There’s finally official news from Plastic Logic that the rumored $299 price, as Forbes and Times Online had stated, is incorrect. The actual email itself  says that there have been some reports that implied Plastic Logic had announced their price, but Plastic Logic has not announced pricing for the product and does not plan to until launch in January 2010. They plan to be competitive in the eReader category, where prices now range from $199 to $800.  But they won’t be at the low end of the market. That’s because Plastic Logic is providing business professionals with some of the industry’s most advanced technologies, including large plastic screen, ultra-thin and lightweight form factor that offers users a digital reading experience unlike any other.

The confusion over $299 probably occurred because by saying ‘competitive price’ Plastic Logic meant ‘competitive with current eReaders, such as the Kindle DX’. Most people made the mistake of assuming they meant the Kindle 2 and Sony 600.

Since the lower end is excluded, we can rule out $199 and $299. Their re-emphasis that the PL eReader is focused on business professionals is pretty telling.

Based on current trends it seems that:

• Kindle DX 2 perhaps comes in at around $400 to $450 early next year
• The subsidized Apple iNetbook comes in at around $300-$400 in September or October ($800 without contract)
• The 9″ Sony Reader 900 comes in at either $399 or $449 just before Christmas

Let’s discuss about all the different ereaders and ebook stores entering the market and how they benefit the consumers like us. Let’s look at the good ideas and initiatives each company is bringing to the table, whether the idea is being adopted by other companies, and the benefits to us.

Amazon and the Kindle

1. WhisperNet and WhisperSync. Plastic Logic and Sony will both match this by early 2010 and we are well on the way to having wireless book delivery becoming a standard feature for ereaders.
2. $9.99 prices - Shortcovers, BN, Sony have all matched this recently.
3. Validating the market. If not for the success of the Kindle, there would be much less interest.
4. Self Publishing.
5. Addressing the textbook market with the Kindle reader.

Sony and the Sony Reader

1. They were the first big company (in this current era of ebooks and ereaders) to launch an ereader and restart the push.
2. PDF and ePub support.
3. Low prices and the first $199 eReader that is reasonably up to date in terms of features.
4. Worldwide availability.
5. Preventing Amazon from totally overrunning the eReader market.

Apple, iPhone App Store and the rumored 10″ Apple iReader

1. App Store and providing a channel for publishers to address once-a-month readers.
2. Allowing lots of people to test out various ideas via the App Store.
3. Rumored iReader has given Amazon and Sony motivation to release new products faster.
4. Probably, really good usability when its out.
5. Probably, really good looks when its out.

Google and Google Books

1. Scanning Library Books. Amazon signed up with the University of Michigan so this idea is spreading.
2. Free Public Domain Books. Again, Amazon offered this (7K books though, not a million), and B&N and Sony are using Google Books.
3. Trying to make orphan works available.
4. The threat of advertising based books. Forcing Amazon to apply for a patent. For the people that are OK with books subsidized by advertising, this is good.

Barnes & Noble and eBookstore

1. A device independent ebook store.
2. Retail Locations for users to try out ereaders.
3. Reduce the overwhelming advantage Amazon enjoyed over other ereaders.

Indigo and Shortcovers

1. Device independent ebook store like B&N.
2. Added competition for the bigger players.
3. Support for BlackBerry and Android before other companies.

iPhone Reading Apps – Stanza, Classics, etc.

1. Validating the market for reading on iPhone.
2. Creating a popular category of Book Apps.
3. Providing publishers alternate channels.
4. Forcing Amazon to support iPhone.

Plastic Logic and its eReader

1. Large Screen Sizes and unbreakable screens.
2. Probably caused a quicker Kindle DX launch.
3. Hope for non-US customers and probably accelerating Amazon efforts to launch in Europe.
4. Promise of a 3rd party app store.

Gutenberg, The Internet Archive, ManyBooks, etc.

1. Actual altruism.
2. Lots of free ebooks.
3. Support for most formats.
4. Device independence.

Dell Tablet Reader

1. Promise of a subsidised $0 reader and a subscription model.
2. Validating the idea that eReaders are big.

Pixel Qi and its 3qi screens

1. Promise of color screens for cheap and a couple years ahead of schedule.
2. Great battery life on color screens.

11 Next Big Ideas and Initiatives

While different companies have created some huge advances, there are still some really big ideas left to be implemented (am including a few ideas from above that are not yet implemented) -

• Technology that smartly leverages network effects and word of mouth
• An App Store for eReading devices
• A well thought out Social Reading option
• An ebook rental model
• A solution for independent authors to get a fair chance
• Color support
• Better eInk for Faster Refreshes and Better Contrast
• Foldable or Rollable Screens
• A well executed subscription model
• The evolved version of the eReader that replaces paper, and not just books
• An idea that reduces the distance between authors and readers

This is the Q&A with Ed Ditto covering Kindle, ebooks, and the Future of Publishing. Ed Ditto recently sold his first novel,  Heart for a Hero.  It is equal parts mystery, romance, personal transformation, and war story.  But Ditto’s publisher has declined to release HFAH on Kindle, which Ditto finds surprising.  Why would his publisher feel threatened by e-publication? Ditto has a few theories and he’s decided to test them by participating directly in the market himself.  To that end he’s self-published “The Battle of the Swine King” through the Kindle store.  Swine King is an 11,000-word “EP” of seven short humor pieces.  Ditto has priced it at $1.99 on the idea that Apple’s iTunes store has taught consumers to think of $.99 as the right price for an “entertainment unit.” He’s blogging his e-publishing experience, and he’s entirely open to commentary and constructive criticism.  His email address is GratefulEd@gmail.com.

This part is basically answering questions from a non-author perspective. Let’s start:

Q1: What are the eReader features that make readers love them?

1) The first time I saw an e-reader I wondered: what makes a $300 gizmo better than paper?  I think that’s a common reaction.

Now, Kindle’s cool and I’m not insinuating it’s an overpriced gizmo.  Far from it.  But I note that for some Kindle fans it seems to be as much about the device itself as it is the content.

The question is: what are the features that win readers over to these devices from paper?  How do those features enhance the content?  And as a writer, how can I leverage those enhancements to make the content I offer more valuable to e-reader users?

Thoughts: The short answer would be – Just as some people fall madly in love with the physical ‘book’ object, a lot of Kindle owners fall in love with the device. It’s positive association.

The Longer Answer: We tend to be very fond of any experience that we find pleasurable and associate things and people present at the moment as sources of pleasure. When a device makes it more convenient to experience pleasure (ipod for music lovers, kindle for book lovers) we tend to transfer a lot of our love for the experience to the device.

The main features -

1. Whispernet and convenience of 60 second downloads.
2. Great reading screen.
3. Ability to carry a lot of books everywhere.
4. Lots of others.

In terms of enhancing content - you could argue there’s a built-in dictionary, and the ability to enhance fonts, and Internet access for reference, and the ability to search.

However, does the content really need enhancing?

The way the Kindle is currently structured and marketed it’s recreating the book, and making things a lot more convenient – However, it’s not enhancing books. Quite frankly, I have no clue what the answer is to -

1. Do people want books to be enhanced?
2. What ways could the book be enhanced when using eReaders?

Q2: How can independent authors reach kindle owners?

2) What’s the best way for a relatively unknown author to reach a Kindle reader?  Assume the author has a good book but no publisher, no advertising budget, and little appetite for hanging out on Kindle forums trying to infiltrate them for subversive commercial purposes.

Thoughts: Unfortunately, at the moment, there is no way other than to use forums and blogs and social networks to promote yourself.

I would completely remove the thought that promoting my book is ’subversive commerical purposes’ out of my mindset. People want to find good authors. Promote yourself smartly and politely and they’ll be glad.

There are three strategies -

1. Do Nothing. This is probably not going to work.
2. Do it stupidly i.e. try to get value without adding value. This will only engender hostility.
3. Do it smartly i.e. provide some value.

Doing it smartly would encompass -

• Most Important: Make sure your book is top notch. Zero spelling mistakes, well polished, worth $100 (even if it’s $1).
• Mind Frame: Providing the users obvious value and letting them help you.
• Use Free intelligently i.e. first book free or cheap, and remaining reasonably priced.
• Ask for feedback and help and incorporate feedback and use the help.
• In relevant niche forums and for niche blogs (a mystery forum if your book is a mystery book) simply notify people and ask for reviews and help.
• In general social networks and book social networks, build friends in relevant groups and niches and then notify them very politely.
• Offer free copies to review.
• Offer a first book free on your blog.
• In forums with large participation, start building a profile and your network of friends.
• Most important, look at what the successful authors and networkers are doing.
• Treat Amazon and Google with a lot of respect and polite caution.

Here’s a list of people to model/learn from -

1. John Rector.
2. Boyd Morrison.
3. Stephen Windwalker
4. Bufo Calvin.
5. J. A Konrath.
6. Stacey Cochran.

Not everything they’ve done is perfect (so don’t just blindly copy everything) – However, overall they all have good strategies.

Q3: Can Indie authors hit it big via Kindle Store?

A related question.  Judging from the Amazon lists, the bestselling Kindle titles track the bestselling hard-copy titles.  They tend to be celebrity memoirs, pop psychology, James Patterson’s latest, and so on.  But the bestselling titles are also the most expensive titles.

Furthermore…in trade paperback my novel, “Heart for a Hero,” sells for more than Cormac McCarthy’s “The Road.”  That’s pretty much bass-ackwards from how it should be, I think.  I’m no McCarthy.

Kindle, though, is a platform that makes easy for a premium author to charge a premium price.  Likewise, a lesser-known author can “give it away” to attract budget-minded readers.  To wit, the Kindle store sells McCarthy’s “Road” for $7.99 and my “Swine King” for $1.99.

But I’m not aware—and correct me if I’m wrong—of even one indie author who’s broken into the big-time by circumventing the traditional agent-publisher-distributor-retailer chain and going directly to e-readers.  Indie authors who are making e-text money are doing so through their blogs.  Nate Silver’s FiveThirtyEight.com is a perfect example.  And even then, Silver’s making his money by using his blog as a loss-leader to score newspaper, magazine, and book contracts.

So is it realistic for an unknown author to try going to Kindle readers directly?  Are Kindle users willing to risk a buck or two on an unknown author’s book, or had they rather pay $7.99 for a known quantity like Cormac McCarthy?  And how do they make that decision?

Thoughts: Let’s look at some data points -

1. J. A. Konrath saw a lot of success via the Kindle Store.  He shares his secrets and advice on his blog. Required reading for anyone self-publishing on the Kindle.
2. Boyd Morrison got a 2 book contract.
3. John Rector got a contract that may or may not have been influenced by the Kindle Store.
4. A decent number of independent authors were doing well in the Kindle Store.

Kindle users are definitely willing to risk a buck or two. A lot of people (lots, not just 1 or 2 or 4) buy independent author books when they’re mentioned on Kindle Review.

Kindle owners understand that there are a lot of benefits to encouraging authors directly. At this point it’s the authors who are stuck in the mind-set of success can only come via Publishers and old models.

In the Indian Vedas there’s one particular shloka that says – when it comes to certain things (such as God, medicine, etc.) the results you get are directly proportional to how strong your belief is.

The same holds true with Indie authors and the Kindle Store.

While there are authors making money and getting book contracts via the Kindle Store, people are still doubting that it could work. Now is the time to come in with the strategy that Boyd Morrison and J.A. Konrath are using i.e.

1. Free books at the blog.
2. Cheap $1 to $2 ebooks at the Kindle Store.
3. Doing a lot of relationship building online.
4. Asking for feedback in forums.

Do it NOW before everyone starts doing it and every 1st book in a series is free. It’s amazing to me how clear the opportunity is and yet people still don’t want to try it out.

Of course, there’s the opportunity cost of missing out on working on traditional means (agents and publishers).

Q4: Teenagers don’t seem to read any more? Can eReaders help?

4) A teenaged Morgan Stanley intern recently wrote a media trends report that stood MS’s management on its ear.  Among other things, he says:

“No teenager that I know of regularly reads a newspaper, as most do not have the time and cannot be bothered to read pages and pages of text while they could watch the news summarised on the internet or on TV.”

His report doesn’t even mention books—as if they’re so far out of favor among teenagers that they’re not worth spending space on.  And that leads me to think that the future of publishing MUST be e-readers, but that we‘re going to have to wait a decade for today’s kids to get jobs, etc., before they’ll be able to afford e-readers of their own.  And those e-readers will have to be a lot more flashy and glitzy than the ones on the market today.

So: have we really reached a paper-book/e-book tipping point here?  Or, looking back, will we remember e-readers as a fad or niche market?

Thoughts: It’s rather hasty to take one teenager’s report, especially one who is a 15 year old intern at Morgan Stanley (very atypical, don’t you think?) and get worried about it.

Let’s consider the Contrarian view i.e. this report is very irrelevant to publishing -

1. Most teenagers are going through identity formation and ‘discovering themselves’. The unnatural social pressure cooker of high-school has made them super concerned about a lot of things that don’t really matter later on, for example popularity among a peer group that won’t be your peer group in just a few years.
2. In the U.K. the drinking age is 18, age of consent is 16, there’s a completely different social structure. It’d be hasty to take what is happening there and apply it to the US.
3. In the  U.S. 70%+ of wealth is concentrated with Baby Boomers. They are going to be around for a long time. Shouldn’t we be concentrating on our main market, rather than teenagers who’ll morph into a completely different demographic a few times over the next 5-10 years.

The report itself says that teenagers are reluctant to part with the 79 pence that a mp3 song costs and would rather pirate music - We sell 10 pound books. Why would we ever care about a demographic that pirates 79 pence songs?

The  one valid point is that eReaders can really make reading a fun activity for kids and balance the ‘teaching us to hate reading’ that our education systems tend to do.

Reading is associated with homework and schools and boring subjects.

Just balance that out by letting kids use an ereader to read things they are actually passionate about. Of course, the logical next step would be to make 90% of kids’ overall education tailored to them and things they are passionate about.

Q5: Apple and whether Apple’s iNetbook (or iReader) is a threat?

Given Apple’s consumer-gadget successes and the predicted price (around $499), are Kindles and other e-book readers threatened by an Apple tablet?

From what I’m seeing, Apple doesn’t plan to participate in the e-book market.

So if they’re going to release a device that can
compete with e-readers, why wouldn’t they follow the same
hardware/content model by creating an e-book store?  The only reason I
can think of is that they don’t see e-books as a market where there’s
money to be made.  And that’s unsettling.  The marketing people at
Apple are a lot smarter than me.

Any thoughts on this?

Thoughts: Apple is looking for the lowest hanging fruit - What they will get into is being the middle-man i.e. the platform.

With a model (iPhone App Store) where developers work for Apple for free, they would be extremely stupid to go into publishing which has so much work involved.

They own the platform and make 30% margins on all sales. It suits them much more to let other companies and publishers test out the iPhone as a platform for ebooks and just make 30% off sales.

If Apple stopped all ebooks on their platforms (without providing their own solution) then it’d be time to get unsettled.

A Final Comment

Because it’s really interesting, here’s another commment from Ed -

Well, there goes the idea that indie authors can build readers with
free/low-price offerings…

http://tech.yahoo.com/news/ap/20090807/ap_on_hi_te/us_free_e_books

Seems like e-books are capable of competing with used bookstores in
ways I hadn’t really considered.

Thoughts: Yes, it’s only a matter of time before -

1. Publishers start killing the used books market by offering older releases as ebooks at lower prices. The Kindle is actually the perfect way to kill the used books market.
2. Everyone, even established publishers and authors, is using the ‘give a book away free to hook users’ strategy.

We’re going to see HUGE changes in the books market. If I were an independent author here are the three things that’d be top of my list -

1. Path of Least Resistance: People will usually buy what’s #1 on Google. So – Getting top search ranking in google for my genre i.e. #1 for kindle mystery novel, kindle mystery, kindle mystery books, and so forth.  That would probably mean blogging at kindlemysterybook.com.  You’d have to build this in parallel with your own brand name.
2. Liking: People prefer buying from people they like, even when things aren’t equal. So it’s imperative to build relationships and keep them alive across EVERY kindle forum and blog. Also, keep in touch with your readers via a blog and by participating in book networks and actually interacting with them.
3. Path of Least Resistance and Social Proof: Hit the Top 100 list (ideally the main one) or Get Amazon to Feature You.

Just some notes on how content is treated on the Internet that newspapers and bloggers will find useful. 

The Default Attitude towards Content on the Internet

1. Content is considered free to read, and free to re-use on other sites.  
2. Content is considered cheap/free to produce.
3. Even when people consider content has some costs they assume advertising pays for it.
4. Any news item will be copied/replicated instantly, half the time (if you’re lucky) with a link back to the original source. If you’re not the original source you’ll not usually be linked to.
5. There’s an overwhelming amount of content so its not valued much at all. Exceptions are discussed later.
6. Any content on a sharing site like youtube loses its value very, very quickly.

 The Importance of Links

1. Links get treated as votes and search engines rank based on these (and other factors). 
2. Links bring new visitors from the sites that link to you.
3. Links also flow trust i.e. a link from a user trusted site increases that user’s trust in your site.   

Content creators have a huge dilemma – Links are the main and cheapest way to grow. And yet, to get links you have to give away content –  

1. Paid content hardly ever gets links.
2. The higher the quality of content the more links you’ll probably get.
3. The more content you produce the more links you’ll probably get (provided quality is maintained).
4. There is a randomness factor in quality – see Jakob Nielsen’s post (the second chart).  

Basically, you have to be giving away content or providing some utility to get links.

Content Strategies - Paid, Niche, Advertising Supported, Expertise, Freemium, Content as the Loss Leader. 

We’re ruling out the case of people who are creating content without expecting to get ANY reward for it.

In the case of people who are trying to benefit from content they create, the content strategies include -

1. Advertising Supported – This does not really work. Especially not if you’re actually producing quality content. Think about it -
   

   Even huge companies that have millions of people producing content for them for free i.e. YouTube and FaceBook are having problems hitting profitability.
   It might be worth re-considering pinning your hopes on advertising.

2. Paid – Close to Ideal.  
3. Niche – This is where you cater to a particular niche. This is one of the smartest content strategies – even more so than paid. Will discuss this later.
4. Expertise – You become one of the authorities in a field.
5. Freemium – A Free Version and a ‘Premium’ Paid version. This is actually what most newspapers are migrating towards.  
6. Content as the Loss Leader – This is the case where you’re giving away content to sell something else i.e. consulting, products, etc.  

Do note that search engines and aggregators take a certain portion of your content’s value (Jakob Nielsen thinks its 98%, me 25%). For newspapers and free content and content that does not cater to traffic of good intent it probably is higher than 50%.

Because good, new content is difficult to discover, search engines and aggregators have a ton of power. Its in their interest to promote the concept that content is not really that valuable.

You’ll see similar trends in facebook apps and iphone apps where the platform and the discovery element are treated as more important than the actual content.

Niche Content

This deserves an entire post. However, will note down a few important points -

1. Niche content is extremely valuable.
2. You become the gate-keeper for the niche.
3. The more niche you go, the less strong competition you have.
4. The more niche you go, the more valuable the customers.
5. Niches are most useful when they are emerging niches.
6. People are usually starving for niche content.

 The Types of Content that Work

1. Breaking a story as it’ll get you a ton of links. Covering a news story 2nd, in comparison, has extremely low value.
2. Niche Content – content that caters to a niche has a ton of value.
3. Expertise Content – Like niche, expertise content is very highly valued. It’s worth nothing that the difference between #1 and #2 is usually a factor of 10. So if you go for the ‘expertise’ strategy make sure you’re the clear #1.
4. Intelligence and Content that helps people make decisions. 
5. High quality content – articles that are well thought out, well researched.
6. Contentious Content - Anything that gets people riled up. It’s a risky strategy – however, when it works it gets a ton of attention.

There are a lot more types of content that work decently. However, the top 5 listed above are some of the very best. 

Closing Thoughts on Content

As things currently stand, Content is Still King.  

1. We are over-run by content. Yet, there is very little high quality content, even less expertise content, and even less niche expertise content.  
2. Content consumers and Content middle-men are constantly pushing to devalue content. However, they are completely dependent on content.
3. Even search engines like Google are rushing to acquire content sources like YouTube and out of print books.

The Internet is full of the siren songs of ‘altruistic donations of content’ and ‘giving away content for something you might get tomorrow’.

Don’t listen.

You can be sure that any content you create and share online, provided it’s good quality content, is making money for someone.

Why should it be anyone other than you making the money?

Posted in publishing, thoughts