Amazon Wants To Get Away With Ads in Their e-Books

There’s news floating that Amazon is planning to apply for an in-book advertisement patent for their Kindle Devices. Amazon is hoping to subsidize the cost of the e-books through ad sales, making their Kindle device more appealing to consumers. But there are other ways to make this successful for Amazon without consumer backlash.

First, if Amazon decides to place ads in the books, they should give the option to the buyers. If the readers don’t want ads in an e-book, they can pay the regular cost of the e-book but if they want to pay the cheaper price then place the ads within the e-book. This way the consumers can’t complain because it was their choice.

Second, if Amazon decides to force ads into the book, which will not sit well with Kindle readers, they should place it at the beginning of the e-book. It’ll be similar to movie studios placing upcoming movie previews on DVD releases. Most consumers wouldn’t mind ads in the beginning of the book for cheaper e-books. Now if these ads are placed throughout the e-book, then it could become troublesome for Amazon.

There’s an alternative to subsidizing the cost of the e-books, subsidizing the cost of the actual device through ads in e-books.

I recently bought a Kindle 2 but was hesitant at first to buy the device just because of the cost. In the end I justified the cost by downloading the e-books from other online sources rather than Amazon’s own marketplace . If the cost of the device were cheaper, I would have considered buying books through Amazon because it’s actually easier and faster on their Whispernet service.

Subsidizing the device will attract the masses to the Kindle devices, many of them willing to see ads for a cheaper hardware. After a few months of use, if a user decides they no longer want to see the ads on the device, then Amazon can charge a fee to upgrade to the “ad free” version of the Kindle. This is very similar to what many software providers do, ad free version costs money while versions with ads are free.

If Amazon hopes to dominate the e-book reader market, this is a golden opportunity for them to do so. People will pay for the cost of e-books because the Kindle 2/DX are the cream of the crop, with internet access and a tremendous e-book library to choose books from. If you don’t believe me, just ask AT&T what subsidizing the iPhone has done for them. They recently broke all time records for sales and transactions after the release of the iPhone 3GS, which ties customers to a monthly data plan for two years. If the device is cheap enough and works well, people will pay the slightly higher costs of the books and even sit through a few ads for it.