Amazon’s stagnating software app
Letters of OpinionAmazon / Kindle30 Comments
This article was linked to over at MobileReads and it struck a real chord with me. There’s lots to digest in that article but the one topic that I found myself nodding along with was the stagnation of Amazon’s software. Amazon has several different apps that span everything from PC to an iPhone and each app has separate functionality. I suppose that Amazon would like us all to own some versions of the Kindle, either Fire or Paperwhite. But wishes, horses, etc. Amazon’s Kindle Fire is so unsuccessful that they are selling the bottom of the line model at $49.99. This article suggests that the Kindle Fire market loss is nearly 70% year over year.
I’d wager that the majority of people that are reading Amazon books are either on dedicated eink devices or mobile devices. I base this on the fact that 64% of adults own a smartphone versus 32% who own a dedicated device. Judith Curr, publisher of Simon & Schuster’s Atria, told The Wall Street Journal that more people are reading on their phones and that phones (and print) are the future of reading. “The number of people who read primarily on phones has risen to 14% in the first quarter of 2015 from 9% in 2012.” (Except if the book is YA. Video blogger Zella sold 20 print books for every ebook sale.)
Why is this important? Amazon controls the digital reading market and despite the tepid efforts of others in the marketplace, Amazon is likely to continue to dominate for the near future. The problem is that without any competition Amazon has zero incentive to improve in any significant way.
The PC and Mac OS desktop apps are sad, poor versions of the iOS and Android Apps. For instance, the desktop apps don’t allow you to utilize your whisper sync account. You can’t view the most recent books purchased, only the most recent books “viewed.”
But the apps themselves are weak as well. The organization tools are very rudimentary requiring you to manually create collections instead of creating collections based on categories or book tags. Both iBooks and Kindle launched a new font this year. Bookerly from Kindle and a new engine finally solved simple typography issues such as the “all-new layout engine that introduces better text justification, kerning, drop caps, image positioning, and more.” But you won’t see the new kerning on all the books because it requires Amazon to reprocess the digital books:
Just a quick note if you don’t see the improved layout engine when you update the app. Amazon needs to reprocess each book in their Kindle catalog to support the feature. They’re currently working through an extensive backlog, so if you don’t see any improvement, re-download your book, or try again later. Some of the books updated so far can be found here.
It took them over seven years to achieve this! Reading apps are so bad that Google actually bought Oyster for the reading app rather than for the content.
These apps don’t utilize the power of the devices. Third party reading apps offer significantly more customization options. Some allow you to increase or decrease the brightness by merely dragging your finger up and down the screen. You can’t use the side buttons (such as the volume) to turn the pages even though Android software would allow that feature for apps. Marvin for iOS has a shuffle feature which can help you discover hidden gems within your digital to be read collection. There’s no way to give your books a star rating in the Kindle app. You can rate a book on Amazon but that rating does not carry over to the actual device.
Some third party apps allow you to group books by word count so you can quickly identify which book is a longer epic novel to be read on the weekend versus a novella that you can gobble up before bed.
You can’t share an account with your family unless you all are using a Kindle device. Kindle has a Kindle Family Library to share books between family members. But this is only for people who all use and read on their Kindle devices. Sharing is also a feature that’s not fully integrated into apps but is available for the dedicated devices.
Because Apple takes 30% of every in app purchase, Amazon has decided not to sell books through it’s app. (Android is a different story) Instead, you can borrow KU books only. I feel like that limitation is one of the reasons why KU is popular. When you’re on your smartphone and want to read something you can easily go to the Kindle Book Browser and download any number of books. But buying them isn’t an option.
Android and iOS allows for split screens which would be great if you could have a book open on one side and the Kindle app open on the other. But no. The Kindle apps are compatible with the split screen. Neither can you write notes within a Kindle app, either on the Android or iOS even though both platforms allow for this function.
Amazon’s dominance in the industry makes it unlikely that they will innovate, creating a more robust app that pushes beyond what it currently does now. The app is rudimentary but Amazon doesn’t have an incentive to create a better one and that’s unfortunate.
I’m one of the dinosaurs that loves my Kindle :) I’m never going to read a book on my smart phone, because everything on it is so small I only use it for calls. I doubt my next phone will be a smart phone! I have an iPad, but it’s far too big to slip in my handbag, and I find it heavy to hold for any length of time, plus my eyes get very tired after looking at it if I use it too much. My Kindle (I have the Paperwhite) is just what I need: light, portable, doesn’t strain my eyes. I’m middle-aged and my reading prescription has deteriorated quite alarmingly in the last few years, but I have my eyes tested recently and have a very expensive pair of varifocals to prove it. Am I the only person that struggles with smart phones because of this? For me, even if the apps were better, I wouldn’t be using them. I’ll be using a Kindle for as long as Amazon keep selling them.
Unlike Shelagh, I’m floored that Kindle and similar devices sell at all anymore with the availability of apps on the phones that most of us already carry around…although I’m imminently looking forward to my first middle-aged reading prescription, so I might change my mind about that! The market for smart phones, reading devices, and other portable platforms like iPad seems to be converging on outsized smartphones which take care of some of the font-size issues. Maybe the quality of apps on those platforms will improve as the technology itself settles into some kind of intermediary between too small to read and too big to carry around.
I was wondering why the damn Kindle for PC refused to show the most recent titles the way the cloud dresser (read.kindle.com) does. I need to have them both up to find the books I want to download to my laptop.
The Kindle Android app has gotten so slow and bloated that I don’t even use it to find/buy new books on my phone.
The nook app was completely redone yet again this past week and although I’ll still never buy another nook book (because you can no longer download them to a computer) I was impressed that it now tries to group together titles from the same series. Sad that the Kindle app doesn’t.
I am like Shelagh, I have an old keyboard Kindle and received a Kindle Fire for my Birthday earlier this year. I love them both. I will buy new ones if needed for as long as they sell them. Reading on a phone just doesn’t appeal to me. It is convenient but then screen is smaller and I simply prefer the kindle.
However it is odd that Amazon is not trying harder to please such a large market. The fact that there are so many people on smartphones should be incentive enough.
I like reading on dedicated, larger-sized devices or on my Chromebook, rather than on a phone. Too small a screen.
I have a Nook Color, 5 Kindles (the first was back in, what?, 2010, keyboard version), and I once owned a Sony E-reader (2007). I love that the Amazon readers get better and better (Paperwhite, Voyage, HD Tablets). I hope they get better about organizing the reading material, but I’ll likely buy more Kindles if they keep making them sharper and longer battery life.
I knnow other hyperreaders who love their Kindles. I am not alone, so even if we’re a smaller market (because phones, tablets, etc can be used for reading), but we’re pretty fanatical.
I have a smart phone but I just use it as a phone and not much else. I always have one of my Kindles with me, in my purse, I may forget my phone but I never forget my Kindle when I leave the house! Pitiful software and all, my Kindle and the ability to get a book in a blink still rate as a miracle of 21st century life for me.
I use a kindle voyage for my Amazon purchases and anything I convert via Calibre. The Voyage wins bc no glare, backlighting is situational, I like a dedicated device, it’s very lightweight – and I have and heavily use Marvin on my phone and iPads. I have uninstalled the kindle apps – they’re slow and kludgy and infuriatingly rigid.
I suspect that in the long run, if the suck of the kindle app remains unremedied, Amazon will be pretty much driving folks away from their ecosystem.
I read almost exclusively on a Kindle Voyage, but there are times that I use TTS on Moon+ Reader on either a tablet or a cheap phone I use as an audio player.
Primary reason I wouldn’t consider my phone as my primary Kindle reader? Battery drainage.
I don’t read on my phone. I find it too small and I read too fast. With the limited amount of text on the screen, the almost constant swiping drives me nuts. That and my horrible inability to read anything unless I’m wearing my glasses or my 2.75 readers (with contacts) limits me to not even seeing the screen to make a call. I also don’t have a dedicated reader. I have a Samsung 2014 Note 10.1 which I use if I’m not reading on my laptop. I have an anti-glare screen protector on it which takes care of the reflection, I can turn the contrast up and down and I can use Calibre on it so I’m not limited to one eBook seller. I owned a Nook for a long time but had to root it in order to use the various reading apps and that got old. In the long run though, I’m still buying way more print than eBook…
I read pretty exclusively on my smart phone and I’m not surprised others do too. I didn’t expect to like reading on my phone but the convenience trumps everything else for me. And me and my middle aged eyes are remarkably fine with reading on the phone – another surprise for me.
If I’m going able to spend several hours reading, then I want my Nook, but that doesn’t happen that often. I own two Nooks and I think of my Nook Color as my primary device, because it’s the best organized, I have all my folders set up the way I want them.
I read almost exclusively on my laptop. I was horrified by the deterioration of Kindled for PC with the appearance of Kindle for Windows 8. It lacks both features and functionality of previous versions. Thank goodness you can still use the earlier version instead. Don’t know what I’ll do if it were to be discontinued, as I have so much invested in the Kindle format.
@mharvey816: You can still read from B&N on a PC, just not through a download. They have a PC app that pre-dates the nook itself. It’s old and slow and takes forever to load, but it will download everything in your B&N library. I open it about once a month and update it as my primary backup for my nook. From your hard drive, you can move books to Calibre or other apps. You can also sideload other content into the app, but it won’t import thumbnails. It also renders color and non-scalable content, like maps and charts.
It doesn’t look like B&N supports it anymore, but it is still available through 3rd party download sites. Search for “nook for PC”.
I have a traditional, not smart, cell phone. I do read some books on the Kindle Paperwhite I was given about 18 months ago. I’m the luddite who still far prefers to read on paper. Even if I did have phone reading capability, I doubt my eyes would permit me to read there.
I have a smart phone for calling and texting and I read e-books exclusively on Kindle. My favorite is my 6 inch Fire….it fits easily into my small purse while everything else is stuffed in my backpack. I’m like Peggy P I may forget my phone, but never my Kindle.
I love my Kindle(s)! I have a smart phone, but I just can’t read comfortably on it. I will be horrified if Kindles are ever discontinued. I used to have all the paper books, but now I only buy non-fiction or “collectible” fiction… things that I want in all forms. I wouldn’t have the space for all those books in paper. We went through a big move, and I was losing a lot of my storage. I couldn’t keep boxes and shelves of extra books. This is my library in my purse, and I love it:)
I’ll read on my smartphone, but I much prefer to read on my Kindle Fire; even a larger screen holds too little text and leaves me constantly swiping to advance. My Fire is a few years old, and is the third Kindle I’ve had, starting with one of the originals way back when. (I actually still miss my original Kindle, which died when it was stepped on, cracking the screen.)
Jane…
I have a Nook Galaxy Tab 4 that I just bought and want the ability to purchase and read Kindle books. Are you telling me in order for the Kindle App to work on my tablet I HAVE to purchase a KU membership to read books on the app? I REALLY don’t want to invest $79 or whatever to Amazon just to read a few books that I can’t get in epub… Do I understand this correctly? …HELP!
I read posts like this along with the supporting articles and I wonder if I’m too easily satisfied.
Give me a front lit eink reader with an adjustable serif font and I’m totally happy for my fiction reading. I do keep the kindle and Moon+ apps on my tablet and phone but the only thing I download on them are short stories because that’s about my limit for using that type of screen.
I’m pretty sure the last apps I used for novels with any regularity were Scribd and Oyster. I cancelled the subscriptions because of the device I have to use, not due to any particular dissatisfaction with the app or service.
Anyway, none of this is to say that I disagree with your concluding paragraph. It’s a concern I have as well but you’re talking about stuff that I don’t even think about. It’s not like I can even ask the younger kids in the family their thoughts because all but one read on eink. Well, I can ask. Maybe they tried the apps and gave up on them. I’ll find out.
Though it took me a while to make the transition to ebooks, now, the majority of my purchases and reading is done on a Kindle Touch. It’s not fancy, but e-ink screen is easy on my eyes, and I can adjust the font size depending on lighting. My middle-age eyes are great in bright light, but in dimmer light, I need a larger font. The only things I read in print are comics and graphic novels.
I see myself as very tech friendly, dependent even, but I can’t imagine reading a novel on a phone. All that swiping would be annoying as hell.
I have Kindle for PC install on my computer, but use it only as a means of managing my ebook library through another, ahem, ebook manager. Given the format–a computer–you’d think it would have an advanced and sophisticated means of handling content, but, alas, it doesn’t.
I’m just hoping that Amazon will never be mean enough to discontinue the Kindle. For heavy readers, there are too many drawbacks to the tablet and phone screens, whereas reading on my Kindle and e-ink screen feel most like reading a physical book, with the advantage of less wrist and eye strain, but without the ability to flip rapidly through pages (the one thing I miss most in physical books).
On the other hand, their software has always been a disappointment. The collections thing is horrible. I flat out refuse to use it. The one time I did try, they then did an update that made my organizational scheme useless. I still can’t figure out what synchs on which devices and any software that is that unintuitive is not something I’m going to waste any time on. I wish they had some incentive to improve, but I doubt anything will improve. Maybe if enough people complain….
This is annoying but there’s a way around it. I added my husband’s Android phone to the list of devices registered to my Amazon kindle account, and we share books that way.
@Glittergirl: No, just to borrow books through Kindle Unlimited. You can buy books via a web browser like Chrome. I think the Kindle app runs on android on the Nook Galaxy? So you should be able to buy in app unlike with an apple device. hope that helps.
@Glittergirl: I’ve run the Kindle app on two Samsung Tab 2s so see no reason why it should not also work on your device unless the Android software has been compromised in some way when making it a “Nook”. A google search will probably tell you if this is the case but why not just try it out and see what happens?
A more general comment: I am clearly pretty undemanding when it comes to software as I just do not have the problems that others are seeing. Whenever I download a book I add it to the appropriate collection and have never felt the need for the functions others feel are necessary. I do almost all my reading on a Paperwhite or an old Kindle keyboard. I’ve tried the tablets, a Fire, mylaptop and my PC and e-ink beats them all anyday.
I was using nook for PC to download books up until about six months ago when it stopped downloading new purchases. It still works with books I bought years earlier. But nothing new.
The original nook will also no longer download new purchases. When my mom took hers to a B&N for help, they said they no longer supported that device.
I have a Paperwhite, a Fire HDX, the app on my Android phone and Android tablet. They all work wonderfully, and am a happy bookworm customer.
Let me say that the the newest Fires, at $49.95, are also available to give easy accessibility to the host of Amazon’s new TV and movies which are produced solely to the Amazon subscribers. To those who don’t read a lot, but love well-produced TV shows and movies, a $50 high-quality tablet may be a viable option.
Backlit devices give me eye-strain, and I am going through the middle-aged eye change, so like a few others, I prefer reading on an e-ink device (Kindle with keyboard in my case). That’s what is most comfortable for me and what I use most at home.
For convenience, I do read some on my iPhone and iPad-mini. I use my iPhone for short spurts, like while waiting in a Dr. office, and my iPad-mini for some library books (such as anything I check out from Open Library). I also use my phone for audio books.
@Jane and @Mike. Thanks for the answers. My daughter, last night got me hooked up with Google Play and downloaded the app. Now I need to probably set up an account with Amazon. Oh and @Mike, it’s a NOOK Samsung Galaxy Tab 4 and I’m guessing in tech language it’s been “partitioned” kinda for a dedicated ereader and integrated with a tablet and internet as well. BN no longer “makes” ereaders and has given them over to Samsung to develop for them…
I guess I’m a weirdo dinosaur using my almost-5-year-old Old School Kindle. I hate reading on my phone, both because the screen’s so small and the screen bothers my eyes/leads to headaches.
I’m not keen on reading on my phone. It’s harder on my eyes, the swiping is annoying, and it eats up battery.
Love my Paperwhite for reading and, like others, literally always have it on me whenever I walk out the door. I do less reading on the Fire, but I still prefer it over a phone.
There are things about the Kindle software that bother me but, for the most part, I just shrug it off and deal. As long as I can buy, download, and read books, I’m basically content. Maybe I need to be a more demanding consumer, but eh.
The only time I use my Kindle app on my phone is when I have to use the restroom at work or I’m stuck in a meeting where it is permissible to look at your phone but not permissible to page through a paperback. Oh, I forgot about the line at the grocery store and only sometimes because those prices at Walmart can always be cheaper. I love my Kindle Paperwhite and prefer it to all the other platforms right now mostly because of the back lighting.