Around the Kindlesphere: Kindle Stores in Germany (and Beyond) in 2011? Could an AmaHammaWhammaZon Partnership Help Bring Us a Color Touch Kindle in March 2011? Team Kindle Announces Newspaper and Magazine Advances That Could Shake Up Periodicals Around the Planet

By Steve Windwalker - November 9, 2010

*** Bringt Amazon Anfang 2011 deutsches E-Book-Angebot? Via TheBookseller.com, the German website Buchmarkt reports that Amazon has been in talks with publishers in preparation for a 2011 launch of an in-country Kindle Store for Germany. With such a launch, one would expect significant growth of German language catalog for the Kindle, which currently stands at just over 6,000 titles. Actually, following the launch of the US Kindle Store in November 2007, the globalization of that store in 2009 and the in-country UK Kindle Store in August 2010, we expect to see in-country Kindle Stores in several other countries in 2011. Our best guesses right now would include at least three of the following: Canada, Spain, Japan, Australia, France, Mexico, Brazil, South Korea, China, San Marino, Andorra, and Monaco. (Yes, I realize that firewall issues could be sticky in China, but that could cut two ways. Of course, Amazon might want to speak with the folks at Google before trying to romance Chinese officials with the notion that an in-country Chinese Kindle Store would allow a stronger firewall. And on another front, it strikes me that expanding the number of in-country Kindle Store in European Market nation could be a very smart legal and regulatory tactic in Amazon's ongoing tussle against the *DPAPFM.)

*** QWERTY with that Kindle? Not so much. I was reading Pat Conroy's wonderful (if overpriced, in the UK) new ebook My Reading Life yesterday and his vignette about trying to get his manuscripts typed in Paris got me thinking about one relatively arcane but potentially important impediment to true internationalization of the Kindle Revolution. We wrote at length last February about how the complexities involving alphabets, copyright geographies, and other kinds of balkanization must be negotiated by Team Kindle. But it goes beyond talk and software: that annoying little QWERTY hardware keyboard on your Kindle would be a deal-breaker in many countries. 

Our best guess is that one thing that will really speed Kindle internationalization will be the launch, which we expect in or around March 2011, of several new Kindle models, some with an Android platform, with touchscreen technology similar the color e-Ink technology to be introduced by Hanvon today on Tokyo for March shipment in China, according to a report by the New York Times' Eric Taub. Among other things, that technology would allow Team Kindle to leave the hardware keyboard behind and offer software-based touch keyboards suited perfectly to each in-country Kindle Store. 

Want to talk about a truly forward-looking partnership for Amazon? Can you imagine Hanvazon? Amavon? AmaHammaWhammaZon? Can't touch that, and it would be worth at least a dozen acquisitions of diaper, shoe, or 20th-century bookstore companies.

*** Amazon is Dramatically Expanding Kindle Periodical Reach with Apps, New Publisher Tool, and 70 Percent Royalties. Over at our sister blog Planet iPad, editor Tom Dulaney asked an important question recently: "Who will be the dominant force in sales for electronically delivered newspapers and magazines?" 

Well, for anyone who thought that Kindle Periodicals might become a Kindle sideshow with anything less than a full commitment from Team Kindle, I suggest a fresh look based on recent developments. In the past couple of weeks Amazon has rolled out three major initiatives that, taken together, could help it to change the face of periodicals delivery, and perhaps the periodical business itself, over the next few years:

1. The company quietly announced on its own website's Kindle forum that "we are making Kindle newspapers and magazines readable on our free Kindle apps, so you can always read Kindle periodicals even if you don't have your Kindle with you or don't yet own a Kindle. In the coming weeks, many newspapers and magazines will be available on our Kindle apps for iPad, iPhone and iPod touch, and then we'll be adding this functionality to Kindle for Android and our other apps down the road. Our vision is Buy Once, Read Everywhere, and we're excited to make this possible for Kindle periodicals in the same way that it works now for Kindle books. More details when we launch this in the coming weeks." (Ed. Note: We've been pushing hard for this even before this post on the day of my total hip replacement last April, and we're glad to see it. -S.W.)
2. Yesterday Team Kindle launched "the Beta release of the Kindle Publishing for Periodicals tool, which allows publishers to more easily add their newspaper or magazine to the Kindle Store." Like the May 2009 Beta release of the Kindle Publishing for Blogs tool, and for that matter the November 2007 release of the Kindle ebook Digital Text Platform, the new Beta for newspapers and magazines will open the doors to the blooming of thousands of content flowers. The number of blogs in the Kindle Store has grown from the mid 3-digit range to 10,324 in the past year and a half, and without getting bogged down in silly predictions I would be willing to wager my beer money that the number of Kindle periodicals will increase just a bit over the next few months from their current U.S. Kindle Store levels of 146 newspapers and 84 magazines and journals. So we will soon have a wide open door for new content in four of the major Kindle-compatible formats (ebooks, newspapers, magazines, and blogs, with the door about to crack open wider for "active content" or apps). And just

   

   Media Mogul Keith R. Murdoch

   as we've seen with the other formats, the direct publishing tool for newspapers and magazines will greatly strengthen Amazon's hand in negotiating with traditional newspaper and magazine publishers while making it possible for Kindle readers to select from an ever-widening range of periodical providers.
3. Finally, and just to make the point that Amazon is not the toughest negotiator in the world when it comes to securing content for the Kindle, the company also announced yesterday that it will soon begin paying a 70 percent royalty for newspapers and magazines, net of electronic delivery costs, through its Beta publishing tool. Here's the guts of the company's press release from yesterday:

Amazon Announces 70-Percent Revenue Share Terms Now Available for Kindle Magazine and Newspaper Publishers 

Starting today, publishers can use the new Kindle Publishing for Periodicals tool to more easily add content to the Kindle Periodicals Store
SEATTLE, Nov 08, 2010 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN) today announced that magazine and newspaper publishers will soon be eligible to earn a larger share of revenue from each title they sell in the Kindle Store (www.amazon.com/kindlestore). For each magazine or newspaper sold, publishers will be able to earn 70 percent of the retail price, net of delivery costs. These new 70-percent royalty terms will become available on December 1, 2010.
"We are constantly working at improving the Kindle magazine and newspaper experience for both customers and publishers," said Peter Larsen, Director of Kindle Periodicals. "Building on the recent introduction of Wi-Fi-enabled Kindles and the upcoming availability of newspapers and magazines on Kindle Apps, we're pleased to add an increased revenue share and a great new tool for making Kindle better and easier than ever for publishers."
For orders delivered to Kindles using Amazon's Whispernet service, delivery costs are shared between Amazon and the publishers (see www.amazon.com/kppinfo for more information).
To qualify for the 70-percent royalty terms, newspapers and magazines must satisfy several customer experience requirements, including:

• Customers can read the title on all Kindle devices and applications.
• Customers can read the title in all geographies for which the publisher has rights.

These new terms do not apply to blog publishers because existing terms are generally more advantageous for them.
Amazon also announced the Beta release of the Kindle Publishing for Periodicals tool, which allows publishers to more easily add their newspaper or magazine to the Kindle Store. Publishers can quickly create their account, add content and preview Kindle formatting prior to making their titles available for the fast-growing base of Kindle customers.
To learn more about the new royalty terms for publishers and Kindle Publishing for Periodicals, visit www.amazon.com/kppinfo.
Kindle is in stock and available for immediate shipment today at http://www.amazon.co.uk/kindle.

*DPAPFM is the technical acronym for the Dinosaur Publishers' Agency Price-Fixing Model.