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Book Nook provides readers with insights into the world of books. Vick Mickunas takes you into the center of the publishing world with the latest book buzz, book reviews, and exclusive chats with authors..Home > Blogs > Book Nook > Archives > 2008 > October > 13 > Entry
political books that are only available on-line
In the Amazon…
There was an amazing article yesterday in the New York Times. It went into great detail about the E-Commerce giants Amazon.com and EBay. Apparently EBay is losing traction while Amazon.com is on the rise.
Today in the New York Times there is another interesting article about Amazon.com. Almost one year ago, Amazon.com introduced the Kindle, their paperless electronic reader. I know people who won’t go anywhere without their Kindles. One guy told me that he reaches for it first thing in the morning before he even gets out of bed to download and read the New York Times.
This current article is about some new political e-books that are only available on the Amazon Kindle:
Campaign Articles From Newsweek Become E-Books for Amazon Kindle
By RICHARD PÉREZ-PEÑA
“It would seem to be a magazine’s dream in these straitened times: Take something you have already published and sold, repackage it and distribute it without all that expense of paper, ink and trucks, and then sell it again.
This week, Newsweek will publish four books, one about each of the major presidential and vice presidential candidates — Senators John McCain, Barack Obama and Joseph Biden, and Gov. Sarah Palin — books that will not appear in print but will be available only as e-books from Amazon.com for download to Amazon’s Kindle device.
The books will contain versions of articles that Newsweek, owned by The Washington Post Company, has already published during the campaign. Turning this kind of collection into books is an old idea; what is new is to do it with such minimal production and distribution costs that even the most limited sales could be profitable.
Amazon says this is probably the first such venture by a publication, but it is not likely to be the last.
“We think it’s a very interesting model that could broaden,” said Ian Freed, an Amazon vice president in charge of the Kindle reading device. “This could start to change the way at least some books are published.”
The books, at $9.99, will go on sale Wednesday and can be ordered starting Monday.
Jon Meacham, editor of Newsweek, approached Amazon with the idea about a month ago. The use of material published over the course of the campaign points to another advantage of digital books: a fast turnaround time.
“Every magazine editor thinks their stuff should be in an anthology, but that’s hard to do economically,” Mr. Meacham said. “Here’s a way of doing it more quickly and with virtually no overhead. This is competing in the digital space with our traditional strengths, and that’s been hard to do.”
News magazines, like newspapers, have struggled financially, with circulation and advertising in decline. The economic downturn has cut deeply into advertising, while the magazines are forced to compete with many sources of information available instantly, and usually free, on the Internet.
The Kindle, introduced in November, costs $359. Amazon offers 180,000 books for wireless download, along with more than 40 newspapers and magazines.
The potential audience may be voracious, but it remains relatively small — Amazon will not say how many Kindles it has sold. Industry analysts have estimated that the figure is in the low hundreds of thousands.
But the experiment is appealing “because anyone who owns a Kindle is someone we want as a reader,” Mr. Meacham said. “We’re putting it in front of committed readers.”
(Newsweek/Amazon.com)
Permalink | Comments (3) | Post your comment | Categories: in the Amazone
Comments
By Mike
October 13, 2008 1:26 PM | Link to this
I have the same feelings as you. As long as there are neanderthals like use who cling to the ancient ways I guess they’ll have to keep publishing real books on real paper for the time being. We literary cave men need something to carry around, right?By vick
October 13, 2008 1:07 PM | Link to this
Mike, I am not a Kindle user. I spend way too much time on a computer as it is. I’m enough of a Luddite to prefer reading actual books. In regard to periodicals, newspapers, and other quickly disseminated media I read on-line because it is much more timely to do so. I appreciate anything that increases knowledge and reading so the Kindle is fine by me but I don’t see myself using one except in an extreme emergency.By Mike
October 13, 2008 12:51 PM | Link to this
It seems like a very clever and smart marketing ploy. And it would appear to have an astronomically high profit margin for the publishers. I can’t say I fault them for wanting to give this a try. If you don’t make money you don’t stay in business. It’s as simple as that. And regurgitating already written items in some kind of collection format makes sense. I guess you could call it the publishing worlds version of reality TV, huh? Cheap to make and easy to distribute. As for me, I don’t think it would have a significant appeal, as I try to keep fairly current as it is with regard to major news magazine stories. But I can see it appealing to people who already own Kindles and want to stay informed. But how long will the stories really be relevant in the news cycle? Would you spend ten bucks for rehashed magazine articles which are likely available on-line with only a little effort? What are your thoughts, Vic? Do you own or use a Kindle? Are you ready to pony up the money for something like Newsweek’s offer?