “front cover” as possible, to engage readers during their free samples. That would mean, for instance, putting acknowledgements in the back. Depending on how Amazon does it, though, you might be able to “return proof” a book by frontloading it with content people tend to skip so they get right past the 10%. I wouldn’t recommend that: you don’t want to trick people into having to keep a book! I was a successful brick and mortar bookstore manager, and I made sure that my clerks knew we were making customers, not sales (that’s not an original phrase with me). It’s okay to lose a couple of dollars by taking a return if that cements an ongoing relationship that results in profitable sales later.
We’ll see what happens…
Amazon Devices & Services Event
On 28 September, Amazon introduced their new devices & services. As usual, there were many items, some incremental changes, some big.
There are usually a couple of jawdroppers, and there were two big ones I want to mention.
First, there’s a new sleep monitoring device, the
Sure, there are sleep trackers already, but this is something different. Amazon is well aware of privacy concerns, and the Halo Rise doesn’t use a camera…or even a microphone! Among other things, it apparently uses radar to detect your respiration & movement! I think there may be a market for this one, at $139.99. It may actually be a step forward in one of the really impactful areas of health, sleep. You can’t buy it yet, but you can sign up for a notification when it becomes available.
This next one…well, I’m less sure about it. In a way, it’s something people have wanted for a long time. It’s the
Sure, it’s a new Kindle, it’s an e-ink…but you can write on it. That’s the huge innovation here: writing on a screen which isn’t backlit. I certainly get the appeal of that. You can actually a “pen” to do it, so you can do drawings and such.
While they do promote it for reading Kindle books (and I can see how you could want to annotate those differently than the way we’ve done it in the past, especially nonfiction), they also have blank templates, including lined paper.
They are clearly making it much easier to export and import (that’s never been a strength of Kindle devices).
I’ll be interested to see if people start using it unconnected to Kindle books…for example, someone working on a factory floor might like the eye feel. The pen won’t need charging and the Kindle Scribe can stay charged for weeks: might be great for expeditions.
It does have a frontlight, like a Paperwhite, and that’s always been the comfortable way for me to read, more so even then paper.
My question is whether people will see the advantages enough to pay $339.99 for it, when you can get a tablet for well under $100.
We use a
and like that. You use a special pen (but it’s ink), you are writing on paper…but you can easily erase it (a damp microfiber cloth will do it particularly well). Obviously, the Kindle Scribe has a lot more robust capabilities, for about $25, it’s a good solution.
I’m convinced the Kindle Scribe is cool, but is it more than niche? We’ll see.
I haven’t done a Round up like this in some time…it was fun! I’m always curious to know what you think. Feel free to let me and my readers know by commenting on this post or on Twitter at
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* I am linking to the same thing at the regular Amazon site, and at AmazonSmile. When you shop at AmazonSmile, half a percent of your purchase price on eligible items goes to a non-profit you choose. It will feel just like shopping at Amazon: you’ll be using your same account. The one thing for you that is different is that you pick a non-profit the first time you go (which you can change whenever you want)…and the good feeling you’ll get. Shop ’til you help!
This post by Bufo Calvin originally appeared in the I Love My Kindle blog. To support this or other organizations, begin your Amazon shopping from a link on their sites: Amazon.com (Smile.Amazon.com)
Shop ’til you help! 
I Love My Kindle 