KDP Select ups the ante for authors’ exclusivity with All-Stars perk

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Amazon have announced the continuation of KDP Select All-Stars, a perk for authors who enroll in KDP Select in the U.S., UK, and Germany: the chance to earn bonus cash if you or your book falls in the top 100 for the month of October. The top 10 most-read authors on Amazon.com will each be paid $25,000; the top 10 on Amazon.co.uk will receive £2,000; and the top 10 on Amazon.de will receive €3,000. In theory, an author can be top selling on all three sites and be paid for Read More …

Kindle Unlimited expands again, but is it worth it to enroll?

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[UPDATE December 2014: Now available on Amazon Brazil. UPDATE February 2015: Available on Amazon Canada and Amazon Mexico. UPDATE September 2015: Available on Amazon India. UPDATE November 2016: Available on Amazon Australia.] Amazon’s Kindle Unlimited has expanded to Spain and Italy, adding to its availability in the UK, U.S., Germany, France, and Japan. Titles enrolled in KDP Select are automatically enrolled in Unlimited, and authors do not have the ability to remain in Select but opt out of Unlimited. This is problematic for authors who support the concept of the Kindle Owners Lending Read More …

Third edition of The Global Indie Author now available in Canada

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Well, after much trial and tribulation, the third edition of The Global Indie Author is out now in Canada. Readers can find it on Chapters/Indigo and Amazon.ca. By the way, that “Usually delivers in 3-5 weeks” declaration on the Amazon.ca website is nonsense; the book delivers in less than a week. The extended delivery time is just part of Amazon/CreateSpace’s strategy against competitor Lightning Source, which, incidentally, is covered in detail in the book. If you want to avoid supporting Amazon, buy from the Chapters/Indigo website, where the book is Read More …

Third Edition of The Global Indie Author is now available in U.S. and Europe

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The third edition of The Global Indie Author is out now in print on Amazon U.S., UK, Germany, France, Spain, and Italy. All other territories coming soon! eBooks are also on the way. As mentioned in my previous post, the third edition features a new cover, new subtitle — to reflect the truly global phenomenon that self-publishing has become — and a great deal of new content (over 80 pages). The technical chapters have been completely overhauled to deal with the complexities of image handling, the increasing frustrations of font Read More …

Amazon plead for your support in Hachette dispute and why you shouldn’t give it

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A few days ago I unpacked a piece of Amazon propaganda that was posted on the Kindle forum. Well, Amazon have upped their game: in a lengthy letter sent to Kindle authors today (and posted on a new site Amazon set up specifically for this purpose, www.readersunited.com), Amazon have asked indie authors to join Amazon in their fight with Hachette: we are asked to send opposition emails to Hachette CEO, Michael Pietsch (Amazon even published his email, which is really bad manners) and to copy our emails to readers-united@amazon.com. We Read More …

Unpacking Amazon’s propaganda

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As the dispute between Amazon and Hachette ramped up earlier this year, Amazon tried to exercise some leverage by delaying the sale of Hachette titles as well as increasing print book prices and changing Amazon’s algorithms to Hachette’s disadvantage. Hachette authors took to social media, and Amazon customers, accustomed to finding what they want at prices they like, were similarly annoyed. In an attempt to counter the barrage of bad publicity, on 29 July Amazon posted their version of events on the Kindle Forum. The delivery of the message on Read More …

Amazon are bullying traditional publishers — why you should be worried

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The BBC has reported on the latest round of negotiations between Amazon and UK publishers as Amazon attempt to secure ever more favourable terms for themselves. Many of you will already be familiar with the Amazon versus Hachette dispute, whereby Amazon are trying to bully large publishers into lowering ebook prices. In the UK, Amazon have further upped the ante by demanding that publishers hand over their print files and give Amazon the right to print any books where the publisher has failed to provide Amazon with adequate stock. But Read More …

New bugs in Kindle for PC app

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Amazon recently updated the Kindle for PC app, and alas two bugs have appeared. The first is that the app no longer defaults to justifying body text as it did before, regardless of how you code your book. Previously, if one left the text-align value out of the relevant CSS, or if you coded in “text-align:justify;”, the app would justify the text; now everything displays aligned left and you get the jagged right margin. I have informed Amazon of the bug, and they have responded that the technicians are now Read More …

Are we approaching the release of HR ebooks?

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With the release of high-resolution devices from all the major manufacturers, I have been musing on the possible development of high-resolution ebooks developed specifically for this market. These devices demand not only larger images but also a rethink of how image-heavy content must be delivered: just as we now see movies delivered in both HD (Blu-Ray) for one market and in standard DVD format for those without an HD system, I expect that we will start seeing HR ebook files developed for the high-resolution device market and differentiated from standard Read More …