Next month, Amazon will introduce Kindle MatchBook, which allows customers to purchase (for $2.99, $1.99, $.99 or free) Kindle editions of print books they bought new from the company. While more than 10,000 books are scheduled to be available at launch, print purchases dating back to 1995 can also qualify if a publisher adds a title to the program. In addition, Amazon Publishing will include its titles in Kindle MatchBook.
The New York Times noted that "the success of the program will be determined partly by whether book publishers embrace it. So far, Amazon has agreements from only a couple of major publishers." Russ Grandinetti, v-p of Kindle Content, mentioned HarperCollins in the interview, but added that most publishers hadn't been told about MatchBook prior to the announcement. "Although publishers have shown discomfort with Amazon's outsize clout in book retailing, Mr. Grandinetti said he doesn't expect a lot of resistance, because MatchBook represents an 'incremental revenue stream for publishers and authors,' " the Times wrote.
"Some have called the Kindle MatchBook program 'bundling,' for pairing an inexpensive or free e-book with the purchase of a print copy of a book, long considered a possible benefit to readers," Jacket Copy observed. "And yet the price of $2.99 or less for an e-book, whether or not it's a copy of an already-purchased print edition, is far lower than the price point publishers had hoped to establish as an e-book standard."
The five titles mentioned by Amazon as part of the program are HarperCollins and Amazon works and none are current bestsellers. The oldest is The Thorn Birds by Colleen McCullough, which was published in 1977. Others are A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving, published in 1989, I Know This Much Is True by Wally Lamb (2008) and The Art of Racing in the Rain by Garth Stein (2009). The Hangman's Daughter by Oliver Pötzsch was published in the U.S. originally by Amazon Crossing in 2010 and is available as a Mariner Books paperback.
Amazon's web page for the program also indicates another 13 titles that are part of the program. They include Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus by John Gray, Prey by Michael Crichton, American Gods by Neil Gaiman, The Pact by Jodi Picoult, Anathem by Neal Stephenson and Betrayal of Trust by J.A. Jance, all of which are Harper titles. Some of the others are Amazon titles.
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Angry Robot's Clonefiles bundling program, which was trialed successfully in the U.K. last year, will soon launch in the U.S., the publisher announced at last weekend's World Science Fiction Convention in San Antonio, Tex. Under the Clonefiles initiative, when a customer buys a paperback from a participating independent bookstore, they get the e-book edition free. In a jab at Amazon's Kindle MatchBook unveiling, the publisher noted: "It's also gratifying to see that the giants still follow where Angry Robot innovates."