Amazon is offering self-published authors the option of entering their books in the Kindle Select Program. So here’s my question for readers, would you pay $79/yr for an Amazon Prime Membership which offers the following benefits:
1. Free 2 day shipping.
2. Instant streaming of over 10,000 videos
3. Borrow 1 (one) book a month for free from Lending Library. Currently the majority of these books are self-published and none of the Big6 publishing companies participate in this program.
Now, this latest move on Amazon’s part is to get more books in their Lending Library in hopes of trying to make the Prime Membership more appealing to readers. As a reader, would you be tempted to get a Prime Membership knowing there will be thousands and thousands of more books to choose from?
Comment and enter to winter a copy of TOO WICKED TO WED!
I’m feeling so fed up with Amazon right now, it’s hard for me to even consider the question rationally. My husband and I were thinking about getting Prime for the streaming but Amazon’s practices just get uglier and uglier.
So far, Prime is not so attractive to me. I don’t care to watch movies or videos on my laptop or tablet so that’s out and I already have way too many ebooks in my Kindle that I haven’t read yet. Plus, my local library is excellent for borrowing ebooks as well. As for the free 2 day shipping, I don’t buy enough from Amazon to worry about that.
No. I love Amazon (and my Kindle), but I don’t have any plans for a prime membership. I would rather buy than borrow books, and I’m too lazy to stream movies. It’s so much easier to play a DVD or watch regular television.
No, Not the way it is currently set up. I would if more books were available.
As a self-published author with three books listed on Amazon, I can see no advantage to joining Amazon Prime. The more experience I have with Amazon, the more convinced I am that any correlation between their self-interest and mine (or any other author’s) is purely coincidental. To consider one unfortunate example, the additional fees and shipping charges that Amazon applies to self-published paperback books represents a markup of between 45% and 70% in the cost to the customer, compared to my other retail outlets. No amount of free shipping and loaner books can make up for the damage that does.
I don’t think I would pay for the “Prime” membership. There are just too many great authors and sources of books–Amazon is not the only game in town. In fact, I returned my Kindle Fire because I just have to have 3G–guess I’ll get something else instead.
Thanks for asking!
Laura T
heartoftexasbooks[at]yahoo[dot]com
No!
I don’t think I would buy a prime membership. I buy from a lot of different sources.
No plans for this kind of membership
I availed of the free trial a while back —
It’s a great service but not that essential. I would not pay $79 a year for it.
(Is the Kindle Select Program free? If so, it wouldn’t hurt to enter your books there. ^_^)
The problem with the Kindle Select Program is that in order to enter it, you have to pull your book down from all other sites. It’s exclusive to Amazon. I’m not willing to do that. I’d like my books to be available at as many etailers as possible. Limiting myself to Amazon will not, IMO, help me.
Ouch — I wonder if other authors are joining the program. Asking authors to pull down their books from other sellers is a bit too steep a price to pay.
Agree — I think (based on the figures you presented in your previous post), being available on a variety of e-sellers has helped you reach a wider set of readers. Limiting yourself to Amazon will most definitely be a step back.
I don’t have a Kindle, but even if I did, I wouldn’t pay $79 a year for an Amazon Prime Membership. I buy my books from several different sources, and for what Amazon is offering, $79 is way too much. When I want a book lent to me, I go to the library.
I’m still trying to figure this out myself. I’m doing to trial now, maybe I need to look at the loaner books available.
no way would I pay for prime to read 1 book a month….
No, I’m not interested in Amazon Prime – don’t see enough value for the price.
doesn’t interest me. I don’t stream videos much & 12 books a year isn’t many. the cost would tie me to amazon more than I would like in order to recoup the cost & not sure I really would within the year even then.
I have a Kindle but wouldn’t pay that Prime membership fee, too high for what’s offered and nothing really for me to take advantage of or that I would want. Even though I have read quite a few self-pubbed authors whose books I liked and would continue to pick up more if interested, I’m not going to pay and especially that much to try out new unheard of authors, I’ll try them out one by one as I do now.
I won’t want to pay $75/month just to read 1 book when I have lots of authors releasing new books a month. It’s cool to promote self published authors but I don’t think this is a great way to do it.
I am a NOOK person and I will not pay for a prime member ship
I have a Prime Membership, but more for the two day shipping. I haven’t even made use of the book loan thing.
I’m considering signing up to the prime membership, the books make it sound better.
I am in the would rather buy than borrow category, so I don’t think this would be for me. If I am going to borrow a book my library is good for that, they even will buy many titles that I suggest.
I’m with Lexi. I would much rather buy than borrow. I think author’s should be paid for their work because I know just how much blood, sweat and tears goes into writing a book !
No, I don’t stream videos, even though I do like the free 2 day shipping!
i love amazon prime. i order from them enough that the prime is worth it alone. another good thing is if i don’t need something to be shipped in 2 days they offer a mp3 credit to ship standard. and as for instant stream, it works out to be cheaper than netflix. the book loaning would just be an extra perk.
I probably wouldn’t get a membership. For one, I don’t have a device to use. In addition, I have found that memberships of this type usually don’t work for me. The features are good ones for someone who does business frequently with Amazon. If you watched lots of videos, I guess it would be a plus. It would be a good way to check out self-published authors that are new to you without buying a book you may not like.
Kindle Select is an interesting concept, but not worth having to withdrawl your book from other etailers. As with paper books I like to be able to shop around for the best value and Amazon isn’t always it. I do like the free two day shipping and a lot of folks have prime just for that, but I don’t make purchases frequently enough to warrant the expense. I couldn’t even justify spending $39 to convert my free student prime to a regular prime membership.
I have prime and the free shipping is worth it by itself for my family so the kindle loaner books and streaming is a great bonus! Would love to see more books on loan, however. I think it is a great way to try out an author and new series’. Plus, the author is paid a percentage and is that not even better than making a novel/novella free to do the same thing?
$20 for my Barnes & Noble Membership is about my limit for a similar kind of thing. No, no, no to Amazon.
No, its a bit pricey if you aren’t into the streaming videos. I can borrow books from my local library at no cost – now if they were to offer unlimited borrowing of books for that price…but only 1 a month?
My honest answer is NO.
The money wouldn’t be worth trying to find my books or such. I don’t see any author willing to remove their books from other stores, just to be published or sold only through Amazon.
Your graphs the other day, showed us how your books corresponded with each other nicely. Just imagine how the other graphs from shops all around the world have ranged. To loose so much liberties would be ludicrous for any author to consider.
Beverley, stick with your gut feeling, hoping your decision is to say NO. I, as a big fan of yours, and a true customer of B&N & iBook, would truly hate to see any author waste away in Amazon, lonely and desolated .
😀 Whoopsie… did it again… didn’t review my comment. LOL 🙂
“To (loose) (so much) liberties” should’ve been “To lose such liberties…” My literature teacher would be horrified by my mistakes.. lol
No worries Mikki, you should see some of my post! LOL!
Sometimes, nothing connects and before I can stop myself I press the ‘post comment’ key……….geez! 🙂
Have a nice day!
No, I have no interest in Amaon want to watch a movie on my computer or “tablet.” Thank you Bev for making your books available to all ereaders and not just the kindle.
I don’t buy enough Amazon products to warrant paying the $79 fee for 2 day shipping. I like to be able to buy my books from more than one supplier. It doesn’t sound like a good investment for indie book sellers. I would check out Smashwords etc.
I’ve had trouble with Amazon where I won a free book only I didn’t get the link and even with the person I won it from supposedly sending them the info to get it to me I still do not have the book.
I am prime member and I do it for the shipping , I do a lot of my shopping online. While it is nice to be able to borrow a book. I personally would rather buy then borrow any books but I am sure for a lot of people offering more books in the lending library will sweeten the deal.
I have only had my Kindle for a few months and I do like reading on it.
It does feel weird to me sometimes, like, I can’t stop myself from trying to turn a page. LOL!
That’s all I do on mine, just read, even though it does loads of other things.
I haven’t really played around on it yet.
I’m slow, very slow, getting into the ‘modern’ things, it took me forever to get and actually use texting on my cell phone.
I love my paperbacks, I just need to ‘feel’ a book and ‘smell’ the pages, books are my joy.
I still buy books any chance I get, they’ll always be #1 on my list of must haves.
I have heard about this new thing and it just doesn’t sound good to me at all.
I, for one, will NOT be joining Amazon Prime .
I feel it’s not right to be so ‘greedy’, what’s wrong with sharing??
🙂 Thanks for the nice reply comment! I sincerely hope you have a nice day as well.
I have Prime and love it. We replaced our Netflix membership with Amazon Prime to stream movies and TV shows via tablet, laptop and TV. The free shipping is also nice. But oddly enough, I’ve never used the lending library thing.
As others have said, I use my local public library to borrow ebooks and I want to keep supporting libraries since they are funded by our tax dollars and provide services to everyone–FREE. That’s a claim no business can make. I know this is a side rant, but I worry that books and reading may get priced out of reach for low-income families or families with no Internet access.
Now that my library offers Kindle books for loan I wouldn’t sign up for prime because of their lending offer. Most orders from Amazon arrive quickly and I don’t use them to stream media so honestly the $79 is better spent elsewhere for me.
Nope. I don’t think this benefits me at all as I am primarily an ebook reader so I woudn’t even benefit from free shipping at all. And if the only benefit for lending books is one per month, I don’t see any draw here.
I think 79 dollars a year is a little steep for what your get. The only way it would be worth it is you ordered a whole lot of stuff from Amazon. Mostly what I order from Amazon is ebooks and they are free shipping. My son had free shipping for a year and didn’t use it but maybe ten times and part of that was books I ordered. So no as of now I wouldn’t pat the 79 dollors for it.
In the future I would consider the Amazon Prime member ship. I do purchase often from Amazon so the free 2 day shipping would be nice. If the lending library had more to choose from then it would make the service seem more appealing.
Don’t enter me in the contest, please; I already have Cara’s newest. Re Amazon Prime, no it is not attractive for me. I am finding a ton of Kindle books to borrow from my public library and I love it.
No; I wouldn’t pay to join Amazon Prime. I don’t order enough from Amazon to justify that kind of outlay.
Being a print reader this really isn’t for me.
No, I wouldn’t get it.
I think 79 is way too much. If it was around 50 a year then I would have been more willing to pay
I don’t know if it is worth it. It seems you don’t get much for the fee.
I have considered the Amazon Prime program primarily for the movies and TV programs that might be available at free renta. But after looking over the actual selection, decided it wasn’t worth it. Anything they had that I wanted, I could already get from Netflix. When I buy print books, I usually spend more than $25 anyway and I get free shipping. I don’t have an e-reader yet so the rental books is not an issue. The Prime program pros don’t outway the cons IMO. I buy a lot of books & music plus a lot of other things from Amazon and in spite of how much I spend there annually, the cost of a prime membership would not save me money, and I don’t mind waiting a few extra days for my order to arrive.
That said, the way Amazon is treating the libraries with the on-line rental of ebooks, they (Amazon) should be drummed out of the ebook rental business. I wonder if they have heard of the government Anti-Trust laws? I think some enterprising law firm should take a closer look at Amazon’s practices in some of these fields.
I don’t have a prime membership, though I have often wished that I did so that I could get free shipping instead of waiting to buy the books I want to total at least $25 to get the free shipping (which is slow, but it’s free so I can’t complain too much).
For me it would have to be unlimited lending for me to consider the Prime membership, in addition to the free shipping. Only 1 book per month, for an avid reader is not much. A book would more likely be brought to my attention if it were offered for free in general for a short time, then be in a lending library that only allowed me one book per month. There are already hundreds upon hundreds of free books offered…more than one person could read.
The streaming videos is a non-issue for me since I don’t watch many. For me the benefits have to outweigh the cost, and right now I can’t see myself saving that much to justify the cost of the Prime membership…even if the big 6 added their books to the list of available titles since I can just to go my local library and am not limited to one per month. Convenient…not so much, but it gives me more money to spend on other titles I can’t get at the library.
I really like Prime membership for the 2-day shipping. As long as the price stays the same (or better!) anything more is a wonderful addition.
Belatedly, I just wanted to comment on whether or not Amazon Prime would be worth it. I have considered (and still am seriously considering) subscribing to Amazon Prime, but not for the two day shipping… As a replacement for a Netflix-like service. Amazon is cheaper per month than Netflix and has a really great variety of streaming video when you subscribe to Amazon Prime. The free two-day shipping is just a bonus! I shop on Amazon all the time, so it’s a pretty awesome bonus, but a bonus nonetheless.
So yes, I would and probably will become a Prime member.