The other day we covered the controversy among publishers caused by Kindle’s free-e-book giveaways.
Now blogger Ben Metcalfe mentions another controversy: apparently the option to give Kindle books away for free is not available to everyone. Metcalfe’s writing partner, Violet Blue, is unable to set the price for any of her Kindle books below 99 cents.
Metcalfe is suspicious of how publishers, even small publishers, are able to give e-books away for free to sell their print books but an independent author such as Violet Blue cannot.
Perhaps a bit too suspicious—he notes that one of the publishers giving e-books away is Zondervan, publishers of the NIV Bible and other Christian literature, and infers some kind of Christian conspiracy theory (which the Zondervan-published author he mentions shows up in comments to denounce).
While I find conspiracy theories doubtful, it is odd that the ability to give Kindle books away for free is not available to everyone. I am curious just how far this goes. Is anybody out there having the same experience? If you are a self-published or small-publisher Kindle author, can you give your books away or are you limited to 99 cents?
Free ebooks on Amazon actually cost Amazon money for the whispernet delivery. I’m rather surprised they allow any.
Oh, and they’re not free for international customers – they’re $2 (+VAT for EU customers)
“Never attribute to malice what can be explained by simple incompetence.”
Isn’t it a matter of record that Amazon fills the Kindle store through several different back-ends?
And that some of those channels are human rather than online? Maybe all the channels aren’t up to the same spec? I think we’ve seen that already vis-a-vis DRM, no?
Could be as simple as promo ebooks having to go through a human account manager to set the expiration date of the free promo period.
I’m afraid this is old news to Amazon DTP participants. I joined the DTP program in November 1997, and at that time, there was no “free books” option for DTP participants; nor has there been any such option since then. Big publishers and many small publishers bypass the Amazon DTP program, which is why their books can be given away for free.
And yes, this is a bias against self-publishers (and their customers) that has annoyed me mightily. I’d love to be able to give away my short stories for free at Amazon.
Sorry, I meant 2007, of course.
*Cough* – actually, March 2008. I really should doublecheck my dates before posting.
Actually, it turns out that any author can get their books into the store for free … by publishing thru Mobipocket, where they can sign up for limited time promotions, including giving their book away for free.
Those who publish via DTP, regardless of size, are locked into a minimum price of 99 cents. I don’t know what those who sell below that price at Smashwords will see once their books start hitting the Kindle store. So far, they are showing up as free in the B&N and Kobo stores (but I haven’t seen any in the Sony store).
Chris,
You can check this yourself as an experiment, as long as you make an Amazon account (or have one) because you need it for the DTP.
Sign up and try and publish something – one of your long blog posts or something – and you’ll find out by trial and error that 99c is the low limit.
Zondervan is a division of HarperCollins, which is Really Big, and thus able to get a bit more out of Amazon that the little guys. Heck, Amazon is such a closed system, even knowing someone there you can talk with is a Really Big Deal.
Ever notice the highly detailed, graphic-rich pages some products have? Same thing. You need connections to get that sort of advantage.
The Mobipocket option for free books — actually, the minimum was a penny — ended as of March 1. Shepard Publications, my business, was notified that any of our Mobipocket books under 99 cents would not be sold after that date. If anyone knows another way in…..