
The harmful impact of Audible-exclusive audiobooks - edward
https://blog.libro.fm/the-harmful-impact-of-audible-exclusive-audiobooks/
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crazygringo
This argument doesn't seem particularly strong.

First of all, for books that are entertainment (most fiction), how is this any
different from series that are exclusive to Netflix? The answer given by the
author is a non-answer, claiming you can "buy DVD's online". Yeah right,
please show me where I can buy _Tiger King_ on DVD? I didn't think so.

Second, for books that are more in line with libraries' missions to make
information accessible for an educated citizenry, the original print and
ebooks are still available, right? And if you have vision impairment, there
are also methods for automated screenreading, since _most_ books don't have
audiobook versions.

So I don't really see any valid complaint here except "we want to sell things
exclusive to other stores" which, yeah, and I'd like to have a billion
dollars.

If you want to have the conversation that there should be laws breaking up
creation and distribution and making exclusive distribution illegal, then go
ahead, but that would shake up _everything_ , a pretty radical change. But if
you're not going to go there, then there's no reason why audiobooks shouldn't
be exclusive while other things get to be.

~~~
reaperducer
_If you want to have the conversation that there should be laws breaking up
creation and distribution and making exclusive distribution illegal, then go
ahead_

There are laws for this in some industries in the United States.

Movie studios aren't allowed to own theaters anymore. Beer companies aren't
allowed to own bars anymore. Car manufacturers aren't allowed to own auto
dealerships. Most television shows are decoupled from the distributors, which
is why you see things like a big extra Sony or CBS Television Distribution
logo at the end of a sit-com rerun.

I'm not sure that what's happening with audiobooks rises to the level of the
problems we used to have with "tied houses" (bars only allowed to sell a
certain brand of beer), or movie company vertical monopolies of the past.

~~~
thebean11
> Beer companies aren't allowed to own bars anymore.

I thought it was the opposite, where breweries can sell for on premise
consumption, but not off premise?

~~~
reaperducer
It used to be that breweries would own chains of bars in the United States.
Similar to the way you can only buy Exxon gas at an Exxon station. That was
made illegal.

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falcolas
This is a continuation of a trend found throughout our purchasing life:
exclusives are generally harmful to customers. This is specifically because an
exclusive represents an artificial loss of choice.

They are, however, very lucrative to creators and the distributors, so I have
high doubts that the concept of 'the exclusive' will ever go away.

~~~
Solstinox
Harm means to hurt or injure. If I write a book and exclusively circulate it
among my closest friends, am I harming you because there is 1 less book you
for you to happen upon?

~~~
falcolas
This is a distinct usecase from only offering it through, for example, Barnes
and Noble. The former (sharing exclusively among friends) is not necessarily
harmful, the latter (only selling through one vendor) is.

~~~
enkid
I think his point is that if you create an audiobook and then limit how you
sell it, you are creating more choice then if you didn't create the audiobook
at all. You're saying it's different but you aren't saying how. How does
creating additional choice harm the consumer?

I'm not making an argument either way, just trying to clarify positions.

~~~
freehunter
The real answer is, very few authors say “oh I have a great idea for a book
that I’m only going to sell through Audible!” They have an idea for a book
that they want to sell, and then through licensing deals and marketing it
becomes an Audible exclusive.

So the choice is _created_ when the author decides to write a book. The choice
is _restricted_ when the author or publisher decides to offer it only on
Audible. Writing a book is “creating more choice”, offering that book
exclusively through one reseller is limiting that choice.

You might make the argument that this is just capitalism and the free market
doing its job, but to keep healthy competition alive capitalism is generally
regulated to keep the biggest players from dominating the entire market.
Amazon and B&N might have the money to fight over exclusive rights to a book,
but smaller bookstores don’t. This creates a barrier to entry for any new or
smaller stores who want to compete in the book market. The reason regulators
watch for this kind of stuff is because Amazon has the money and the audience
to completely lock out any competitors they want, singe-handedly destroying
the free market.

Amazon doesn’t need an exclusive deal in order to sell books. They need
exclusive deals in order to put their competitors out of business.

~~~
Solstinox
The way I read that, the problem isn’t exclusive deals. It’s _Amazon_ signing
exclusive deals.

What do you think about this: authors can sign exclusive with non-monopolistic
entities?

~~~
freehunter
Just my opinion but I would say that’s fair. That’s such a bad idea if you
care about profits and wide exposure that there’s almost no economic incentive
to sell a book but _exclude_ selling it on Amazon or B&N, you’re just throwing
away money. Which, in a free market, you should be able to do at your own
discretion.

The problem only comes if the biggest players in the space use their power and
influence (read: money) to keep smaller competitors from having a chance.

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krick
I'm not exactly the kind of person that would support Amazon on anything, but
this is sort of what "exclusive" means, you know. So this amazed tone he uses
to repeat you cannot sell "exclusive" stuff at other places is pretty silly.

~~~
kd5bjo
The real issue is the circumvention of the first sale doctrine. Before the
download era, licenses were mostly attached to physical media that could be
given, resold, or loaned out. By eliminating the physical artifact, modern
content companies are exploiting a loophole in consumers’ traditional resale
rights.

~~~
falcor84
How is this different from a band performing exclusively live to people who
buy tickets and actively disallowing recordings? Or what about a Broadway show
that doesn't have a recording?

Should we force all performers to make their content available to buy to
anyone across the world? I'm not necessarily against this, but it would be
quite a big change.

~~~
kd5bjo
In Audible’s case, they’re already selling access to a recording in
perpetuity; your examples are all live performances. There’s a colorable
distinction here, and there’s no need to force people to make recordings if
they don’t want to.

A harder question is where the line between these two regimes should be: movie
theaters and television stations are generally treated like performances
despite showing recorded content. Netflix acts like a rental company: when you
drop your subscription, you lose access to their library.

~~~
falcor84
Well, stretching the analogy a bit, a lawyer could argue that Netflix's act of
streaming a piece of content is a live performance - you're not paying for the
video, but rather to access this "Netflix theatre".

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thaumasiotes
I don't think this is their biggest problem. Libro.fm is selling their
audiobooks at what appears to be some kind of absurd MSRP.

Audible offers audiobooks at that price point too, but you'd have to be an
idiot to pay it. Amazon will sell you the Audible version of a book you've
purchased the Kindle version of at a steep discount. So steep that purchasing
the ebook+audiobook is cheaper than purchasing the audiobook by itself.

Compare the pricing for _All Creatures Great and Small_ , which is atypical
mostly in that the combined-purchase discount is unusually stingy:

Libro.fm: $37.94

Audible: $29.99

Kindle+Audible: $17.48

I don't like buying DRMed audiobooks, but it's not that hard to justify at
$2.99.

~~~
TylerE
If you listen regularly, the Audible membership is even better... $23/month
for two books, and 30% off on everything past that. So that can get the per
book cost down to under $12

~~~
mjayhn
I really hate their dark-pattern of holding your credits hostage if you want
to pause your account. I have like 10 credits that I don't want to spend right
now, I'm backed up and hardly reading and I can't pause my Audible membership
that's $24/mo without losing my credits. I also don't want to be rushed to
pick out 10 books and possibly waste my credits so I can pause. I'm VERY picky
about what books I burn a credit on.

It's a really crappy way of keeping me tied in and I want to make sure people
know about it.

~~~
vhanda
You can convert your membership into the "Silver Plan", which charges you
every other month. This way you're paying a bit less.

However, their silver plan is very hidden away and is only presented as an
option when you go to cancel your account. And even then it might not work and
you'll have to write to Customer Care to switch.

~~~
mjayhn
Oh interesting. Thanks for pointing that out. I'll check that out.

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mdoms
I agree that these exclusivity deals are bad news for most of us but to be
completely frank this is largely on the authors. They are the ones agreeing,
ultimately, to these deals to line their own pockets at the expense of readers
and potential readers. Yeah Amazon is evil but no one forces the authors into
this.

~~~
naravara
> I agree that these exclusivity deals are bad news for most of us but to be
> completely frank this is largely on the authors. They are the ones agreeing,
> ultimately, to these deals to line their own pockets at the expense of
> readers and potential readers. Yeah Amazon is evil but no one forces the
> authors into this.

No individual author has the ability to impact something like this from
happening on their own. Why would it be "largely the author's fault" when they
have no say over the ecosystem?

~~~
ars
> No individual author has the ability to impact something like this from
> happening on their own.

Yes they do, they just .... don't enter into an exclusive contract, and pick
instead a contract that allows them to market in other places as well.

Or are you implying that Audible requires only Exclusive contacts? Because I
don't believe that's true.

~~~
naravara
> don't enter into an exclusive contract, and pick instead a contract that
> allows them to market in other places as well.

It's not like you get to tick off a feature list in your contracts to get all
the stuff you want. Audible is likely paying them for exclusivity and they're
getting read and promotion out of it that other publishers aren't able to get
them. The author's goal is to get their work to where people who want to read
it are. It a weird sift of responsibility to expect the author to concern
themselves with how the overall audiobook market shakes out for consumers or
even other authors. They have no leverage in the negotiation to make those
decisions unless they're like Stephen King.

~~~
ars
> It's not like you get to tick off a feature list in your contracts to get
> all the stuff you want.

Yes, actually that's exactly how it is. The author can choose if they want it
exclusive or not, and Audible will offer them some money to go exclusive.

And they are not required to take that money.

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darth_avocado
I absolutely do not understand this article. It contradicts itself.

> ACX offers higher royalties to creators (i.e. more money from audiobook
> sales) if they opt for Exclusive distribution.

Well, then pay more money to the authors, instead of complaining about it.

Also, how is this any different from bookstores having exclusive rights with
certain publishers. I remember some books I wanted few years back were
available only on Barnes and Noble (back when Amazon was still not that big).
How is this different from games being Steam or Epic store exclusives? Like
come on, create incentives for creators and they will flock to you. You can't
sit around and complain when literally you're a middleman and you refuse to
pay your creators more.

~~~
monkeywork
steam doesn't do exclusives ... not important to your point at all just
thought I'd toss that out there.

~~~
jay_kyburz
Steam however does provide a huge amount of cool features you get for free
when you implement their API and use their platform. This effectively creates
exclusives because its a pain to implement those things yourself.

~~~
monkeywork
That's just offering a good product that people want to use... I find negative
views on exclusivity only really come into play when the platform "buys" that
exclusivity rather than it being a choice of the creator.

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kilo_bravo_3
If I want to write a book, and only sell the audiobook version on wax
cylinders in a physical shop that is only open on leap days for a billion
dollars a cylinder then that's what I'm going to do and everyone else can
pound sand.

The entitlement of people is staggering.

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umvi
Exclusives on _every_ platform are annoying - Audible, Nintendo, Netflix, you
name it. People make mutually beneficial deals, and one way to do that is with
exclusivity.

~~~
gkoberger
Well, I think you mixed things up a bit here.

Nintendo makes sense; they created many of the games from scratch. Are they
supposed to rewrite them for every platform?

Netflix is more of a Tv station now... that’s like saying it’s not fair This
Is Us isn’t on Comedy Central.

I do agree exclusives suck, however I think the only fair comparisons are
media that’s traditionally available everywhere (music albums, podcasts,
books).

~~~
umvi
How is a book as a form of entertainment any different from a movie, video
game, TV show, etc?

~~~
kodt
I don’t think it is fair to compare a book with a piece of software written
for a specific platform.

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dirtyid
I'm glad I've trained my brain to acclimatize to TTS, trivially easy to
compile epubs into audiobooks now. Think we're a few years away from neural
TTS solutions making passable audiobooks. Tons of services for articles sound
OK now. Even youtube wiki TTS spam are becoming not bad.

~~~
st1ck
I've been using TTS for years by now, and IMO it's really good by now for
original digital epub editions. The biggest remaining issue is some words can
be mispronounced (wrong part of speech, foreign or rare words). Even "text in
quotes" is accentuated now in Google TTS, although it'd be nice to also
highlight _italicized text_.

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sandreas
I always wanted to know, if it would be ok to publish an audio book "creative
commons", that has been licensed Audible exclusive, since it would be the
creative work of a private narrator, that has no financial interest.

But since the author is the owner if the base creative work, this must be
forbidden, if the content is licensed to a specific company.

Another interesting question would be, how this would fit to a text-to-speech
approach while not letting a human read the book but a machine...

Can someone tell me more about this topic?

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AlanSE
I was really excited when Google Play came out with audiobooks on their
platform. I realize that Google's success may still result in an oligopoly
situation. That would still be better.

I'm a prolific Audiobook listener, but actively avoided Audible because of the
subscription model.

~~~
input_sh
I've never been attracted to audiobooks because of the really steep price
(compared to ebooks), but I've just checked five fiction books from my to-read
list and they all seem _much_ cheaper on Google Play than on Audible and
Libro.fm.

Out of five, one is $2.5 cheaper, while the other four are $10+ cheaper.

~~~
treeman79
Great for long drives, workouts, Migraines, or if you are losing vision.

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teruakohatu
"We are Libro.fm, an audiobook platform that makes it possible for you to buy
audiobooks directly through your local bookstore“

Can someone explain how this works? Do we actually buy from a local bookstore
or do they just pass a commission to the local bookstore on each sale?

~~~
burkaman
They pass on a commission. I've found a couple articles that claim it's a
50/50 split ([https://www.fastcompany.com/90489801/libro-fm-kanopy-
audiobo...](https://www.fastcompany.com/90489801/libro-fm-kanopy-audiobooks-
free-streaming-quarantine-boredom-support-local-communities)), but I don't
know if that's true at all or true for every store. Since they don't disclose
it, I'm guessing they have different deals with different stores.

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Karunamon
That was a lot of text to convey the point that Audible is doing to audiobooks
what the Epic Games Store is doing to games: paying publishers extra (in this
case, a better cut of the price) to release only on a single platform.

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gxqoz
Last time I checked there wasn't even a good way to filter on Audible
exclusives. They're typically the only audiobooks I get through Audible, as
I'd otherwise wait for them to be available in my library app.

~~~
krick
Library app? I didn't even know those exist. I thought everything is
copyrighted and DRM-ed right now. You mean there is actually a way to
read/listen to new books without buying them, like, "legally", not "stealing"
them from torrents?

~~~
67868018
Yes! Overdrive and Libby apps. Login with your library card. Enjoy!

~~~
krick
Huh, cool. Not in my country, though.

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gentleman11
I have been enjoying downpour.com lately. The token system means most books
are $15 or so. Heard about them from an anti-DRM advocacy group and was
pleasantly surprised at the prices and huge selection

~~~
dwighttk
Libro.fm is good too. No DRM, fairly good selection.

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Nabati
Off topic but, why would anyone want to buy audiobooks via their local
bookstore? I haven't seen this anywhere else: when is it something desirable
to ADD a middleman rather than removing them?

~~~
ballenf
How does Amazon replacing the local bookseller eliminate a “middleman”?

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Nabati
In case of Libro, you have both Libro and the bookstore as middle men. In the
Amazon case, you only have Amazon.

~~~
quickthrower2
Do people think in terms of "middlemen" when buying stuff. I don't think so,
latte sippers.

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gxqoz
Have people used the Libro.fm Android app? I've used the Audible Android app
for years and it's trash, even compared to something like OverDrive. No other
audio app on Android gets shut down in the background like Audible does (if it
lasts more than 30 minutes without being actively played that's a long time).
It takes forever to boot because they want to trick me into purchasing more
credits and showing ads. Whenever there's a notification, it pauses for like 8
seconds, twice as long as any other audio app.

~~~
beervirus
Strange. Works beautifully on iOS.

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vinceguidry
Did anyone else read the headline initially as "Audible Explosive Audiobooks"?

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hirundo
"we all know amazon is evil, but did you know that when a book becomes an
audible exclusive, libraries cannot buy copies of that audiobook? did you know
that capitalism is the enemy of accessibility?"

Evil capitalist Amazon is also the greatest creator of book accessibility
since Gutenberg.

