Monday, June 15, 2009

Jeff Bezos on more formats on the Kindle

More file formats for the Kindle (NY Times)

At a conference sponsored by Wired magazine in New York Monday, June 15, on disruptive business models, Jeff Bezos said that the Kindle device team and the Kindle books team are separate businesses and the focus is to make the Kindle "the most remarkable purpose-built reading device in the world" and added that the the books going for $9.99 will be made "available on the iPhone, other mobile devices and other computing devices."

  And of most interest to many of us:
"In the future, Amazon.com’s Kindle e-book reader will display more book formats beyond its own."
The article goes on to say:
' He said the company did consider selling the Kindle with a lower upfront price, but requiring a monthly subscription or minimum number of books purchased.

“My opinion, and so far the market has responded to our approach, is very simple,” he said. “Instead of driving the cogitative complexity of a two-year commitment, tell people, ‘This is the actual cost of the device.’”

In the future, Mr. Bezos said, he is not opposed to offering a lower upfront price with some sort of commitment if customers want it. But he still doesn’t like that approach. “I personally like the cogitative simplicity of saying, ‘Buy the device and use it or don’t use it,’” and have both sides of the business stand alone. '
He drove home the interesting figures, from his previous announcement May 6, that for titles that are available in paper and Kindle formats, the Kindle accounts for 35% of those sales at Amazon.

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