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The Anti Amazon Echo Review

Reviewing a product without purchasing it may seem unfair but Amazon’s latest hardware invention isn’t going to find its way into my house anytime soon. Here’s why.

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Even at 50% off I’m not buying

Amazon’s latest hardware creation is the Amazon Echo. As an Amazon Prime member I was given the opportunity to buy an Amazon Echo before the general public at $100 less than it will retail for whenever it’s released to the masses. So what does it do and why am I not buying it for $99?

echo-mics

It’s version 0.00001

The Amazon Echo plays music from the Amazon music library (if you’re an Amazon Prime member), reads you news summaries from the news outlets you choose, answers questions (like Google or Siri) and acts as a bluetooth speaker for your devices. That’s not enough to justify it’s price of $199.

It’s always listening…no thanks

It has seven microphones listening all the time for two keywords that will wake it, Alexa and Amazon. If something inside your head just started to worry about privacy you’re not alone. This device is tied to the internet all the time and it is always listening. Amazon says it’s always “ready to listen” for the keywords that wake it up but as a consumer I see that differently. If it has the capability of listening all the time then I’m going to assume it’s listening. Combine its ability to listen and the fact that it’s connected to Amazon’s data services and you have a privacy concern unlike any other I’ve run into in a consumer based product.

Negatives

  • It doesn’t create reminders.
  • It’s not able to tell me my schedule for the day.
  • It’s not able to play music from my Spotify account through voice actions which makes it an expensive bluetooth speaker if you want to stream your music to it.
  • It’s not capable of handling phone calls. This is disappointing because it has seven microphones.

The Amazon Echo is the next generation of electronics because it’s supposed to be controlled by voice but if I can’t make phone calls, send voice or text messages to my contacts or control the most popular music streaming service (Spotify) then I’m not buying it, even at 50% off retail.

Amazon Echo Reviews and Documentation

I’m not the only person unimpressed with the idea of the Echo.
Let’s Call The Amazon Echo What It Is

Echo support documentation and videos.

Click to watch video

Are you going to buy an Echo?

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The hidden fee every Amazon author must factor into their publishing; Digital delivery costs

Post 2 of 26 of The Self-Publishing Series

Amazon’s hidden fee can cost you a lot of money
If you choose the 70% royalty option Amazon.com charges you for each megabyte of your document. Here is their explanation from their KDP Pricing Page.

Delivery Costs are equal to the number of megabytes we determine your Digital Book file contains, multiplied by the Delivery Cost rate listed below.

Amazon.com: US $0.15/MB
India: US $0.12/MB
Amazon CA: CAD $0.15/MB
Brazil: BRL R$.30/MB
Amazon.co.uk: UK £0.10/MB
Amazon.de: €0,12/MB
Amazon.fr: €0,12/MB
Amazon.es: €0,12/MB
Amazon.it: €0,12/MB
Amazon.co.jp: ¥1/MB

We will round file sizes up to the nearest kilobyte. The minimum Delivery Cost for a Digital Book will be US$0.01 for sales in US Dollars, CAD$0.01 for sales in CAD Dollars, £0.01 for sales in GB Pounds, ¥1 in JPY, R$0.01 for sales in Brazilian Reais, and €0.01 for sales in Euros, regardless of file size.

Again, this only applies to your book if you choose the 70% royalty option which is determined by the price of your book. This is a fee that nine out of ten self-publishing authors don’t know about.(Click to tweet that) If you’re going to self-publish you need to know about this fee because it can really cut into your profits.

How to calculate your royalty – Guy Kawasaki’s Royalty Calculator
Guy Kawasaki wrote a great book about self-publishing called APE: Author, Publisher, Entrerpreneur and one of the bonuses he generously created is a royalty calculator so can find out an estimate of how much your get after the platform takes its percentage and the cost of delivering the book. That’s right, Amazon charges you for delivering the digital file just like they charge you shipping for a physical item. To find out how much the file size effects your profits click on the image below and play with the calculator.

The calculator creates an estimate and gratefully in my experience it overestimates the cost. I make approximately $5.40 on each copy of my $7.99 Kindle book but the calculator estimates it to be a profit of $4.83. The important thing to understand is that the delivery fee is very real and must be considered in the creation and publication of your book. Click on the image below to visit Guy’s calculator

How do you avoid paying too much in digital delivery fees?
1. Use fewer images possible. The text of your document will not add considerably to your file size. Images quickly add to your file size.
2. Price your book appropriately. If you price your book in the 35% royalty range you will avoid the digital delivery fees entirely. That’s my understanding of the KDP Pricing Page.


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The story of Michael Hyatt, an Angry German and a Tribe

Yesterday Michael Hyatt, Chairman of Thomas Nelson Publishing, released his new book Platform. Amazon.com has become the number one place to sell books so having great reviews of your book can quickly move it up the sales ranks. Michael Hyatt put together a launch team and leveraged the relationships he’s built over his many years in the publishing industry to garner 70+ reviews before his book’s release date. People like me received advanced copies and many of us left favorable reviews on Amazon.com. That’s where the angry German comes in. Follow me…I’ll explain using some pictures.

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