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Amazon paying for pages read only
They made the official announcement last week. It's largely in response to the flood of "scamphlets" in Kindle Unlimited. At the moment, a 5-page scamphlet consisting of regurgitated information scraped off the web makes the same royalty as a 400-page novel in KU. That's certainly not an equitable system.The new system isn't perfect, but it's a step in the right direction. My books are no longer in Select, so it doesn't affect me, but I might consider bringing them back once the dust settles.
I don't like this; I think it is intrusive and unfair. It'll also discourage the novella, which is a great format that seems to be making a comeback because of e-readers.What I do think Amazon could do with e-books is post word counts on a book's page, not estimated pages - even with a hard copy, the number of pages doesn't really tell you how much material is there.
Mike wrote: "What I do think Amazon could do with e-books is post word counts on a book's page, not estimated pages - even with a hard copy, the number of pages doesn't really tell you how much material is there. ..."I do tend to think in terms of word count, partly because much of my freelance writing is compensated at per-word rates. However, from what I've seen, the average reader doesn't have a concept of word counts. Every time I've told a friend or family member I've written X number of words today, the response has been, inevitably, "How many pages is that?"
Thankfully, this won't effect me at all, since my books are AWESOME! :DSeriously, though, it is interesting to see how Amazon encourages authors to sign up with them as a publisher then stabs all of us in the back. (It would be interesting to see a whole flock of authors agreeing to walk away from Amazon period.)
True - if you're not in the "biz" like us, you don't think in those terms. But I think people would get used to it eventually and find it useful.Incidentally I'm struck by how few words there are to a page in printed novels nowadays. When I was young there were still a lot of postwar economy editions around, with 450 words squeezed onto a page!
In that sense, one of the better things about this plan was that all books would have a uniform word count per page. If my books were averaging the 250 market standard that everyone claims is there, the page count would be nearly twice what it is now.
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I know what I have to say is going to come across like Kent Brockman welcoming the insect overlords*, but listen.
Amazon provides us a way to publish our stuff for free. We don't have to go through gatekeepers, we don't have to be told, "it's not what we're looking for". If you want to write a story about an earthworm raising a baboon as its own and then they take a trip to Disneyland and drown in the Pirates of the Caribbean exhibit, you can.**
So, Amazon provides, Amazon sets the rules. Fair enough.
But, listen kids. We're writers. We are creative. We are innovative. We are
Trust me. I am the laziest, dumbest and dullest among you and I won't let this slow me down.
I have already had a brainstorming session (settling into my couch with my bathrobe and Vonnegut doll, hot coffee served in my Wayne's World mug) and here's what I am going to do:
Stories like Austism, Summerwind and Miss Rubella and the Werewolf Turmoil will get pulled from Select as they are my better sellers.
The Asphalt Carpet doesn't sell worth a damn, but I don't like giving it away. It will be pulled from Select after Hash's Bash on the 4th.
I may do some tweaking of the stuff that will still be in Select, just to make sure they are page turners. I don't want to change the stories themselves, of course, but I may look for some ways to change them just enough to make them more interesting early on.
I realize everyone has a different strategy and some of you do not have a catalog of pointless short stories like I, but you're all clever enough that you can beat this. You will find a way to keep money flowing into your pockets.
NOTES:
* The only overlord I bow to is Ann.
** If you do write such a book, let me know. I'll buy it.
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That's another thing. I have, probably, six or so novels begun. It might be time to actually finish one or two of them.
If you write about an earthworm and a baboon going to Disneyland, I'll buy it.
Sweet! I have a new story concept to sell! It's about an earthworm raising a baboon! And it has a lot of pictures, so that the pages turn faster.
As of right now, you get nothing if your book isn't read to the 10% mark. With the new system, you get paid, even nominally, if someone cracks the book, looks at the first page and calls it rubbish. With the new system in place, authors are all on equal footing and I'm sorry to say, but I knew things were going to change when I saw a rush of "serialized" stories flood the market last year. The only thing I personally find aggravating is the 'all star' program that just makes the rich richer. You don't expect a 40 page short story to cost the same as a 400 page epic, so why should they be considered equal in the KU program?
As for the bashing of Amazon for their invasiveness, I'm sorry, but that's the internet. Everything you say and do is being tracked for the sole purpose of selling you something. To think that Amazon has the monopoly on big brotherhood is a very narrow and incorrect mindset.
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I actually find that pretty amusing. Every time I research something for a story, I get ads for those things for about a week. After writing Dr. Frenzzee's Wondrous Contraption I was bombarded for days with ads for old army cots!
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That's an idea. But, me and little Vonnegut are too lazy to think that big.
Dwayne wrote: "I actually find that pretty amusing. Every time I research something for a story, I get ads for those things for about a week. After writing Dr. Frenzzee's Wondrous Contraption I was bombarded for days with ads for old army cots!"To this day, I regularly get an ad from both Google and Amazon for a banana saver based on a naughty comment I made over email while planning my wedding all those years ago. ;)
That I wasn't arrested for looking up automatic weapons, standard crossbow bolt sizes, and departments under the umbrella of Homeland Security is a darn miracle.
What I didn't like about the article... (Call this hypocritical given my recent statements, if you wish.)was that they suggested this was somehow because Indies are incapable of keeping the interest of their readers. Okay, some aren't. And some traditionally published authors aren't either. But there are plenty of qualified writers, both indie and traditional, that have no problem with this. I've seen a lot of negative. The other day I got an article in my inbox entitled: "Why People Hate Indie Authors." I think that was what it was called, anyhow. I deleted it immediately. I wish people in general would lay off. An author is an author, regardless of what the big five and their myriad of agents have to say about it.
A.E. wrote: "Anyone read this article:..."Yes, I got the email when they announced it. I know it's being spun different ways, but personally I support it 100%. I think if people read your book because it holds their interest, you should benefit from that. There was a lot gaming the system before, and this addresses it. After all, don't we aspire to have our books read? Not just 10% read, but finished? If reader only read 10% (or even 5% -- which paid nothing before), we still get paid, but we get paid more if the finish the book. So doesn't that compensate us for achieving what we set out to do?
I think this change will benefit indie authors; the serious ones most of all.
Well said Christina.From what I understood, it's only for the lending program. My guess is they are doing this to stop people from 'cheating' by having others borrow their book and read the minimum only so they get paid.
We already saw posts here on GR asking readers to do that so the authors would get their royalty. With people thinking like that, it's no brainer that a huge corporate like Amazon would do all in its power to countervail the cheat.
Besides, not to complain against short stories (because I like them once in a while), but you do understand that an author who gets out 20 shorts stories separately was getting paid a lot more than another author writing a 400 page story (or writing anthologies). People can borrow all 20 short stories and read them as fast if not faster than the one other book alone. That meant if the lucky author had all his or her books borrowed by one user, that author was making 20 times more money than the 400 page author. If you still think that was fair, then continue crying. Else, be happy you get any kind of money for borrows. Libraries don't pay authors.
Now, I do agree that it's a bit disturbing that Amazon can track what the readers do. And sadly, it may not deter cheaters from playing the system. They will just make their friends turn the pages without reading them. :/
Rob wrote: "I don't know what I hate more, the fact that Amazon spies on its users every page turn, or that this is likely to promote some already verbose authors to write even more verbosely."If you deal with Amazon, they have your credit card and address, etc. That is not spying. You gave them that info because they are a merchant you want to deal with. The terms are disclosed.
If you want to consider "spying" think of all the companies (Google, FB, Apple, etc) who "spy" on everything you do whether, you deal with them of not -- whether you touch their site or use their services or not. I am constantly cleaning their cookies off my system and I never visit their sites. If Amazon tracks what page I'm on, that's much less an invasion than what other companies (which I choose not to deal with, and never have) do.
Regarding that second point, I'm afraid you are assuming that if people write more verbosely, readers will read it. Reviews suggest this is not the case. If authors pad their books to get the word count up, readers will stop reading, and the author will not get paid, and readers will not pick up more of that authors books. The problem corrects itself.
Owen wrote: "If you deal with Amazon, they have your credit card and address, etc. That is not spying. You gave them that info because they are a merchant you want to deal with. The terms are disclosed..."Nope. Sorry but I have to disagree. You gave them that info because without it, even if you had claimed a gift card, you were not allowed to use it until you did. I don't own a credit card, so I had bought myself a 50$ gift card to buy the books I wanted to read without having to ask the hubby. Well, it might have been a good idea if they'd have let me. Without a valid credit card you can't use the gift card. So in other words, if I wouldn't have been able to find one, I'd have lost my 50$.
Sure iTunes does that too, but only to create your account. After that, you can redeem gift cards AND use them any time you want, whether your card info are still good or not. (But not with Amazon.)
As long as Amazon doesn't know where I buried the bodies, then F'em.
Iffix wrote: "Thankfully, this won't effect me at all, since my books are AWESOME! :DSeriously, though, it is interesting to see how Amazon encourages authors to sign up with them as a publisher then stabs all ..."
You probably gather this, but I must respectfully disagree that any backstabbing is going on here. Before people react so negatively, they should work some numbers. I did. A ROM estimate of the new KU payout comes out to ~1 cent/page read.
Now, that 200-pg book that an author has a hard time selling for 99-cents? And gets 33 cents when they do? If a KU member borrows that book and finishes it, that book just paid them $2.00. If they read half, it paid them $1.00 What about that 350 page book that sells, rarely for $2.99? That nets $2,09 per sale. But if it's read thru, it's worth $3.00 -- not $1.30. If it's read halfway, that's a $1.50, not a $1.30.
Yes, short fiction will be paid less. But a collection of short fiction will not be paid less. Novels tend to sell for higher prices than short fiction, and few people complain about that. The old system paid a premium for short fiction and cut the payment for longer fiction. If it's okay to change more on average for novels than novella when they are sold, why is it unfair to do the same thing under KU?
Lastly, isn't it nice that Amazon is paying us at all in this program? Amazon paid out $11 million last month on a program than grosses $10 per subscriber. That's 1.1 million subscribers just to break even. Does KU have 1.1 million subscribers? I don't know. I would not be at all surprised if it didn't -- it's not a year old yet.
But whether it does or not, I urge people to look at their work, run the numbers and make a reasoned decision on that. You may find this this "back stabbing" just raised your income significantly.
Yep, this seems to be a logical solution, and only hurts those that are pumping out shorts to generate cash. As an author of shorts, this should reduce the flood of cash grabs into the market, and make it a little easier for someone like me to gain traction.
Christina wrote: "Dwayne wrote: "I actually find that pretty amusing. Every time I research something for a story, I get ads for those things for about a week. After writing Dr. Frenzzee's Wondrous Contraption I was..."
You need a good ad blocker. I use ABP; it's free, and it works.
Ken wrote: "They made the official announcement last week. It's largely in response to the flood of "scamphlets" in Kindle Unlimited. At the moment, a 5-page scamphlet consisting of regurgitated information sc..."
I agree with Ken, primarily because of his name, which indicates extreme intelligence, but also because of fairness to those who do write longer books and should be paid accordingly. Currently I have only one book of short stories in KDP Select, and I doubt if that will change whatever Amazon does. And, since Amazon is providing the platform, they do have to right to set the rules.
You need a good ad blocker. I use ABP; it's free, and it works.
Ken wrote: "They made the official announcement last week. It's largely in response to the flood of "scamphlets" in Kindle Unlimited. At the moment, a 5-page scamphlet consisting of regurgitated information sc..."
I agree with Ken, primarily because of his name, which indicates extreme intelligence, but also because of fairness to those who do write longer books and should be paid accordingly. Currently I have only one book of short stories in KDP Select, and I doubt if that will change whatever Amazon does. And, since Amazon is providing the platform, they do have to right to set the rules.
G.G. wrote: "Owen wrote: "If you deal with Amazon, they have your credit card and address, etc. That is not spying. You gave them that info because they are a merchant you want to deal with. The terms are discl..."Odd. Back when I first got the kindle app, I gave Amazon a Discover gift card number and fake expiry date. The gift card had something like thirty cents left on it. I was able to use that for years to 'purchase' free books.
But again, it's not just Amazon and it's not just credit cards. Heck, Amazon has my bank account info which is way scarier than any credit card (cards come with a measure of protection against fraud that your bank account does not). But everywhere you go online is tracked and in recent years this has extended beyond the internet.
Got an iPhone or a newer Android? The mic is enabled. You don't even have to type to be targeted anymore. Heck, I keep my gps off because it's a huge battery drain, yet my phone can get a good estimate of where I am just by pinging the network and nearby wifi signals. Not gonna lie, there's probably a database out there somewhere full of the facial expressions people make while browsing the internet from their phone while on the toilet.
I'm not saying this out of paranoia and I'm not saying this to make any of you paranoid. This is just the direction the world has been headed in ever since the first person realized closed circuit television could be used to deter crime.
Owen wrote: "Iffix wrote: "Thankfully, this won't effect me at all, since my books are AWESOME! :DSeriously, though, it is interesting to see how Amazon encourages authors to sign up with them as a publisher t..."
Man, I gotta start reading the fine print. Yeah, that works for me. Cool.
Christina wrote: "G.G. wrote: "Owen wrote: "If you deal with Amazon, they have your credit card and address, etc. That is not spying. You gave them that info because they are a merchant you want to deal with. The te..."Wow! It's like 1984 all over again. :P
@ChristinaI believe you can still buy 'free' books any time after your CC has expired, but if you redeem a GC, it triggers the 'OH! She doesn't have a CC with us, we may lose money if she wants to buy something bigger than what's on the GC. We NEED a new CC to prevent that!'
And I am dead serious. When I complained about it that's exactly what the representative told me on the phone to explain the need for the new CC.
I don't know what to think about this. I have not published anything... Yet, but I am thinking about doing so. When I think on my experiences as a reader of Indie authors on amazon, I think that this could be a good way to separate the good authors from the bad ones. I have discovered GREAT indie authors so far and I have found some authors where I regretted to "buy" it, even when it was for 0€. I think this system could be good for the quality like they said in the article. Nevertheless an author is an author is an author, no matter if he/she writes good or bad and everyone has put heart blood and soul in his/her books (well, in my fairytale world it is like this) and this should be rewarded.
What I am trying to say is... I understand the thoughts of amazon and the thoughts of the opponents...
G.G. wrote: "@ChristinaI believe you can still buy 'free' books any time after your CC has expired, but if you redeem a GC, it triggers the 'OH! She doesn't have a CC with us, we may lose money if she wants to..."
Huh. Well, to be fair, I can see how having a card on file might reduce instances of gift card fraud, but to have a rep say it's because you might want to spend more money is silly, but not at all surprising.
I'm wondering, now. Apparently, they have a way to know what page a reader is on. What would it take for them to tell us where the reader stopped? How useful that would be. :D If all of the readers stopped on page ? we'd be able to know where the problem is.
Iffix wrote: "I'm wondering, now. Apparently, they have a way to know what page a reader is on. What would it take for them to tell us where the reader stopped? How useful that would be. :D If all of the readers..."My guess it would involve synching your kindle regularly. When I sync as I read, it updates my progress so that if I pick up the same book on another device they are at the same spot.
Iffix wrote: "I'm wondering, now. Apparently, they have a way to know what page a reader is on. What would it take for them to tell us where the reader stopped? How useful that would be. :D If all of the readers..."Amazon could give us SO much more info that would be useful. Author rank/sales rank is pretty useless. How about page hits, icon click conversions, wishlist additions?
Anthony wrote: "Iffix wrote: "I'm wondering, now. Apparently, they have a way to know what page a reader is on. What would it take for them to tell us where the reader stopped? How useful that would be. :D If all ..."Hmm... That might be worth suggesting. (I'm not entirely certain they would listen, but who knows?)
I don't have a hat in this race (pulled all my Kindle Select books), but this it the part that really bothers me:“Under the new payment method, you’ll be paid for each page individual customers read of your book, the first time they read it.”
Does "the first time they read it" mean the first time they look inside it after downloading? (Call that Scenario A.) Or does that mean you'll get royalties up until a reader has read 100% of the book. Subsequent reads will generate no additional royalty payments? (Call that Scenario B.)
It's a vague clause that would worry me.
Scenario A: I see a book that interests me. I download it and immediately open it up, read the first page and think "Hmm, I'm definitely going to read all this!" Author gets only 1 page of royalties. Six months later I read the rest of the book. The author gets 0 royalties because this isn't "the first time I read it."
Scenario B: Same as above except that the author gets the rest of the royalties six months later. Then, a year later I decide to read the story again: author gets no more.
I've not seen a definitive and official answer to this question. All I've seen in all articles about it is the vague statement above. I would not make assumptions either way if I was you.
Micah, it's not for the buying part but rather for the lending part, which means the first time you rent it. There are good chances that if you decided to rent it, you'll be reading it now and not six months later. In other words, the first time the book is uploaded to your device. If for some reasons your time expired and you didn't finish, the page you were at would be the last page read and that's what would count. At least, that's how I see it.
G.G. wrote: "Micah, it's not for the buying part but rather for the lending part, which means the first time you rent it. There are good chances that if you decided to rent it, you'll be reading it now and not ..."Amazon addressed this under the previous system. Anyone can borrow a book as often as they want, but the author would only be paid once and that would be after the first time the threshold was met. With the new system, each page is given its own consideration.
Say I read ten pages and give a book back. The author is paid for ten pages. A month later, I get the book again, read the first twenty pages this time. The author will be paid for pages 11-20. If I read the whole book twice, the author is not going to get twice the page count. Each page is counted once.
That being said, I can already see some issues in the beginning, but just like last year, when we were paid for all downloads regardless of what percentage was read, I predict that any speed bumps and hiccups are going to be in the author's favor.
Thanks for the clarification, Christina. :)
I'm going to add a bit on an expansion to my previous comment, which may have sounded a bit intemperate and might seemed to be stepping on toes, which was not my intent. The expansion is this: I've at least sampled the writing of every author who has posted here. I have also sampled the writing of hundreds of other authors, published by whatever means (many of the traditionally published). I am aware of the quality of work you all put out, and I am aware of how it compares to the general run. Now, my tastes are admittedly a bit odd, and I'm quite picky in many ways. And I now that most people here have not yet achieved the success I feel they deserve.
But I also believe that when people do find the work of the authors here, they read it. I expect the authors here will see high completion rates for the work they elect to leave in KU.
I also believe, based on my experience, that this is not the general case. In producing my estimate I assumed an average completion rate of 75% of a work. I wanted to be conservative, but my guess is this is high. Many works grabbed on KU will be read very little -- maybe 20% or a third, before they are set aside. I expect those are the majority. So my realistic guess is that the average number is around 50%.
Authors who write work that grabs their readers will benefit substantially under this scheme, and I think that describes the authors here. Because of this, those of you who write shorter fiction may not see the decrease in KU revenue that many seem to be assuming. Those who write novels may see a substantial increase (30% to 50%, depending on a variety assumptions.)
I could be way off base in my assessments, of course. The point is that no one knows yet. It is prudent to wait and see. The changes of KU have been put in place to benefit authors like those I know here. Some preliminary numbers suggest that they will. It won't help to run ahead of the facts.
G.G. wrote: "Nope. Sorry but I have to disagree..."G.G., I'm afraid, my wording was clumsy there. The point I was trying to make is that there is certain info you elect to release to deal with a vendor. The vendor may have terms with which you disagree and you can elect not to deal with them, or you can complain and try to get them to change their policies.
This different than someone clandestinely collecting your personal information without your knowledge or consent for the sole benefit of the collector. Google, FB, and other companies do this routinely, whether or not you have any dealing with those companies at all.
The KU program tracking pages read -- which they have always done so you can find your place in the book again -- is not a clandestine operation. I can understand people not liking this (for me, this is a reason to read paper books, which I prefer anyway), but it is not the same thing as "spying".
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But, then we come back to the question of who has the right to determine "good" and "bad" for everyone. "Good" and "bad" are subjective and just a matter of taste and opinion.
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Yep. There are a lot of books I don't care for, but some are quite popular, best sellers even. I wouldn't take them away from their fans just 'cause they're not my thing.
Dwayne wrote: "Cassie wrote: "I think that this could be a good way to separate the good authors from the bad ones. "But, then we come back to the question of who has the right to determine "good" and "bad" for..."
I took that a little differently. Not as a value judgement on the work, but sorting people who are trying to game the system from those who are not. I do think this is step towards that.
I do find it interesting (as I think was pointed out) that now I'll get some direct feedback on how our books are being read. Will people finish the whole thing or not? That will tell quite a bit what our readers think of our work.
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Yes, it would be nice to know if people finish the book or not and, if not, where did I lose them?
Owen wrote: "I took that a little differently. Not as a value judgement on the work, but sorting people who are trying to game the system from those who are not. I do think this is step towards that."
If that's what she meant, then I agree.
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I'm sure you're right, Rob. And people have the right to do this. I'll admit, I thought about taking some of my better sellers and expanding them, but I won't. Why? In the long run it isn't a good decision. The people that buy the book will likely leave reviews, complaining that it was too long and rambling or there were too many pointless sections with nothing happening. Readers will out the writers that "play the system" in this way. I wouldn't worry about it too much.
Rob wrote: "As for playing the system. There are quality decisions authors make that will be negatively affected by this. If you have a verbose draft of 20.000 words that you know needs trimming to about 16.000 words, will you do it? "I have to agree with Dwayne here. Yes, you are right people will always try a game a system -- no system is perfect. But think about how much effort it would take you to be expand a work needlessly? You can't just copy & paste random stuff - reviewers will slaughter you! So you have to write in a verbose style not that obvious. So think about the cost in time of that. Who would do that? And what would they gain? 25% increase in length? Which people may stop reading because it's boring?
Gaming the system that way is much harder, takes much more time, and has much lower payoff than what was the case before. And if an author is going to go to the trouble of writing verbosely -- why not just put all that effort into a new work? It doesn't matter now if you have ten 100-page works, or a hundred 10-page works. It only matters what readers read.
So rather than writing more to needlessly expand an existing work, it's better to create new work.
I'll just repeat myself here: scamming the system with a ten page pamphlet is easy. It is not work, and it never mattered if someone read or not. All they had to do was make sure that the 'start' point began after the 10% mark. No one, and I do mean NO ONE is going to glom on to a "scheme" that requires them to be both verbose and captivating because chances are, they are neither.
As for the paranoia that Amazon is implementing some sort of 24 hour life tracker, all I can say is that you need to take a step back and look at this logically. No, if your machine is off line, all that is being saved is the number of pages you read. Not when, not how fast. Like I said several times before, you don't have to be actively engaged with a website to be "spied" on.
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Opinions? (Me, myself, thinks it's outrageous and typical. As usual they're going after the indie publishers. Nice touch with the 'it has to be fair'-thing.)