Aaron Pressman
on Aug 3rd, 2009
@ 6:23 am: 

I think you may be off-base here on your assessment of what Amazon is up to by not including results for dead tree versions of books when you search the KINDLE STORE either from a Kindle or the Kindle section of Amazon’s web site. Originally, Amazon did display print versions available on the Kindle pages for books. From the point of view of customers, there’s both a good and a bad reason explaining why Amazon changed the layout and neither is really about losing sales. Amazon is not in business to forgo any sales. They constantly change and tweak everything on their web site to maximize sales.

First, the positive. Almost always when I’m on my Kindle and I want a new book, I want a Kindle ebook to start reading. I don’t want search results showing me non-Kindle books because I’m looking for something to read on my Kindle. It’s actually annoying to click through to a search result that isn’t available on the Kindle. When I’m on Amazon’s web site and I go to the trouble of limiting my searching to “Kindle books,” I REALLY only want a Kindle book. In a minority of cases, when I’m looking for a specific book, it’s trivial to broaden the search by clicking on the “any department” line.

I think there is also a nefarious rationale for why they changed the policy. Amazon has been creeping up the prices of ebooks and frequently displaying a made-up “digital” list price. With some older books, they’ve actually priced the ebook edition above the price of available paperbacks. By “hiding” the prices of those competing, dead tree editions, Amazon is hiding information about relative pricing and doing a disservice to its customers. This is tilting a sale towards digital and away from print but only in cases where there’s a Kindle edition available. It’s not forgoing a sale completely, as you suggest.

You final point about the coming wave of competitors is right on. I think the growing and, hopefully, heated competition will improve things for us customers.

[Reply]

Scott
on Aug 3rd, 2009
@ 12:20 pm: 

Great post. I too have noticed the absence of other versions on the Kindle side of the Amazon store. I wonder if it is an attempt to show publishers/authors that if a book is not in Kindle edition then it won’t be seen (and therefore won’t be purchased) by a growing set of consumers. While some consumers (those who know exactly what book they want) will then search and buy on the print side of Amazon or search for the book elsewhere, others may simply find an alternative book in the Kindle format.

[Reply]

Anthony S. Policastro
on Aug 10th, 2009
@ 12:34 pm: 

I would have to agree with Evan’s assessment of Amazon. Now wouldn’t it be nice when you searched for a book on your Kindle and it said not available in Kindle format you could order the print edition right from you Kindle and have it delivered anywhere you want?

Because of the small and slower access to the Kindle catalog on a Kindle, I would keep the catalog with Kindle books only. But, if the book was not in the Kindle format I would have just those books presented as print books and be able to purchase it from the Kindle.

[Reply]

MikeShatzkin
on May 5th, 2009
@ 6:48 am: 

Evan, I think just about everybody buys less music as they get older. Two reasons.

1. You get introduced to music much more readily and frequently when you’re young and single and music is inextricably bound to the discovery of social opportunities with those of whatever sex interests you.

2. As you get older, your stash of stuff you KNOW you like gets bigger, and you never stop listening to it. So your NEED for new new music diminishes.

I bet if you checked you’d find that the pace of adding new ARTISTS has slowed even more than the pace of adding new music.

None of this applies to the other forms of content because they don’t tend to be reused the way music is.

[Reply]

Evan Reply:
May 5th, 2009 at 8:07 am

Mike:

One could make the argument that as you get older you wind up reading more books, watching more TV, and seeing more movies… which isn’t reflected in my experience.

Its not just about music… it’s about everything.

[Reply]

Generation On-Demand « Black Plastic Glasses
on May 6th, 2009
@ 2:52 am: 

[...] On-Demand is the second of a 3-part series.  The first installment,  Disruption, explored my personal content consumption over the years and ended with the observation that [...]

There Will Be Disintermediation « Black Plastic Glasses
on May 11th, 2009
@ 3:28 am: 

[...] first two parts of this series, Disruption and Generation On-Demand, explored my own personal content consumption disruption and traced it [...]