Friday, December 30, 2011

Borrowing drives buying

Amazon offers Kindle store ebooks through the Kindle Owners Lending Library (http://www.amazon.com/gp/feature.html/?docId=1000739811) . The hitch, if there is one, is that you agree to make your ebook exclusive to Kindle for 90 days. You also get a share of a royalty fund (I'm not at all clear on how that part works).


So I signed the LBBD up. I had only offered the book through the Kindle store, anyhow, and I thought it was reasonable to let people borrow the book.


And they have. And sales have almost doubled.


Hmmm.  Stands to reason that trying something -- like a book by an author you've never heard of (like me) -- provides a risk-free way to see if you like it. And some people will (and some people did) and then some of them will decide to buy one. 




Which is how public libraries support the publishing (and music, and move) industry. So hopefully this kind of thing  -- Library Ebook Lending Under Attack -- doesn't happen.

Thursday, December 15, 2011

Now available in paperback...

The Little Black Book of Design, my collection of design-related quotes, has been doing well in the Kindle store. Now you can get it on paper.

Ten bucks, and it does look pretty spiffy, and you can riffle through the pages to get a random thought when you need one.