From the author: My next book is The Internet Con: How to Seize the Means of Computation: it’s a Big Tech disassembly manual that explains how to disenshittify the web and bring back the old good internet. The hardcover comes from Verso on Sept 5, but the audiobook comes from me – because Amazon refuses to sell my audio.
Should note that it’s not Amazon that doesn’t want to carry the book, it’s the author hot having them carry it. The headline makes it sound way more antagonistic than the reality is, it’s just one author choosing not to publish on Amazon. As they are free to do.
Amazon choosing not to sell it without DRM is Amazon refusing to sell. They are free to do so, but they are the one refusing and not the author.
That’s like saying someone wants to publish an app on the iOS app store but the 30% cut and forced DRM prevents them. It’s just a choice.
Given that Amazon does digital distribution of some items you could probably list it on the site and just have them give “digital access” to the ebook files. I’ve never gone through the process but i’d be quite surprised if this wasn’t possible, though it may not show up in the books section of amazon this way.
Choosing not to sell through Amazon because of the 30% cut is a completely different thing than Amazon requiring that the product be changed to add DRM.
Tangental but somewhat related, one of the most popular modern fantasy authors (Brandon Sanderson) recently did something similar where he released/is releasing 4 books this year funded via Kickstarter due to not wanting to work with Amazon.
It actually currently holds the record for highest funded Kickstarter project ever. Granted, it helps if you are an established and popular author already, but id be curious to see if this trend expands.
I hate that its Kickstarter though.
Yeah, he sells it really well. “Stick it to the man, down with Amazon”. Sorry, but you’re one of the biggest authors around, you do not need some common schmuck barely making it through their monthly fees to carry your business risk. You can have ~any publisher you want in the world, and trivially have them release that book not on Amazon if you wanted to.
And that’s sadly the same in board gaming Kickstarters. Sure, the tiny mom&pop games that could never happen outside of Kickstarter exist. But the vast majority is big names and publishers using it to offload their business risk onto the consumer so they can have 0% risk 100% reward.
If the “I just want to get back at Amazon”-statement had truth behind it, the book would be sold independently. But not kickstartered. Shoulder the business cost in creating the product, then make the profit selling it.
If you actually read the post, you’ll see that there’s no “business risk”—the entire audiobook is already recorded. He’s just using Kickstarter as a platform to sell pre-orders.
I hope the trend grows. Amazon needs to be abolished, divided, whatever it takes to destroy their monopoly.
Thank you a lot for sharing! Since he’s the guy who coined Enshittification, I‘m curious to read what his solutions would be in more detail.
I just want to gag reading the synopsis. You people are delusional. Yeah platforms are successful because of a lack of interoperability 👌👍🤣
Obvious troll is obvious.
Yes, that is how monopolies function, Señor EatMyDick.
OMG “Señor” just cracked me up! Thanks for the chuckle. :)
Maybe Amazon doesn’t carry it because Cory Doctorow is a shitty writer? A mountain and a dishwasher? Why do people read his trash.
I’ll gladly check out any books you’ve written. If you think you can do so much better than Doctorow, it must be really good stuff!
Oh, I can’t criticize unless I’m an author is it? I can suppose you’ll hold yourself to the same standards for praise then?
'Cause if you can’t know bad without also writing, how can you know good? Otherwise that would be an illogical double standard.
True! But who gives a shit. Nobody here asked for your opinion about his writing. This thread isn’t even about whether it’s good. You just seem mad.
Amazon carries poorly written smut, they are not big on quality control. And you really need to look up the definition of trash, if you think what he writes is trash.
Tell me you don’t know who Cory Doctorow is without telling me you don’t know who Cory Doctorow is.
