Amazon Will Soon Start Paying Authors Based On E-Book Pages Read

What if we lived in a world where authors earned royalties not based on how many books they sell, but on how many pages we read? The idea, which would have been preposterous 10 years ago, is not only possible with modern technology, it's something Amazon will be test driving this summer.

Beginning on July 1st, authors who self-publish through Amazon Kindle's Direct Publishing Program will become part of a new publishing experiment. Currently, Amazon divvies up a pot of money to its native authors each month, based on the number of times their e-Books are "borrowed" through two separate Kindle services: Kindle Unlimited, a standalone, $9.99 / month subscription service, and the Kindle Lending Library, an Amazon Prime membership perk. In the new scheme, authors will be paid for each page that remains on the screen long enough to be parsed, the first time a customer reads the book.

What this system will essentially do is reward authors who write cliffhangers and page-turners; books that can keep the reader hooked. As The Atlantic explains, the payment scheme will also help neutralize the sentiment among authors of longer books that they're being shortchanged:

Amazon's letter to writers who publish through its Kindle Select program explained that the formula was changing because of a concern "that paying the same for all books regardless of length may not provide a strong enough alignment between the interests of authors and readers." Amazon is being clever: While the authors of big, long, and important books felt that they were shortchanged by a pay-by-the-borrow formula, they probably didn't expect that Amazon would take their proposal a step further. Instead of paying the most ambitious, long-winded authors for each page written, Amazon will pay them for each page read. 

Book length is still going to matter under the new system, but in a slightly more nuanced way. On the one hand, authors will have more incentive than ever to keep their work from growing tediously (an unreadably) long. But on the other, the author of an action-packed, 100 page novella might stand to earn more if he can stretch his book out without letting the pace suffer.

One way or another, it seems, some authors are about to bid farewell to the old publishing saying "It doesn't matter how many people read your book, only how many buy it."

[The Atlantic]

Amazon's voice-guided speaker juggles your IFTTT tasks

You can tell Amazon's Echo speaker to directly control certain apps and services, but what if you want it to send information to other apps that you use more often? That's where IFTTT's new Alexa channel might save the day. Give the Echo a command and IFTTT will relay certain tasks to key apps. You can deliver your to-do list to Gmail when you ask the speaker about your itinerary, for example, or add your grocery items to Evernote without touching your phone. Frankly, this makes the Echo a lot more useful in daily life -- you no longer have to change some of your app habits to make the most out of Amazon's audio cylinder.

Original source here

Amazon to invest in the UK's least popular delivery service

With Prime subscriptions on the rise, Amazon is constantly exploring ways to cut the cost of regular home deliveries. One option the retail giant is considering is to invest in the companies that deliver its parcels, with UK courier firm Yodel currently the object of its desire. The Guardian reports that the two companies have agreed a deal that could see Amazon acquire 4.2 percent of the UK's least popular parcel delivery service for £8.7 million. While Yodel is now the second biggest service of its kind behind recently-privatized Royal Mail, customers haven't been so supportive, putting the company at the bottom of the delivery polls for the second year running. Amazon continues to use a variety of delivery firms across the world, but the company has recently begun using its own trucks to deliver parcels in the US. It's not clear whether Amazon could amass a bigger fleet on the other side of the Atlantic, but strategic investments such as this suggest it could be a possibility.

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Source: Guardian

Tags: amazon, courier, delivery, uk, uk-origin, yodel Next: Ducati's new bike jacket turns you into a human airbag .fyre .fyre-comment-divider

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Amazon smartphone still on the way; currently known inside Amazon as Project Aria

Last year, we heard a number of different rumors about an Amazon branded smartphone. According to one report, HTC would be going back to its early days as a contract ma

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Reported Amazon game controller appears in pictures

Amazon is probably making a game console, and today we've got a better idea of what that console's controller looks like thanks to Dave Zatz and the Brazilian FCC. The standards are all there: two offset, concave analog sticks; four buttons (A/B/X/Y) on the right front; a d-pad in the lower left; and triggers/shoulder buttons around back/up top. What's weird about this particular controller, however, are the other buttons. A slew of media controls sit at the bottom (play, fast-forward, rewind), and in the middle there are four buttons: Home, Back, Menu... wait a minute! These are Android buttons! Either Amazon's building a controller for Android or the console it's making is Android-based (we're guessing the latter). Head below for more!Amazon Game Controller

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Daily Roundup: new Amazon and Valve controllers, Samsung's ultrasonic phone case and more!

You might say the day is never really done in consumer technology news. Your workday, however, hopefully draws to a close at some point. This is the Daily Roundup on Engadget, a quick peek back at the top headlines for the past 24 hours -- all handpicked by the editors here at the site. Click on through the break, and enjoy.

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Image Recognition Startup Slyce Raises $10.75M To Be The Amazon Flow For Everyone Else

Toronto-based startup Slyce has raised a new round of $10.75 million in funding, led by Beacon Securities, and including PI Financial, Salman Partners, Harrington Global and more. The company builds image recognition tech, and wants to be the Amazon Flow for every other retailer on the planet, enabling point and shoot shopping with smartphone cameras.

If you’re not familiar with Amazon Flow, it’s the app from the retailer (now integrated into its main mobile app too) that lets shoppers point their mobile device camera at products and find the Amazon listing. That’s useful for comparison shopping, and for driving purchases to Amazon’s mobile platform. The Amazon tech has some limitations, however: it requires that a product be in its original packaging to work effectively, since it leans heavily on OCR, logo identification and other visual shorthand cues.

Slyce, according to Chief Digital Officer Mark Elfenbein, doesn’t have that limitation, and can identify products wherever they are, as well as outside of packaging. That’s a considerable advantage, and one that it’s hoping will help its customers drive more purchases to their retail operations since it’s useful for ID-ing products in more settings.

“We have to rely more on what are the unique attributes of the item, so that we have to rely more on the item itself versus a logo or text,” he said. “Which, if you think about it, is not really present 95 percent of the time in the real world.”

That’s true, but Amazon’s logic is likely that products will be in packaging when shoppers are out at stores, and their image recognition is based on the so-called ‘showrooming’ effect, whereby shoppers check out products at physical retail outlets and then go online to find better prices. For that use case, the in-package recognition is perfect. Slyce is targeting more than just retail, however, and wants to be a resource no matter where you are.

Besides partnering with major retailers, including proof-of-concept pilots with five of the top twenty retailers in the U.S., as measured by revenue and sales volume, Slyce is also exploring opportunities with using image recognition to tag items for mobile gift registries, and to receive coupons for products ID’d or for equivalents looking to better compete.

“We have combined machine technology with a pretty robust human crowdsourcing element,” Elfenbein explained. “So the machine does 85 to 90 percent of the work, if not 100 percent of the work, but in the cases where it can’t come down to a 1-to-1 match, we then rely on a human crowdsourcing element, which is like our own employee doing the finishing touch and making a 100 percent determination.”

Slyce has a decent amount of bank to rely on, but it plans to accrue even more: Elfenbein says it’s going out to raise another ‘significant’ round over the next two to three months that will be larger than this most recent round, to help it continue its pace of hiring and acquisitions (it recently picked up both some emerging computer vision tech from York University, and a desktop visual image search startup called Hovr.it).

This is bound to be a competitive space, and Slyce is clearly arming itself to help defend its early mover advantage. Key now will be how its tech works in live integrations, as it seeks to spread its presence through the addition of more platform partners.

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Amazon is reportedly working on a music-streaming service

Amazon does much more than dominate the online-shopping space. With its Prime instant video service, complete with original series and exclusives, the company has taken on Netflix -- and it looks like challenging Spotify and other music services is Amazon's next step. According to sources who spoke with Re/code, the company is currently in talks with music labels to offer a subscription-style service. The news is hardly surprising, but it's unclear when exactly an Amazon music-streaming platform would arrive.

According to one "label source," the company's demand for deeper discounts is holding up its talks with labels. When the back-room negotiations come to a conclusion, though, the cost of buying those music rights will likely be worth it, especially considering hints that the annual Prime subscription could increase by up to $40. In theory, at least, customers would be more likely to shell out that fee if they received more bundled features like free music streaming. However, Re/code makes a good point in noting that many Prime subscribers aren't even aware that they have access to instant video, so perhaps a streaming service would help Amazon highlight the privileges of Prime membership -- if the music service is bundled with Prime at all, that is.

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Source: Re/code

Tags: amazon, amazon music service, amazon music streaming, Amazon Prime, music streaming, rumor Next: Engadget HD Podcast 387 - 2.27.14 .fyre .fyre-comment-divider

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Samsung Lines Up Content Deals with Amazon, Comcast for 4K TV

993SharesShareTweetShareWhat's This?By Todd Wasserman2014-01-06 23:50:46 UTC

Samsung is addressing the chicken-and-egg problem of finding content for its 4K TVs — that is, customers won't spend a premium for a new UHD TV unless good content is available — by inking content deals with Amazon, Comcast and M-Go.

The three will begin offering 4K, also known as ultra-high definition streaming, for Samsung's UHD TVs. Comcast plans to let its Xfinity customers launch the app on their Samsung UHD TVs, which will stream 4K movies and TV shows. The cable company said it's also working with NBC Universal to provide more content.

See also: LG's 105-Inch Curved 4K TV Has an Astronomical Price Tag

Meanwhile, Amazon announced it is working with Samsung, as well as Warner Bros., Lionsgate, 20th Century Fox and Discovery to offer 4K programming this year. The ecommerce company also announced in December that it plans to shoot all of its new original series in 4K.

Finally, M-Go, a pay-as-you-go streaming service backed by Technicolor and DreamWorks Animation, announced its plans to have 4K programming ready for Samsung UHD TVs by this spring.

The trio of announcements come as content providers appear to be tripping over each other to roll out 4K programming. Netflix announced on Monday that the second season of its original series House of Cards would be shot in 4K. YouTube has also unveiled its plans to offer 4K programming this year.

That said, 4K, which boasts twice the horizontal and vertical resolution of the 1080p HDTV, isn't a brand new technology; the BBC broadcast the 2012 Olympics Games in 4K, for instance. But the combination of high-priced TVs and the lack of UHD programming has hindered 4K's widespread acceptance.

Have something to add to this story? Share it in the comments.

Image: Joe Klamar/Getty Images

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Holiday Survey Indicates Strong Performance In The Tablet Space By Amazon, Microsoft

This morning, online advertising network Chikita released a short report detailing the changes it saw in the tablet space after Christmas compared to the period directly before. The report shows a small decline in Apple’s tablet dominance, strong momentum for Amazon, and perhaps surprisingly, second highest in-class growth for Microsoft’s Surface line of devices.

What Chikita found is that Microsoft’s Surface tablets picked up 0.5% usage share in the United States and Canadian tablet markets during the post-Christmas period. Assuming that more consumer-friendly tablets are gifted in the holiday period than business-facing devices, we can assume that Microsoft moved more Surface 2 devices than Surface Pro 2 devices at Christmas.

This data therefore affirms the other market indications that the Surface 2 tablet hybrid is selling well.

Why are we looking so closely for data of this sort? The simple answer is that the Surface project remains so nascent, and yet so important for Microsoft’s future as an OEM and platform (that thing called Windows) that we need to track its pulse as closely as possible.

Microsoft will provide us with a single Surface figure when it reports its calendar fourth quarter earnings: revenue. But that blunt statistic will only get us so far. That Microsoft picked up 0.5% usage share in the period to land at 2.3% indicates that as a percentage of its total share, this holiday was big for it, even if its total share gain pales compared to Apple’s dominance.

Amazon picked up 0.6% usage share in the period, on what Chikita calls the Kindle Fire’s “remarkable run to the top of the Android tablet marketplace.” Amazon ended the period with 9.4% usage share.

Usage share of course is not directly commensurate with market share.

With the help of Amazon, Android continues to outpace Windows handily, but there was a minor change of the guards that is worth nothing:

Microsoft’s Surface lineup also continued its impressive year end run. Surface users generated more tablet traffic than all Google Nexus tablet users following the holiday, making Microsoft the fourth-largest source of continental tablet Web traffic should it maintain the lion’s share of this latest share growth.

Of course, Nexus devices are only one part of the Android tablet ecosystem.

Looking at the above broadly, innovation by partners is helping keep Android growing, while Windows claws market share from tablet leaders. That Apple is shedding minor share in the face of the twin challenge is not surprising.

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Rdio shutters Vdio movie streaming service, offers Amazon gift cards as compensation

Rdio was a bit late to the game when it announced its movie streaming service, Vdio, earlier this year. The spinoff site was available in beta form in the US, the UK and Canada, offering blockbuster flick rentals for $6 and movie purchases for up to 20 bucks. Rdio took Vdio offline today, however, citing an inability to differentiate its offering in a very crowded market. Customers who purchased movies and TV shows or have unwatched rentals will receive compensation in the form of Amazon gift cards, while promotional credit will expire. Click through for a surprisingly succinct FAQ.

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Via: TechCrunch

Source: Vdio

Tags: hdpostcross, movie, movies, rdio, streaming, vdio, video, videostreaming Next: Judge rejects ACLU challenge, says NSA telephone data collection is legal (update) .fyre .fyre-comment-divider

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Rdio Shuts Down Video-Streaming Site Vdio, Offers Amazon Credits As Reimbursement For Purchases

It’s only been six months since Rdio launched its video-streaming platform Vdio to the world, but it appears that the company has already decided to give up on that experiment. In an email sent to customers today, the streaming media startup announced that it has decided to discontinue the service.

While Vdio was only just introduced over the summer, it followed nearly two years of speculation that Rdio would compete against Netflix and Amazon with a streaming video product. When it finally launched, Vdio was less of a Netflix clone, and more of a competitor to traditional on-demand video rental services like iTunes or Google Play.

The shutdown of the service follows a layoff that affected 35 people at the company. At the time, Rdio didn’t comment on how the layoff would affect the video service.

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Amazon Bought GoPago’s Mobile Payment Tech And Product/Engineering Team, DoubleBeam Bought The POS Business

Last week, we wrote about how Amazon had quietly acquired mobile payments startup GoPago. Today, some more details about the deal: A source close to the situation confirms that Amazon bought the technology and the engineering/product team of GoPago, but none of the existing point of sale business and current merchant relationships. This part of GoPago is going to DoubleBeam — a sale confirmed by DoubleBeam late Friday.

DoubleBeam — founded and run by a team of seasoned payments executives from companies like PayPal, Green Dot, and Digital Insight (bought by Intuit for $1.3B) — provides white-label mobile payments technology for mobile apps and point-of-sale systems, including services like e-checks.

Amazon really wanted the GoPago technology, a source says, but not the existing business. That eventually led to this “non-traditional” arrangement that seems to include some aspects of GoPago’s point-of-sale technology, which will be integrated with DoubleBeam’s existing products.

“We are very excited about the synergies between Doublebeam’s leading mobile commerce solutions and the mobile point-of-sale systems that GoPago brings to the table” says Ted Tekippe, CEO of DoubleBeam, in a statement. “The complimentary capabilities of these technologies will bring a unique and holistic solution to the retail industry. It’s exactly what our customers have been asking us for.”

However, “The bulk of the story stays the same: Amazon is getting into the mobile payment space and has major plans for it,” says the source.

It seems that originally there was going to be an official announcement in January about some aspects of this deal — such as the fate of what would happen to the part of the business that wasn’t going to Amazon. But with the news leaking out this week, it looks they moved up the DoubleBeam announcement so that merchants and employees had more security about what would be coming next. (It may have also been to fend off more reputation-damaging stories like like this one and this one from coming out.)

It’s still not clear when and how Amazon will use GoPago’s technology, but as we mentioned when we first reported on the sale, there are already a lot of moving pieces that point to Amazon’s ambitions to offer a way to make payments for goods more seamless and mobile-friendly:

– Amazon already has some mobile payment systems in place, mainly for in-app payments on apps sold via Amazon’s app store, and APIs that let third parties sell Amazon products in their apps.

– Over a year ago, we reported that Amazon was working on a Square competitor, and Gopago, with its business firmly rooted in facilitating local commerce by way of mobile devices, could be part of that plan.

– Amazon has other e-commerce giants in sight. It recently launched “Log In and Pay with Amazon“, a digital wallet service that places it in competition with the likes of PayPal and credit card companies, with a one-click checkout option for online sellers that would let a customer pay instantly through his or her Amazon account. Mobile payments would help Amazon reach even more product parity with PayPal and eBay.

– Many believe Amazon will soon launch its own mobile phones — alleged models revealed to us here. If there is a Square competitor in the works, you can envision how Gopago technology might get integrated into those handsets and a Kindle Fire tablet souped up specifically for merchants to provide Amazon with a built-in payment loop between consumers and merchants — putting Amazon also in competition with Apple and its merchant-friendly iPad/iBeacon pitch.

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Amazon puts Kindle Fire HDX on interest-free payment plan, starting at $57

Short on cash? Amazon wants to sell you a Kindle Fire HDX anyway. As of today, you can pick up the shopping giant's flagship slate on a quarterly payment plan. Naturally, the amount of each installment varies based on the size and configuration you choose; a 7-inch model with WiFi, 16GB of storage and Special Offers, for example, runs $57 per payment. A similarly equipped 8.9-inch model on the other hand, costs $95 every three months. If you're worried about financing fees or interest, don't sweat it -- Bezos and pals aren't charging either of them. That doesn't mean Amazon is a completely forgiving money lender, though: miss a payment, and the shopping giant will block any access to its content library and possibly delete your account. Harsh, but at least it's better than a broken leg.

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Via: All Things Digital

Source: Amazon

Tags: amazon, e books, e-book, e-books, e-reader, KindleFire, KindleFireHdx Next: IRL: Trading in the Sonos Play:3 for Korus' V600 and V400 wireless speakers
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Amazon shooting 2014 original series lineup in 4K

Set top boxes everywhere just cried out in agony. Amazon announced this morning that its full lineup of 2014 series will be shot in 4K. The retailer-turned-TV-studio likely considers the move a bit of future-proofing, given the limited options for actually watching such shows in their intended resolution. The list of 8.3 million pixel programs features five new pilots, including Chris Carter's The After, Roman Coppola's Mozart in the Jungle and Jill Soloway's Transparent.

Update: We received clarification from Amazon -- seems the 4K shoots pertain to full series and not the already-completed pilots.

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Source: Amazon

Tags: 4k, amazon, amazon studios, hdpostcross, ultra high definition Next: 'Breaking Bad' spin-off 'Better Call Saul' will be a Netflix exclusive in Europe and Latin America .fyre .fyre-comment-divider

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Daily Roundup: New Nexus 5 hardware, Amazon Pantry, next-gen console sales and more!

You might say the day is never really done in consumer technology news. Your workday, however, hopefully draws to a close at some point. This is the Daily Roundup on Engadget, a quick peek back at the top headlines for the past 24 hours -- all handpicked by the editors here at the site. Click on through the break, and enjoy.

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Amazon tipped to launch online wholesale store called Pantry in 2014

While Amazon has no shortage of rivals, it's now reportedly gearing up to take on big players in the warehouse store business, like Costco. According to USA Today's anonymous sources, Amazon is prepping the launch of an online service called Pantry that'll initially carry around 2,000 common grocery items to be sold at low cost. As long as you're an Amazon Prime member, you'll be able to fill a box up with Pantry goods that the retailer will ship for a nominal fee, assuming you're within the weight limit. Amazon hasn't commented on the report, so while there's no firm word on when you can start shopping in your bathrobe for month-long supplies of canned goods, sources say it'll be sometime in 2014.

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Amazon Coins can now be gifted to other people for purchasing content in the Amazon Appstore

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It’s now possible for Amazon Appstore customers to gift Amazon Coins, the e-commerce giant’s virtual currency, to one another. This means, right on cue for the holiday season, users can send anyone in-store credit to spend on their preferred apps, games or digital content.

When users splash out on a set of Amazon Coins, they can now choose to send them to another Amazon Appstore user, who will be notified via email. Furthermore, Amazon is offering a 20 percent discount on Amazon Coins before January 5 to drum up some interest in the new feature.

Amazon Coins were launched in the US back in May. Similar to Microsoft Points for the Xbox 360

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Amazon wants customers to gift Amazon Coins for games, apps

(Credit:Amazon)

Amazon's app store customers can now buy Amazon Coins, the store's virtual currency, as gifts, the company announced Thursday.

When customers purchase a bundle of Amazon Coins as a gift, Amazon will notify the gift recipient through e-mail. The coins are normally priced at one cent per coin, but Amazon is adding a slight discount for bundles to encourage gifting. Bundles currently range from $4.80 for 500 coins to $90 for 10,000 coins. The promotion ends January 5.

It's a way for Amazon to use existing Appstore customers to attract new ones. The company recently decided to use a similar tactic with Amazon Prime memberships, which customers can also purchase as presents.

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Since coins work the same way as money, it might seem odd that people would buy coins in the first place. Amazon gave Kindle tablet owners 500 Coins for free earlier this year to encourage customers to check out its still growing App Store. Since then, customers have purchased "hundreds of millions" of Coins, according to an Amazon press release.

Amazon quoted one customer as saying, "My daughter and I both have the Kindle Fire HD and the coins are a great way for us to stay on a budget. At the beginning of the month we each buy our Coins for the month."

Customers can use the coins to buy apps as well as items within apps. Amazon also included top purchases in its announcement:

• The top 5 purchased apps and games with Coins are Minecraft - Pocket Edition, Wheel of Fortune, Plants vs. Zombies (Kindle Tablet Edition), Bejeweled 2, and Scribblenauts Remix

• The single most purchased app using Coins is Minecraft - Pocket Edition

• The single most purchased in-app item using Coins is "Get more lives" in Candy Crush Saga

• The first app purchased with Coins was a tie between Jewel Legends: Tree of Life and Cut the Rope: Time Travel HD

Clearly, gaming plays a huge role in Amazon's fledgling store. The company is using promotions like Amazon Coins in an effort to grow the store, which is considerably smaller than Apple's app store or Google Play. If people really are buying Coins, it's a show of commitment from users that Amazon hopes will encourage app developers.

Topics: E-commerce Tags: Amazon Appstore, Amazon, Amazon Coins

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