#Kindle matchbook icon full
#Kindle matchbook icon free

The only conclusion IвЂ™ve been able to reach is that this is an extension of AmazonвЂ™s attempt at playing the worldвЂ™s longest-lasting game of chicken: they are willing to make a loss (and their shareholders are willing to indulge this strategy) for as long as it takes for them to outlast all of their competition вЂ“ and then, perhaps, theyвЂ™ll try and make some money.

#Kindle matchbook icon full

So what will this do to eBook downloads for Amazon? IвЂ™m sure that lots of people will happily bundle the two formats and pay for the print and e-editions simultaneously, but who will want to continue paying the full price for eBooks as standalone products (which they have, at long last, managed to establish themselves as being) if theyвЂ™re available for little or nothing when you buy the print edition? And what will MatchBook do to the general assumption about what eBooks вЂњoughtвЂќ to cost? What will that shift in buyer behaviour do to AmazonвЂ™s bottom line, I wonder? Even if the norm is for a $2.99 pricetag, rather than a straight giveaway, the inescapable conclusion is that the e-format is nothing more than an adjunct to print. Yet MatchBook seems to fundamentally devalue that core product: it treats eBooks as commodities with no inherent worth as products that can be given away for nothing as promotional tools. Conventional wisdom is that Amazon have been pinning their hopes on eBooks as the key area which might one day make them a profit (theyвЂ™re certainly not making any money on sales of Kindle devices, which operate on absolutely wafer-thin margins). On the surface, I can see how it sort of makes sense: Amazon tie more people into the Kindle platform, potentially upsell a lot of people who were intending on only making one purchase into spending a couple of extra dollars, and increase eBook downloads at a stroke.Д«ut itвЂ™s not really that straightforward. But as a publisher, and someone interested in how Amazon run as a business, itвЂ™s hard to see what the rationale was for this programme.

#Kindle matchbook icon free

The move is being compared to another campaign launched last month by Amazon, AutoRip, which offers free MP3 versions of previous CD purchases вЂ“ but reallly itвЂ™s a much bolder step than that: for one thing, CDs are already easily digitisable, whereas thereвЂ™s no straightforward way (you could scan every page, I suppose, but thatвЂ™s about it) of getting a print book onto an e-reader.ДЄs a consumer, MatchBook looks great to me вЂ“ there are all sorts of reasons why having eBook editions of my print library is an appealing idea.

Yesterday Amazon announced Kindle Matchbook вЂ“ a new programme (initially only in the US) that will offer customers Kindle editions of previous print book purchases for either $2.99, $1.99, $0.99, or free.