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4 Reasons To Think That The Kindle International Was Released Early

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Eoin Purcell

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UPDATE: A bonus #5: No content on the Amazon Kindle Global Blog!
Update: Making it #6: UK Kindle buyers (and by extension Irish Kindles readers) pay 40% more for ebooks

This is just a short list but here are some reasons I suspect this is a rush release by Amazon:

    1) It’s not shipping till 19th October! Did they need the news before Frankfurt and not have the device ready?
    2) No country specific sites, you need to order the device from Amazon.com
    3) The iphone/itunes app is not yet live in Ireland, I doubt it is live in the UK yet either (Twitpic)
    4) No word on the extension of the Digital Text Platform to other countries (that would extend the device to independents and authors outside of the US, currently you need a US Bank Account)

I’m sure there are more, but this feels like something of a rushed and to my mind fluffed launch, despite the massive space given on four site home-pages to the product!

More on Kindle International here too,
Eoin

4 responses to “4 Reasons To Think That The Kindle International Was Released Early”

  1. Nate the great Avatar
    Nate the great

    1, It’s only a 2 week delay. That’s not unusual.

    2, Not all countries where the Kindle is available have a country specific site. Also, a single site makes more sense if you expect geographic restrictions to be dropped.

    Reply
    1. eoinpurcell Avatar
      eoinpurcell

      Nate,

      Re #1 I agree except that this enables them to announce pre-Frankfurt
      Re #2 That’s an obvious issue that with some planning could easily have been resolved along the lines of itunes. by logging in, they know who I am, where my billing address is and can thus restrict my access by geography on my home site. The way they have done it implies a need for speed rather than good planned roll out.

      Reply
  2. Nathan Avatar
    Nathan

    Regarding #6, 20% of that is because all the countries in the European Union charge a ridiculous amount of tax called VAT. That has nothing to do with Amazon.

    A better # would be the fact that the release date of the Kindle International just happens to be 1 day before Barnes and Noble plans to unveil their new LCD E Ink hybrid ebook reader.

    Reply
    1. eoinpurcell Avatar
      eoinpurcell

      Nathan,

      On #6 I’d agree except that the rate varies per country and with a little bit of planning they could easily have made this country specific. Also they withhold a large sum for duty and customs fees on top of the $20 (see here for my example).

      On the other, I’m not sure they could have know aboutthe B&N launch but that’s a great reason if they did!
      Eoin

      Reply

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Hello,

I’m Eoin,

Co-founder and publisher @fullsetbooks 📚. Expect books and 🍰.

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