# z



## zzzzzzz (Dec 6, 2011)

z


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

Just got this email.

"We are writing you to inform you about upcoming changes to our royalty structure and bounty program for new audiobook projects started on ACX on or after March 12, 2014. The new royalty rate for titles distributed exclusively to Audible, Amazon, and iTunes will be a flat 40% paid to the Rights Holder (or, on Royalty Share deals, split equally between the Rights Holder and the Producer). For non-exclusive distribution, the Rights Holder will receive a flat 25% royalty."

Royalty rates have been 50%, escalating up to 90%, for exclusive titles, so this is a BIG change. 

Personally, I'm getting as many of my other projects as possible agreed to/scheduled with the producer right the heck NOW, so they get the higher rate when they're done. Thought you all might like to know, in case you're in the pipeline with this like I am.

ETA: I see I am not the first! Maybe we can merge the threads.


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## Courtney Milan (Feb 27, 2011)

That...freaking sucks.


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## Michael Robertson Jr (Feb 24, 2011)

Yeah, it does kind of suck, bu 40% still isn't bad, and to me it's a sign that the industry is really taking off for self-pub audio.


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## erikhanberg (Jul 15, 2011)

I got to 275 book sales for one of my titles ... was really looking forward to getting to 500 and triggering another percentage increase!

Dang.

Huge changes and it makes me re-consider adding more titles to ACX.


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## Jan Thompson (May 25, 2013)

What are the alternatives to ACX? My books are not ready and my projected timeline for audiobooks is not until Christmas (er, hopefully _this_ Christmas). This is a bummer for me that they drop the royalty rates before I get into the playing field.

Has anyone here done audiobooks the DIY way? I know friends in the theater industry and I am sure I can get them to read my books for me for a price, of course. But then from that point on, how do you get to market without ACX but be on Amazon?

I think I will be doing audiobooks instead of bypassing it. I know of vision-impaired friends for whom this would be a good thing.

What do traditional publishers do?

TIA for solution suggestions.



Michael Robertson Jr said:


> Yeah, it does kind of suck, bu 40% still isn't bad, and to me it's a sign that the industry is really taking off for self-pub audio.


I see your glass-is-half-full POV and I can live with that too.

But still, can't help asking... Maybe there are alternatives to consider?


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## erikhanberg (Jul 15, 2011)

Oops. I misunderstood. My current titles will continue to earn the escalating rates. But new ones won't. So there's still a chance I'll bump from 50% to 51% someday!


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

erikhanberg said:


> I got to 275 book sales for one of my titles ... was really looking forward to getting to 500 and triggering another percentage increase!
> 
> Dang.
> 
> Huge changes and it makes me re-consider adding more titles to ACX.


Actually it makes me consider getting all my stuff in quick with my current producer before the March 12th deadline. The production doesn't have to be completed before that dead line as far as I can see, but the deal must be signed before it. Otherwise, we lose 10% right away and never get the escalating royalty as sales accumulate.


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## nobody_important (Jul 9, 2010)

Michael Robertson Jr said:


> Yeah, it does kind of suck, bu 40% still isn't bad, and to me it's a sign that the industry is really taking off for self-pub audio.


No it's a sign that ACX is the biggest and the most dominant player in the market.


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

erikhanberg said:



> Oops. I misunderstood. My current titles will continue to earn the escalating rates. But new ones won't. So there's still a chance I'll bump from 50% to 51% someday!


That's right, and if you "start" a project--post it, request auditions, or agree with the producer, before March 12, you still get the higher royalty. So--Agreement Town, here I come! (One book coming out Saturday, one in progress, and if I can get it, three more agreed to before that evil date arrives.)


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## Lisa Grace (Jul 3, 2011)

Thank God I just finished one, and I have another in process. I'll push up my third project to beat the March 12th date, but that is all I can do. My angel series is being marketed by my agency, so I can't produce anything new with them. But this blows on all my future self publish titles.


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

Mcoorlim said:


> http://www.acx.com/help/important-announcement/201457230
> 
> This is... unfortunate. Titles produced before March 12 will still get the standard escalator rates (50%+), but everything new is a flat 40%.


I'm reading it as deals signed before that date will be honoured. Do you agree? This means if you get your books in before March 12 you don't have to have the production completed only a deal signed to get the old rate. I have 3 books in production, deal signed in Jan. I have 6 more with no deal signed, but I could probably get my current narrator to agree to signing--the completion date would be way later in the year though.


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## zzzzzzz (Dec 6, 2011)

Yep, they're honoring the rate on older books.

This is what happens when an amazon subsidiary actually has a monopoly, I guess.


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## blakebooks (Mar 10, 2012)

So much for the notion that the Zon would never reduce our royalty rates because otherwise we'd all go elsewhere. Does anyone believe that ACX operates in a vacuum?

Not saying we should all freak out. I am saying that the history of corporate life is to squeeze the vendors for more profit, and notions that we are customers, not vendors, are almost entirely rhetorical, if not whimsical as well.

This really kind of blows, though, if you've got a business model that assumed the 50%, and now have to revise it to reflect a 20% reduction in your pay. "Hey, we love you, but instead of $20K a year, we're only going to pay you $16K, OK? Now go make some nice rat tail soup and celebrate that it's still more than traditional publishers, who bear 100% of the cost to produce, package and distribute audiobooks, pay." I think that last bit is the most insulting part of the announcement.


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## FictionalWriter (Aug 4, 2010)

Oh crap. I just saw the email pop up but I haven't read it yet. Guess I don't have to now.


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## nobody_important (Jul 9, 2010)

blakebooks said:


> This really kind of blows, though, if you've got a business model that assumed the 50%, and now have to revise it to reflect a 20% reduction in your pay. "Hey, we love you, but instead of $20K a year, we're only going to pay you $16K, OK? Now go make some nice rat tail soup and celebrate that it's still more than traditional publishers, who bear 100% of the cost to produce, package and distribute audiobooks, pay." I think that last bit is the most insulting part of the announcement.


Yeah. I kinda rolled my eyes at that part. And how this reduction accommodates us better somehow.


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## JeffreyKafer (May 22, 2011)

bye bye royalty-share. It will be harder than hell to find someone of any quality to narrate your title on this structure. I certainly won't. What an idiotic move.


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## KBoards Admin (Nov 27, 2007)

(Merged two similar threads.)


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## blakebooks (Mar 10, 2012)

Nadia: Yup. That typical bureaucrat speak. "We aren't curtailing your rights, we're increasing your safety!" Uh huh.

Appears that cynicism is still the best approach to business...


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## Quiss (Aug 21, 2012)

Sooooo, are ebooks next?


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## Courtney Milan (Feb 27, 2011)

Actually, I think 40% is not great at all. I didn't think 50% was great, for that matter. I really can't figure out how what they say follows logically.



> We are lowering the royalties as we continue our mission to accommodate more audiobook productions. Our royalties still remain well above those offered by traditional audiobook publishers.


What does that mean? If what they mean is, "We have too many audiobooks being produced now, and so we're lowering the royalty rate so that fewer people publish audiobooks," that's what they should say. Yes, their royalties are above those offered by traditional audiobook publishers, but I wouldn't pay for production for a traditional audiobook, and so since I'm taking on more risk, I deserve more of a reward.

We get 70% on our books from Amazon. The costs involved in creating an audiobook are substantial, and they're bearing almost none of that risk. They're taking 60% because they can.

I'm going to be writing to them to express my displeasure.


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## nobody_important (Jul 9, 2010)

blakebooks said:


> Nadia: Yup. That typical bureaucrat speak. "We aren't curtailing your rights, we're increasing your safety!" Uh huh.
> 
> Appears that cynicism is still the best approach to business...


I used to get paid a lot of money to come up w/ BS to make getting laid off sound like promotion among others! So I can smell it.



Quiss said:


> Sooooo, are ebooks next?


Not yet since they don't have the monopoly on ebook distribution. Apple & BN are still hanging in there (and Apple has a lot of cash and loyal fans). Google has the potential to be a significant player. Kobo is doing OK in Canada.

This is why I try to distribute on platforms other than KDP.


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## FictionalWriter (Aug 4, 2010)

Courtney Milan said:


> Actually, I think 40% is not great at all. I didn't think 50% was great, for that matter. I really can't figure out how what they say follows logically.
> 
> What does that mean? If what they mean is, "We have too many audiobooks being produced now, and so we're lowering the royalty rate so that fewer people publish audiobooks," that's what they should say. Yes, their royalties are above those offered by traditional audiobook publishers, but I wouldn't pay for production for a traditional audiobook, and so since I'm taking on more risk, I deserve more of a reward.
> 
> ...


Ditto.


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## SLGray (Dec 21, 2013)

I guess I'll be doing my own books then. Or I could put the two that are ready for audition up now and hope by the time I have new ones ready to go that there'll still be talent auditioning.

Bleh. This does not make me happy.


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## blakebooks (Mar 10, 2012)

The removal of the escalator clause will also remove a huge incentive for production. Most won't hit the point where that matters, but several of my titles have, and it's a good chunk of change as it increases.

A prediction: this will substantially chill the appetite for doing audiobooks. If I have to pay $2500 up front for a decent narrator to perform a book, it substantially alters my ROI, and further reduces my overall expectations for income moving beyond the ROI date, both in absolute royalties as well as escalated royalties. That means the investment parameters change, and I have to look at alternative areas to invest my cash. 

I don't condemn what they are doing, but if their goal is to increase the market size, this is a terrible way to go about it. It will have the reverse effect.


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## Guest (Feb 27, 2014)

> We are lowering the royalties as we continue our mission to accommodate more audiobook productions.


This is classic Doublespeak. How does lowering the incentive to produce audiobooks accomodate more productions?



> Our royalties still remain well above those offered by traditional audiobook publishers.


Except traditional publishers pay all of the production costs. This is why I have always ranted against referring to these arrangements as "royalties." They are not royalties in the traditional sense of the word.


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## SeanBlack (May 13, 2010)

I'm always wary of knee jerk reactions to changes like this, but yeah, I'll just look to have my agent sell audio rights now rather than going through ACX. A shame too. Oh well.

Russell also makes some excellent points, as usual. I have been actively expanding my ebook distribution channels beyond Amazon as much as I can, and this is why.


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## nobody_important (Jul 9, 2010)

blakebooks said:


> A prediction: this will substantially chill the appetite for doing audiobooks. If I have to pay $2500 up front for a decent narrator to perform a book, it substantially alters my ROI, and further reduces my overall expectations for income moving beyond the ROI date, both in absolute royalties as well as escalated royalties. That means the investment parameters change, and I have to look at alternative areas to invest my cash.
> 
> I don't condemn what they are doing, but if their goal is to increase the market size, this is a terrible way to go about it. It will have the reverse effect.


I agree with this. My plan was to do audiobooks later this year. I don't want to do the royalty share deal but I don't have the money to do it right now. But with 40% with no escalation, I may not want to bother. I don't think it's going to be worth it (I need to redo my Excel to know for sure, but I'm pretty sure it won't work out so great).


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## Quiss (Aug 21, 2012)

NadiaLee said:


> Not yet since they don't have the monopoly on ebook distribution. Apple & BN are still hanging in there (and Apple has a lot of cash and loyal fans). Google has the potential to be a significant player. Kobo is doing OK in Canada.


Oh, I think we can be sure that, if Amazon drops their royalty, the others will do so by the time the sun comes up. Why wouldn't they?


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## wildwitchof (Sep 2, 2010)

I was waiting until my first audiobook paid out (I'm close after 3 months, which was a surprise) to put the next into production. Mine was just under $3K to produce, and I didn't know how it would perform, so I only did the one.

Yesterday I figured I was a month or so away from starting production on the next book... but now I don't  know if I should rush it into the pipeline (which might be unlikely given how everyone else will be trying to do that), or abandon ACX. Taking over 50% for distribution--when there is no promotional support, no social media sophistication, etc--really bugs me.

Rrrrrgh.


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## Courtney Milan (Feb 27, 2011)

Quiss said:


> Oh, I think we can be sure that, if Amazon drops their royalty, the others will do so by the time the sun comes up. Why wouldn't they?


Well, Apple's 70% royalty rate preceded Amazon's, you may recall. Amazon was 35% before Apple came along.


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## nobody_important (Jul 9, 2010)

Quiss said:


> Oh, I think we can be sure that, if Amazon drops their royalty, the others will do so by the time the sun comes up. Why wouldn't they?


Because of other guys & author incentive to push their readers to one platform over the other.

It's easier to drop royalty % if you're the biggest guy (or the only guy). It's much harder if you have a lot of other players.

ACX can drop royalty % like this because they can and authors do not have another easy place to run to.


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## mrv01d (Apr 4, 2011)

Quiss said:


> Oh, I think we can be sure that, if Amazon drops their royalty, the others will do so by the time the sun comes up. Why wouldn't they?


Good point.

But the high earners will just sell to readers direct and bypass the royalty bs. So it's still a risk for booksellers to mess around too much with royalties. The big money makers have options that would hurt the booksellers' bottom lines. Given that Bezos has always seen book sales as a way to datamine consumers (he'd never cared about books) I don't think he'll be in a hurry to stop attracting customers. New content=customers=data mining mother lode. He's not going to repel content any time soon by messing around with royalties.

Re: ACX, hopefully they'll start losing money and see the error of their ways. I'll push through contracts now before the deadline but after that I'm out of the audiobook game. It's not worth my time.


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## The 13th Doctor (May 31, 2012)

Just received the email. I have a book on ACX and a couple of people have auditioned, but I was going to hold out until the end of March to see if anyone else wanted to take on the project. I'm offering royalty share as I can't afford the prices otherwise.


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## olefish (Jan 24, 2012)

Is there a way to reserve audiobook spots now before the march 12th?


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## Guest (Feb 27, 2014)

mrv01d said:


> Good point.
> 
> But the high earners will just sell to readers direct and bypass the royalty bs.


Can they? Selling direct has a whole new set of problems. It is not easy to get people to shop "off the grid". Shoppers are creatures of habit. They shop where they are comfortable and have a certain level of trust. Trying to sell direct means trying to sell the customer twice: the first time to get them to buy and the second time to get them to buy from your site.

This would also cut off almost all of the current promotional tools used. Bookbub won't take a book that isn't available on Amazon. Many of the ebook promotion sites won't accept books that are only available from the author.

There are also legal issues involved. It isn't just a matter of slapping a Paypal button on your site and calling it a day. You open the door to new tax issues, security issues, etc.


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## evecarter (Nov 30, 2012)

Changes like this will make the quality of the audio books go down, at least initially. 
The best producers will no longer accept royalty share and rights holders who pay for the productions will have to select cheaper producers to keep the cost down.
Long term it might even out though as the better producers will have to accept smaller budgets.


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

blakebooks said:


> So much for the notion that the Zon would never reduce our royalty rates because otherwise we'd all go elsewhere. Does anyone believe that ACX operates in a vacuum?
> 
> Not saying we should all freak out. I am saying that the history of corporate life is to squeeze the vendors for more profit, and notions that we are customers, not vendors, are almost entirely rhetorical, if not whimsical as well.
> 
> This really kind of blows, though, if you've got a business model that assumed the 50%, and now have to revise it to reflect a 20% reduction in your pay. "Hey, we love you, but instead of $20K a year, we're only going to pay you $16K, OK? Now go make some nice rat tail soup and celebrate that it's still more than traditional publishers, who bear 100% of the cost to produce, package and distribute audiobooks, pay." I think that last bit is the most insulting part of the announcement.


It blows I agree, but I have a feeling they are doing the March 12th thing to get all those books sitting in ACX accounts that haven't been put up for narration activated. I can foresee audible's catalogue exploding with coming soon titles really soon. I just activated 2 I was hesitating about for example. I knew I wanted them done, but I was going to wait until the third quarter of 2014. Now though, I would be foolish to wait. But you're right. Monopoly causes this.


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## wildwitchof (Sep 2, 2010)

Hate to say it, but I agree with Julie and Russell. Seems like this is likely with Amazon ebooks someday if Apple & Google abandon the ebook market. But I can't do anything about that, so I'll plug along writing books and holding onto my rights. I'm not exclusive with Amazon, so I can take whatever their terms are today and not angst about the future.

ACX, though, was a lot of money up front, and I'm exclusive with them, and I don't know what my options are otherwise. Perhaps this will spur a competitor? Another link between voice talent and writers that's more co-op? (I'm granola, what can I say?)

In the meantime... perhaps we can pressure them to reconsider.


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## 31842 (Jan 11, 2011)

Just looking at some other options out there... I believe if you go directly through iTunes like an indie musician, you get 65% royalties on 99-cent sales (I couldn't find percentages on higher price points).  And it looks like if you sign up as an Amazon seller distributing "music", it is 99-cents per sale plus some seller fees (I couldn't find the info on those "fees").  I think what made ACX so great was the ease in making audiobooks (handling the contracts, reaching out to artists, etc.).  But to go from a potential 90% to a fixed 40%...  There is a great USB plug-in microphone called a Blue Snowball (recommended to me as the favorite microphone by one of the big voiceover artists at Warner Bros.) which costs around $60, there is some great audio editing software for $20 over on Tucows, there are local actors everywhere desperate for work (a potential $1000 payday would bring out the best non-union talent.  Shoot $250 would)...  It's more work, I don't know how exposure would be affected doing it yourself vs. the exposure on ACX with WhisperSync.  But at 40% royalties with all of the financial risks, it makes signing with an audio publisher make more sense than going the indie route.  I remember hearing that it was iTunes offering 70% royalties which caused other outlets to raise their rates.  Might be time to see again what going direct with iTunes can do.


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## blakebooks (Mar 10, 2012)

I wouldn't freak out and extrapolate this move by ACX as a foreshadowing of things to come from Amazon. But it does underscore that a healthy dose of cynicism is warranted whenever we're evaluating corporate motives, of any sort, by any corporation. Same goes for people. Whenever I hear that someone is going to help me, I put a hand on my wallet.

I can't imagine what the reasoning was in ACX for making this move other than wanting to cut the number of audiobooks in production moving forward by a substantial amount. Taking 60% of the cut on something that requires thousands to create, while delivering no value add of any sort...well, let's just say that's an unprecedented margin.


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## mrv01d (Apr 4, 2011)

Julie: Are you aware that some writers sold direct to the tune of $60k+ a year long before KDP existed? It's been done and if the booksellers become a hostile sales environment for authors, the ones who are big enough to walk are going to walk and their bank accounts won't even blink.


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

I have always operated under the presumption eBook royalties will be 35%.  Its not cynicism. Its just my best guess at what I will face in the future. I call it prudent planning.

And how they word their announcements? Who cares?


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## C.F. (Jan 6, 2011)

Things like this are what make me so hesitant to do royalty-share and commit to that 7-year exclusivity. Yes, older titles aren't affected, but is that to soften the blow or because they're required to honor the previous terms? I don't know, but I'd bet that their terms are setup in such a way that they're not legally required to continue at the old royalty rate.

Seven years is a long time, especially in this new publishing world where things are changing by the month, not the year. In seven years the entire audiobook marketplace could look completely different, not to mention ACX. 

Is there a way to get your audiobook on your book's Amazon page without going through ACX? I haven't done too much research into it because I'd always assumed I'd just go through ACX.

Looks like I need to move this to the front burner and make a decision by the deadline.

ETA: I just realized how this post might sound, so I wanted to clarify that I understand when doing a royalty split that there does need to be some exclusivity commitment to ensure fair compensation to the narrator, but I don't like that the narrator and I can't decide to take our audiobook somewhere else for seven years. It doesn't bother me being exclusive to the narrator, it bothers me being exclusive to ACX.


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## Alan Petersen (May 20, 2011)

Not only is this a terrible change from ACX Amazon, but they give us less than two weeks notice? 

We're already limited when it comes to marketing audiobooks compared to eBooks (we don't have price control, we can't run sales, very few audiobook focused websites/affiliates, etc) and now they're going to pay less to boot? Fuggedaboutit. 

I had my first audiobook released in December, but this will put production of my (yet to be published) next two books into audiobooks way in the back burner. Especially since I pay production/narration costs up front (I don't do royalty splits).


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## evecarter (Nov 30, 2012)

This is why it's so important to have ways to connect with your readers/listeners directly. Email list, Facebook fan pages and so on.
It really doesn't take much work or cost to setup your own author site to sell ebooks and audio books and keep 100% minus the payment processing costs.
That makes sense to do for authors with a medium to big following. 
Release a new audio book exclusively on your site for the first month, and then through ACX. People hate to wait.


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## 28612 (Dec 7, 2010)

Some of my response to ACX:

<<A 20% decrease in base royalty with no escalating clause -- to put it mildly, this is not encouragement to proceed with putting more books into production.

If ACX felt there were too many books being turned into audiobooks, I believe it has hit on the way to trim the flow to a trickle.>>

The, ahem, upside is that I now have a whole lot less on my 2014 to-do list.


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## JeffreyKafer (May 22, 2011)

blakebooks said:


> Taking 60% of the cut on something that requires thousands to create, while delivering no value add of any sort...well, let's just say that's an unprecedented margin.


The narrators groups over on FB are going NUTS about this, because it is simply corporate greed. ACX does nothing to produce these books, has no upfront expense with the production. That's all on the authors' shoulders and in the case of royalty share, all on the narrator's shoulders.

It's simply going to mean that you authors won't be able to pay appropriate rates, which means you'll get subpar narrators and the quality of your titles will go down. All so Audible can make more money from your hard work.


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## C.F. (Jan 6, 2011)

JeffreyKafer said:


> The narrators groups over on FB are going NUTS about this, because it is simply corporate greed. ACX does nothing to produce these books, has no upfront expense with the production. That's all on the authors' shoulders and in the case of royalty share, all on the narrator's shoulders.
> 
> It's simply going to mean that you authors won't be able to pay appropriate rates, which means you'll get subpar narrators and the quality of your titles will go down. All so Audible can make more money from your hard work.


Thanks for giving us the reaction from the narrator side. It definitely makes it seem like there is an opportunity for a competitor to come in with more favorable terms for authors and narrators and scoop up some marketshare.


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## Justawriter (Jul 24, 2012)

evecarter said:


> Release a new audio book exclusively on your site for the first month, and then through ACX. People hate to wait.


This is a great idea! Following in Beyonce's footsteps&#8230;

Is there any other option besides ACX or are they it?


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## Guest (Feb 27, 2014)

mrv01d said:


> *****: Are you aware that some writers sold direct to the tune of $60k+ a year long before KDP existed? It's been done and if the booksellers become a hostile sales environment for authors, the ones who are big enough to walk are going to walk and their bank accounts won't even blink.


Are you aware that the fact that "some" people do something is not indicative of a widespread ability for everyone to do so? I mean, SOME people make it to the NBA. That doesn't mean everyone who plays basketball does. And those that do make it did so through enormous effort


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

Working like a bandit here to get all my books posted, drumming my fingers to hear back from my producer so I know whether I need to contact the second-best narrator who auditioned for me to see if she'll contract for the three non-New Zealand books.... This is turning into a busy day! Oh, well, it makes my decision about how many of the audiobooks to do right away REAL easy.


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## Guest (Feb 27, 2014)

MeganBryce said:


> Personally, I think it must be a reaction to Whispersync. Royalties are lower for us and profit is lower for ACX. I get the same royalty as a full-price audio sale if you look at both the ebook and audio, but ACX does not. I think as the audiobook market continues to grow, the larger number of audiobooks sold will make up for this lower royalty. I'll keep on with my original plan with audio.


I can't imagine this has anything to do with Whispersync. I know several people with audible accounts. None of them listen to their audiobooks on Kindles with Whispersync. They listen to them on smartphones and other portable devices or their Fire. Not to mention sales on iTunes have nothing to do with Whispersync. There is just no real logic to this other than greed. It doesn't help authors or narrators at all.


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## Courtney Milan (Feb 27, 2011)

Bards and Sages (Julie) said:


> I can't imagine this has anything to do with Whispersync. I know several people with audible accounts. None of them listen to their audiobooks on Kindles with Whispersync. They listen to them on smartphones and other portable devices or their Fire. Not to mention sales on iTunes have nothing to do with Whispersync. There is just no real logic to this other than greed. It doesn't help authors or narrators at all.


Agreed. If this were the case, they could amend the contract to have 40% royalties for those sales in particular, and keep the royalty rates otherwise in place.


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## FictionalWriter (Aug 4, 2010)

Okay, sent my letter off to express my displeasure. Luckily, my next audio book will be out before March 12 but I don't see any coming after that.


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## JeffreyKafer (May 22, 2011)

nothing to do with Whispersync. This is simply Audible wanting to make more money because they know they are the only game in town.


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## redacted (Dec 16, 2013)

Well, this is disappointing. Looks like it's time to take my books out of KDP Select and expand to other retailers. Even if I'll be losing money in terms of borrows (right now, the borrows from Select easily outpace the combined sales on the other retailers by a ratio of 2 to 1), I think it'll be worth it, in the long run, not to be too dependent on the almighty Zon.

Anyone else making the move?


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## Alan Petersen (May 20, 2011)

JeffreyKafer said:


> The narrators groups over on FB are going NUTS about this, because it is simply corporate greed. ACX does nothing to produce these books, has no upfront expense with the production. That's all on the authors' shoulders and in the case of royalty share, all on the narrator's shoulders.
> 
> It's simply going to mean that you authors won't be able to pay appropriate rates, which means you'll get subpar narrators and the quality of your titles will go down. All so Audible can make more money from your hard work.


Absolutely. I thought ACX operated like one of the freelance sites (escrow payments, 1099 management, etc.) but they have a clunky interface and we (authors and narrators) handle everything else. Compare that to how oDesk or Elance operates and it's night/day. And now they have the cajones to pay less. Dumbfounded.


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## Guest (Feb 27, 2014)

JeffreyKafer said:


> nothing to do with Whispersync. This is simply Audible wanting to make more money because they know they are the only game in town.


And increasing the "bounty" at the same time is a real slap in the face. We're going to pay you less, but still expect you to help us remain a monopoly in audiobooks by getting more people to use us exclusively (via a paid membership). Why would I go out of my way to encourage people to get a membership when that will just embolden them to potentially lower payments again in the future?


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## Courtney Milan (Feb 27, 2011)

Bards and Sages (Julie) said:


> And increasing the "bounty" at the same time is a real slap in the face. We're going to pay you less, but still expect you to help us remain a monopoly in audiobooks by getting more people to use us exclusively (via a paid membership). Why would I go out of my way to encourage people to get a membership when that will just embolden them to potentially lower payments again in the future?


They're not increasing the bounty. They used to pay three authors $25 bounties each. Now they're paying one author a $50 bounty.


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

Maybe those narrators on FB will create TNC (The Narrators Collective) and replace ACX as middle man to iTunes etc.


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## Guest (Feb 27, 2014)

Courtney Milan said:


> They're not increasing the bounty. They used to pay three authors $25 bounties each. Now they're paying one author a $50 bounty.


Ye gods, you're right. I just re-read that. You used to get $25 if your book was one of the first three bought. Now you only get it if it is the first one.

And yet they called it an increase in their announcement. Slimy.


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## SeanBlack (May 13, 2010)

jackcrows said:


> Well, this is disappointing. Looks like it's time to take my books out of KDP Select and expand to other retailers. Even if I'll be losing money in terms of borrows (right now, the borrows from Select easily outpace the combined sales on the other retailers by a ratio of 2 to 1), I think it'll be worth it, in the long run, not to be too dependent on the almighty Zon.
> 
> Anyone else making the move?


I know this is a subject of often heated debate, but apart from very early on or for a limited 3 month release window I have never been exclusive to Amazon. I don't think it qualifies as a strategy to be exclusive to one sales channel.

When I started using KDP it took a while to establish a foothold and I've found the same to be true with Kobo (as much as they drive me nuts), Apple, Nook and the others. Now Amazon is 50% and the others likely make up 50% of my ebook revenue so if I Amazon did pull a stunt like this I am somewhat cushioned from the impact.

I'd add that when it comes to lots of international territories, Amazon is by no means No. 1, not even close.

Other people's mileage may vary but I think a strategy is to have your work available in as many formats and through as many sales channels as you can. It's just a shame that ACX/Audible have achieved such dominance in audio that they think this will fly.


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## wildwitchof (Sep 2, 2010)

I'm not good at writing complaint letters (way too meek.) Is anyone willing to post theirs as a sample and I can sign/send a version of it? Patricia quoted hers, but I don't want to plagiarize without permission.


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## Courtney Milan (Feb 27, 2011)

Gretchen, this is mine:



> I'm writing about the royalty change at ACX. I have been an enthusiastic user of ACX for years. Because I was one of the first authors to walk away from a traditional publishing contract, I serve as a sounding board for a lot of authors who are beginning to self-publish. I'm a relatively influential voice in the self-publishing community, and I'm also one of the authors who traditionally published authors talk to about their experiences. I've told countless authors--both traditionally published and self-published--about my experiences using ACX, and have suggested to dozens of authors that they should give it a try.
> 
> While your announcement notes that your royalty rates are above what a traditional audio publisher gives an author, this neglects one crucial point: A traditional audio publisher bears the cost of production. Of course I'm going to get less of a reward going through them.
> 
> ...


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## Courtney Milan (Feb 27, 2011)

1001nightspress said:


> I guess they thought that would sound better than "Exciting new decrease!"
> 
> So now will they be able to afford royalty statements?


Yes, because emailed royalty statements are SO much more expensive.


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## FictionalWriter (Aug 4, 2010)

SM Reine said:


> Where should I email my complaint for it to be most useful? I don't know if I should be bugging my usual contact at ACX about this or if there's some way to get it higher up the food chain.


[email protected]


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## Just Browsing (Sep 26, 2012)

Courtney Milan said:


> Yes, because emailed royalty statements are SO much more expensive.


Maybe if they drop the royalty to 30%, they'll even be able to post them online in our accounts, like, oh, everybody else does.


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## wildwitchof (Sep 2, 2010)

Courtney Milan said:


> Gretchen, this is mine:


Thanks, Courtney. I knew you had a great letter in you


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## Sonya Bateman (Feb 3, 2013)

Where is the tearing-my-hair-out smiley?

Argh. "This reeks like an open sewer in August" is not strong enough.


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## ElHawk (Aug 13, 2012)

Yeah, this is a huge bummer.  I'm glad I've been moving everything over to financing production directly and not using stipends or royalty shares, but this sucks for folks who haven't found their go-to narrators yet, and for people who were benefitting from that nice escalator clause.

I don't doubt that any other company that wanted to offer a similar platform for indies to make and distribute audiobooks would have an easy time of it.  People love audiobooks, and there aren't enough options out there as it is.  Now there's going to be a nice demand for more competition with Audible and ACX.


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## scribblr (Aug 20, 2010)

Amazon's policy is to sell at the lowest possible price. They always do this on the backs of their suppliers. They make the supplier take the hit in their goal to control the worldwide sale of goods and merchandise. We'd all be getting 35% maximum royalty on ebooks if not for Steve Jobs. It's competition alone that forced Amazon to share the wealth.

Amazon has been trying to get me to go with their audiobook services for several years, first with Audible.com, and then with ACX, but I've been too busy and I didn't like the offers. So I shopped around and found the audiobook production market to be very limited. No doubt, the Audible/ACX marketing ability has discouraged other people from even entering the market. The 800 pound gorilla in the room always stifles all competition. What it can't stifle, it buys out. Amazon is lowering the royalty share simply because they can, and this probably won't be the last decrease if authors don't stand against it. A couple of weeks ago I discussed the fact with my KDP rep that none of my books are available as audiobooks. During that discussion, I tentatively agreed to put one of my books through ACX under a new pilot program (which I won't discuss even though I hadn't yet signed the confidentially agreement).

An hour ago I notified my rep that I will NOT be participating in that program, or any other with Audible/ACX.

And if Amazon is going to harm their own virtual audiobook monopoly, a host of new production companies may seize the opportunity to grab part of the market share.


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## Guest (Feb 27, 2014)

This is what I wrote, which in retrospect is much more subdued than my usual complaint letters. But I'll probably be writing a snail mail letter directly to Amazon as well, because I fear we'll need to go a bit further up the food chain to get a reply.



> I am emailing to voice my displeasure with these arbitrary and one-sided changes to the ACX service. These changes are not in line with how your parent company, Amazon.com, has traditionally treated content producers.
> 
> The very wording of the message is an insult to intelligent people.
> 
> ...


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## AutumnKQ (Jul 27, 2013)

Is there a way to get audiobooks on Audible without ACX?  What about Amazon?


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## JeffreyKafer (May 22, 2011)

AutumnKQ said:


> Is there a way to get audiobooks on Audible without ACX? What about Amazon?


Amazon owns Audible/ACX. so, no. At least not aside from using a traditional publisher.


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

> Taking 60% of the cut on something that requires thousands to create, while delivering no value add of any sort...well, let's just say that's an unprecedented margin.


Delivers no value of any sort? So why use them?


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## Jackie Barbosa (Mar 23, 2011)

I have yet to produce any audiobooks, but I was planning to do so this year. Now, I'm not.

I thought perhaps it might benefit ACX to know that they're not just losing existing content producers, but driving away new ones. Here's my letter:



> I'm sure you're receiving plenty of angry email on this subject, but I want to add my voice. I am not, at present, an author who has produced an audiobook with ACX, but I was planning on doing an audio version of at least one of my books in 2014. Now, I am not.
> 
> My chances of earning back my production costs were low even at 50% with an escalation, but at 40% the risk is simply too great for me to even test the waters. I don't need audiobooks enough to justify bearing the costs of production for less than half the sale price, especially when I won't have control over distribution channels or pricing.
> 
> But I guess I can thank you for helping me reduce the number of items on my "to-do" list.


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## SeanBlack (May 13, 2010)

Bards and Sages (Julie) said:


> This is what I wrote, which in retrospect is much more subdued than my usual complaint letters. But I'll probably be writing a snail mail letter directly to Amazon as well, because I fear we'll need to go a bit further up the food chain to get a reply.


Excellent letter, Julie, as was Courtney's and the others posted. I agree with Jeffrey that as an Amazon company they need to see some pushback to this.


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## JeffreyKafer (May 22, 2011)

Terrence OBrien said:


> Delivers no value of any sort? So why use them?


You got another option?


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## cee-dog (Feb 27, 2014)

This is an Orwellian idea that will quickly circle round and bite ACX on the backside.

It’s never “encouraging” to people if you cut their pay.

Offering a potential 90% royalty for achieving high sales *is* an incentive for all the creative people in the supply chain.

Cutting it to a 40% royalty (no matter how much you sell) is *not*. 

Especially for a key part of the production chain--producer/narrators.

Let's face it, the vast majority of ACX's royalty-only deals are on books by unknown authors that might sell a few hundred copies.

So if I'm looking at 60-80 hours of production time (recording, editing, finishing) for a 15-hour book, why would I choose to do that for a couple of hundred bucks when I can (and recently did) negotiate a per-finished-hour rate of (for example) $250 to $300 pfh (and with SAG-AFTRA benefits?)

Clearly, I won’t. 

The new bounty, certainly doesn’t offset the lost potential royalties. $12.50 is a good tip for lunch, not ten days of production.

Bottom line: If you want to hire the best talent, you have to be willing to pay for it.

I got into audiobooks last year when I became aware of SAG-AFTRA’s success in getting major audiobook publishers into the union fold.

In other words, there was potential for me to use my talent in the audiobook arena and be fairly compensated for it.

ACX’s new deal, is a puzzling step backward.


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

JeffreyKafer said:


> You got another option?


There might be others, but I don't know them. It looks like AXC delivers value and they are increasing the price of that value. It would be the same situation if they reduced the KDP eBook royalty. KDP delivers great value.


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## Pnjw (Apr 24, 2011)

JeffreyKafer said:


> The narrators groups over on FB are going NUTS about this, because it is simply corporate greed. ACX does nothing to produce these books, has no upfront expense with the production. That's all on the authors' shoulders and in the case of royalty share, all on the narrator's shoulders.
> 
> It's simply going to mean that you authors won't be able to pay appropriate rates, which means you'll get subpar narrators and the quality of your titles will go down. All so Audible can make more money from your hard work.


I am not surprised the narrators are going crazy. It's a blow to all authors and narrators. I'm hugely disappointed and frustrated by this.


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## Courtney Milan (Feb 27, 2011)

The cynical part of me thinks that they announced the 40% flat royalty so that there would be outcry, and then they could come back and reinstitute a 40% to 70% increasing royalty, and people would be mollified. Because look, they just gave way! It's like a compromise, even though it's a substantial cut.


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## 31842 (Jan 11, 2011)

Just throwing it out there for anyone else seriously looking for other options, do a quick google for Voice Over Talent. There was site after site after site of voice over production companies who will do exactly the same services that ACX provided. You will be responsible for distribution, but take a look at CD Baby. I'm still looking for the fine print, but it appears that for a flat $50, they will list your "album" on all the major sites and take care of distribution: http://members.cdbaby.com/sell-music All the money is yours. It's a brave new world.

ETA: Found this interesting article on Voices.com http://www.voices.com/resources/articles/audiobooks/distributing-your-audiobook


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## Charmaine (Jul 20, 2012)

All I know is that if I get an email about this regarding dropping royalty for the ebooks,
my first plan of action is to setup 100 ebook drafts before the deadline.
yes I'm talking ebook 1, ebook 2, etc. with a file that has random filler in it so it can hold my place with the old royalty agreement.

Had no intention of doing audiobooks, but I'm tempted to do it here.
I've never used ACX, but can't you hold something in draft indefinitely? 
Don't even need a narrator agreement. In case you were going to do it yourself and then at a later date decided you wanted to hire out.


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## X. Aratare (Feb 5, 2013)

This isn't going to just affect royalty share deals, but also paying in advance.  For example, I paid $200 a finished hour for my audiobook.  Now with the possibility of it taking much longer to make up those costs due to the 40% flat royalties, my desire/ability to pay that much again is lowered and clearly I'm not alone. People will offer less to voice actors for the same work, or they won't try to produce audiobooks at all, which again takes money out of voice actors' profits.

Also, the fact that ACX is now taking more profit than the artists ever will is like having our noses rubbed into the dirt.  Why should they get 60%?  Because they're advertising the own site?!? It's insane.  And gee, thanks for the doublespeak in the email and two weeks notice.  Really good of you ...

I'll be adding my own displeasure in an email today as well.


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## wildwitchof (Sep 2, 2010)

Courtney Milan said:


> The cynical part of me thinks that they announced the 40% flat royalty so that there would be outcry, and then they could come back and reinstitute a 40% to 70% increasing royalty, and people would be mollified. Because look, they just gave way! It's like a compromise, even though it's a substantial cut.


LOL, I'm cynical too. One of my first thoughts was, "when people complain, they'll 'improve' it to 50% flat rate with no escalator." Then we 'win' and they don't have to pay out 90% to the Hughs of the world. (Of course there's only one real Hugh. I was speaking figuratively.)


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## JeffreyKafer (May 22, 2011)

Charmaine said:


> Don't even need a narrator agreement. In case you were going to do it yourself and then at a later date decided you wanted to hire out.


Nope. You need to have an agreed upon contract with a narrator before the deadline.


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## Charmaine (Jul 20, 2012)

JeffreyKafer said:


> Nope. You need to have an agreed upon contract with a narrator before the deadline.


Fudgesticks! That sucks.
Rummaging my brain for a loophole.

What if you were your own narrator?
Make a load of contracts with yourself before the deadline?
Then hiring it out, but that may be a breech of contract... 
Back to the drawing board


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

Just heard from ACX that as long as you make the offer and get the acceptance before March 12, you can set the completion date as far into the future as necessary. You just have to have the agreement in place by then. I'm scrambling right now to get it all lined up for all my books.


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## Christa Wick (Nov 1, 2012)

Courtney Milan said:


> Well, Apple's 70% royalty rate preceded Amazon's, you may recall. Amazon was 35% before Apple came along.


And Apple was 70% for music and apps before they put up an iBook store.

I just wish Apple would let us upload audiobooks, too. Audible might be inclined to reconsider.


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## AutumnKQ (Jul 27, 2013)

KateDanley said:


> Just throwing it out there for anyone else seriously looking for other options, do a quick google for Voice Over Talent. There was site after site after site of voice over production companies who will do exactly the same services that ACX provided. You will be responsible for distribution, but take a look at CD Baby. I'm still looking for the fine print, but it appears that for a flat $50, they will list your "album" on all the major sites and take care of distribution: http://members.cdbaby.com/sell-music All the money is yours. It's a brave new world.
> 
> ETA: Found this interesting article on Voices.com http://www.voices.com/resources/articles/audiobooks/distributing-your-audiobook


I'm using CD Baby for my music. That's what I've been googling...to see if I could use them for audiobooks. I'm still not sure. They get your albums listed in the music categories...


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## minxmalone (Oct 28, 2012)

I wrote to them as well. I've recommended ACX to a lot of people as well and this feels like a slap in the face. Here's my letter:



I'm stunned by the recent change in royalty rate. This is going to force a lot of the small publishers to evaluate whether it makes more sense to simply sell audiobooks from our own websites. Due to the membership credits Audible uses, most of my audio titles are receiving only $5 or $6 per audiobook for a title that is selling on the site for $19.98. This is an effective royalty rate of only about 31%.

If the stated royalty is now 40% with no option for escalation, then the actual royalty is going to be so small that I'm not sure it's worth it. I could sell them on my website for $9.99 and make out better, especially for the books that are in a popular series with an established fan base.

I sincerely hope that Audible and ACX rethinks this new royalty plan because it feels like a blatant money grab after you've locked us into exclusive distribution with you.


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## Robert Bidinotto (Mar 3, 2011)

My email letter, just sent to ACX:

Sirs:

I used ACX for the production of the audiobook edition of my bestseller, _HUNTER_. The terms at that time were attractive to me, worth the investment risk, especially using the royalty-share arrangement. The audiobook has been successful, recouping production costs quickly and adding a source of income.

However, the new terms you have just announced make future use of your service far less attractive to me and to my narrator. Fixed costs are always increasing over time, yet the significantly reduced royalties (a 20% decline for each of us) substantially increase the risk that we will fail to recoup, let alone exceed, our significant investments of time, effort, and money.

I shall shortly release the sequel to my first bestseller, which I also expect will sell very well. However, the reduced likelihood of getting a decent return on investment compels me to rethink my plans to issue an audiobook edition. That is a disappointment to me and to a lot of waiting fans.

These new terms cannot do anything except shrink the future number of available audio titles. By now, you must know that your announcement has upset many independent authors and narrators. I strongly urge you to reconsider this decision, because ACX and, by extension, Amazon, are undermining their reputations and good will with many independent authors.

Sincerely,

Robert Bidinotto


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## mrv01d (Apr 4, 2011)

minxmalone said:


> If the stated royalty is now 40% with no option for escalation, then the actual royalty is going to be so small that I'm not sure it's worth it. I could sell them on my website for $9.99 and make out better, especially for the books that are in a popular series with an established fan base.


Yep. And then when you've exhausted your fan base you can list select audiobooks with ACX and include a push in the script to check out your site and get an audiobook from your personal catalog at a reduced rate or even free. Mwahahaha.


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

Charmaine said:


> All I know is that if I get an email about this regarding dropping royalty for the ebooks,
> my first plan of action is to setup 100 ebook drafts before the deadline.
> yes I'm talking ebook 1, ebook 2, etc. with a file that has random filler in it so it can hold my place with the old royalty agreement.
> 
> ...


This won't work. You have to sign a contract with a narrator for your project to be considered in production.


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## Guest (Feb 27, 2014)

Ryne Douglas Pearson said:


> Maybe they are lowering the royalty rate to fund more stipend productions. That would fit with their language about accommodating more audio productions. Hey, I'm not betting on it, just wondering.


That's the proverbial robbing Peter to pay Paul. Someone can correct me if I am wrong, but the stipend program requires royalty-share, correct? So the producer still loses out in the long run because he makes less per sale. It just shifts the money to the front end instead of over time.


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## EC (Aug 20, 2013)

How about if a narrator agrees to sign a contract on a draft book?  Would that work? 

( says I pretending I know what I'm talking about. )


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## ElHawk (Aug 13, 2012)

Yeah, this doesn't look like a great deal for narrators or authors.  Certainly selling audiobooks directly from my web site is looking pretty juicy at this point.  I'm sure it can't be too hard to develop an app that delivers discounted content directly from me to subscribers.  It can't be any harder to deliver an audiobook than it is an ebook, which is to say, not hard at all.

I really need to start talking to my two app-writing brothers-in-law about this.


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## JeffreyKafer (May 22, 2011)

ElHawk said:


> It can't be any harder to deliver an audiobook than it is an ebook, which is to say, not hard at all.


I thought this, too.

I was soo sooo wrong. Delivering an audiobook is a HUGE technical hurdle. You have to give MP3s AND .M4Bs for regular MP3 players and ipods. Plus you've got to make sure you're serving the audio correctly, or it will timeout due to file size issues. PLUS you have the oh-so-fun task doing customer service when someone's ancient legacy player doesn't work correctly or whatnot.

I've done this. Trust me. It sucks.


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## Jay Allan (Aug 20, 2012)

ElHawk said:


> Yeah, this doesn't look like a great deal for narrators or authors. Certainly selling audiobooks directly from my web site is looking pretty juicy at this point. I'm sure it can't be too hard to develop an app that delivers discounted content directly from me to subscribers. It can't be any harder to deliver an audiobook than it is an ebook, which is to say, not hard at all.
> 
> I really need to start talking to my two app-writing brothers-in-law about this.


How does selling a fraction as many books from your own website compare favorably to a 20% royalty reduction?

You can't really think you can sell as many directly as you can on the Audible platform.


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## LeeBee (Feb 19, 2014)

Terrence OBrien said:


> Delivers no value of any sort? So why use them?


The statement you were quoting was not that ACX "delivers no value." It was that they are arbitrarily making a huge cut in the potential rewards of using their service without ADDING any other value ("delivering no value add").


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## Pnjw (Apr 24, 2011)

1001nightspress said:


> No, for my book with a stipend (of ACX putting in $100 per finished hour), only one narrator was willing to do a royalty split with me on that. The others all wanted between $100 an $400 an hour on top of that. I actually thought the royalty split guy was best anyway, before I checked his terms.
> 
> I could live with them backing off some on the escalation. Like sending it up to 70% instead of 90%. But to reduce it from the get go AND have no escalation? This is supposed to encourage us? wtf?


I agree that I could live with backing down off the 90% to maybe 70%. But a 10% cut across the board with no escalator stinks of a money grab. I'm scrutinizing my draconian royalty reports and will make a decision as to what to do in the future, but it isn't looking good to continue to produce audio (which kills me, because I love audio).


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## EC (Aug 20, 2013)

With the amount of people that are stating they will walk away from audio, it could be a great opportunity for those that stick with it.


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## JeffreyKafer (May 22, 2011)

SM Reine said:


> That said, if there is a viable alternative distribution method (like going to iTunes directly, as the effulgent Kate Danley mentioned above),


Audible is the exclusive distributor to iTunes. So, they've got us all by the short hairs until iTunes goes their own way and starts their own audiobook store. But I doubt they'll give out 50% royalties.


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## STubbs (May 13, 2013)

Great... so the level of narrator talent on ACX will drop and the royalties will drop as well.  

Smashwords ought to get into the audiobook business... yesterday.


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## Michael Kingswood (Feb 18, 2011)

AutumnKQ said:


> Is there a way to get audiobooks on Audible without ACX? What about Amazon?


There are several ways, in fact. ACX was just the easiest to find and do. J Daniel Sawyer wrote a great book about everything you need to know to make audiobooks called Making Tracks, that talks about some of the other options.


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## scribblr (Aug 20, 2010)

theblether said:


> With the amount of people that are stating they will walk away from audio, it could be a great opportunity for those that stick with it.


I haven't seen posts about anybody walking away from audio, just walking away from ACX.


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## EC (Aug 20, 2013)

scribblr said:


> I haven't seen posts about anybody walking away from audio, just walking away from ACX.


Touche

Point me in the direction of the other show in town please.


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## JeffreyKafer (May 22, 2011)

There is no other show in town. At least not in terms of enough market share to recoup the costs of production.


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## Robert Bidinotto (Mar 3, 2011)

Which is the problem: The combo of Audible, iTunes, and the Amazon platform constitute a huge share of the audio marketplace. 

This is a great opportunity for Google or Apple to step in and offer a competitive alternative, no?


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## Monique (Jul 31, 2010)

I don't think anyone posted this, but I suggest everyone also post comments on the ACX blog post:

http://blog.acx.com/2014/02/27/an-important-note-about-acx-payments/


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## EC (Aug 20, 2013)

JeffreyKafer said:


> There is no other show in town. At least not in terms of enough market share to recoup the costs of production.


Yup,

I'm of the opinion that ACX are out of order by not only drastically reducing the royalty structure, but also springing this on us at short notice. I'm launching the first of a twelve part series on Saturday and ACX were part of the strategy. They still will be as I can cram ( hopefully ) at least half of the titles in before midnight on the 11th.

If they had even given us fair warning, say 90 days, so that those among us that had WIP's could accelerate that would have been tolerable. The reality is I had to go wake a good friend of mine halfway through the night in Asia to alert her. With the short window, and knowing that she had several WIP's, I knew she couldn't afford to lose a working day US time.

As it turned out, she had just picked up on it from another source and was already in communication with her narrators and others. ACX have put the stress level up. That wasn't very polite.


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## Zelah Meyer (Jun 15, 2011)

Well, as a European, they don't want to work with me anyway.  

However, this move makes me want to DIY and diversify as much as possible.  Yes, it means the audiobook might not be listed on Amazon with the print & ebook versions - but it would still be available.  (I've got a background in performance, and my main improvisation teacher was a voice-over artist who gave us tips on doing voice work in a few of his lessons.  Thus, it wouldn't be a total culture shock to do my own.  Though the editing & production would be a scary learning curve!)

I agree that this could be a bit of an own-goal for them.  Because, they currently have a near monopoly, and this encourages people to look into new start-ups, or to look into adding audio sales/distribution to their existing portfolio.  I'm another one hoping that Smashwords will pick up the ball, but they may be too busy at the moment consolidating what they already do.


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## Elliott Garber (Apr 8, 2013)

Rosalind James said:


> Just heard from ACX that as long as you make the offer and get the acceptance before March 12, you can set the completion date as far into the future as necessary. You just have to have the agreement in place by then. I'm scrambling right now to get it all lined up for all my books.


Do you know what this would mean for someone like me who is planning to narrate my own book that will be released this summer? Do you think I could get some kind of draft up there with ACX prior to the deadline and still take advantage of the higher rates?


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## Michael Kingswood (Feb 18, 2011)

JeffreyKafer said:


> There is no other show in town. At least not in terms of enough market share to recoup the costs of production.


There are other distributors who can get you into Audible, and thus into iTunes.


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## X. Aratare (Feb 5, 2013)

Monique said:


> I don't think anyone posted this, but I suggest everyone also post comments on the ACX blog post:
> 
> http://blog.acx.com/2014/02/27/an-important-note-about-acx-payments/


I tried to comment, but it kept having errors. Here's what I attempted to say:

Paying for production up front is what I do now, but the thought that it will not take me LONGER to recoup those costs makes it less likely I will want to pay as much, which reduces the voice artist's cut, too. Many people are saying that they won't even start doing audiobooks now, because of the flat rate and the ham-handed and disingenuous way this was handled. How is this increasing production of audiobooks exactly?

Also, what about the fact that you are now decreasing the amount that can be earned by getting people to sign up for Audible? It was before that 3 people could get the $25 bounty, now only 1 person can get $50, which makes it all the harder to get any bounty.'

Stating, too, that you are higher in royalties than other traditional audiobook publishers is comparing apples to oranges as those other publishers PAY FOR THE UPFRONT COSTS. Right now I'm paying for those costs and you want to take 60% of what I earn.
And thanks for the 2 weeks notice for this huge change. This looks so greedy, so foolish and short-sighted that I'm embarrassed about it. I normally am very supportive of Amazon companies, but this just reeks of wrongness.


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

X. Aratare said:


> I tried to comment, but it kept having errors. Here's what I attempted to say:
> 
> Paying for production up front is what I do now, but the thought that it will not take me LONGER to recoup those costs makes it less likely I will want to pay as much, which reduces the voice artist's cut, too. Many people are saying that they won't even start doing audiobooks now, because of the flat rate and the ham-handed and disingenuous way this was handled. How is this increasing production of audiobooks exactly?
> 
> ...


It's working again now. I just made a post.


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## Hugh Howey (Feb 11, 2012)

blakebooks said:


> The removal of the escalator clause will also remove a huge incentive for production. Most won't hit the point where that matters, but several of my titles have, and it's a good chunk of change as it increases.
> 
> A prediction: this will substantially chill the appetite for doing audiobooks. If I have to pay $2500 up front for a decent narrator to perform a book, it substantially alters my ROI, and further reduces my overall expectations for income moving beyond the ROI date, both in absolute royalties as well as escalated royalties. That means the investment parameters change, and I have to look at alternative areas to invest my cash.
> 
> I don't condemn what they are doing, but if their goal is to increase the market size, this is a terrible way to go about it. It will have the reverse effect.


Yup. I see this really reducing the pool of VAs as well. The only reason many could take the risk to do a split with indie authors was the chance of earning a higher rate. This is a bad move. I would understand getting rid of the escalators and moving to a flat 60% for the author, but not moving below the entry threshold.


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

Remember: you don't have to have the project finished. You just have to have an agreement to do the project in place. The due date for the project can be months down the road.

You have almost two weeks to post your titles, audition narrators, select one, and make an agreement. All that took me about a week first time around. Already today I have discovered that my current production company can't commit to the additional three titles, have confirmed that my narrator wants to do them, have secured a referral to another production company in her area, and have talked to my #2 choice narrator and confirmed that she wants to do the three books in my second series and will send me an audition tomorrow. Result: I think I can have all eight books up by the end of June, at current royalty rates. I've got four of the books put up on ACX this morning, about to do the last two. 

So if you want to do audio through ACX and you want current rates, you still can. You just have to hustle and get your ducks in a row within the next 13 days, and you're all set.


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## Guest (Feb 27, 2014)

Hugh Howey said:


> Yup. I see this really reducing the pool of VAs as well. The only reason many could take the risk to do a split with indie authors was the chance of earning a higher rate. This is a bad move. I would understand getting rid of the escalators and moving to a flat 60% for the author, but not moving below the entry threshold.


Come on, Hugh! Get your buddy Jeff on the phone and get this fixed! 

But seriously, yes, what you described above would have been more in line with how Amazon companies normally work.

The more I think about this, the more it doesn't make sense. My normal thought process is to never assume malice where stupidity will suffice. I just have to think this was a boneheaded decision by some bean-counter in ACX's accounting department and nobody stopped and asked if it would make sense. The alternative is to assume malice. And while I have never been a "cheerleader" for Amazon, I've always considered them a smart company that makes smart business decisions. There is nothing smart about this decision.


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## ElHawk (Aug 13, 2012)

Jay Allan said:


> How does selling a fraction as many books from your own website compare favorably to a 20% royalty reduction?
> 
> You can't really think you can sell as many directly as you can on the Audible platform.


Oh, I don't think I could out-sell what I sell on Audible. But diversifying where I do sell, and having full control over at least one of those places, is smart. Wouldn't you agree?

I only meant that I've been thinking about figuring out how to deliver ebook content directly via an app; might as well roll audiobooks into that plan, too. The intent isn't to out-sell any current, better-established platform...just to have a safety net that remains fully in my own control.


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## Abalone (Jan 31, 2014)

This is the time for revolt! Revolt I say! Grab your shields and spears, head towards the sunset. Raise your arms in rebellion. 







Seriously, I looked over their royalty chart last week or the week before. I thought it was pitiful, and this is far worse. Though I suppose there isn't a large market for audio books.


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## Christa Wick (Nov 1, 2012)

I can't use my wordpress login, etc., so the comment I tried to post won't go up. However, instead of racing to get titles through the system to capitalize on the existing rates, I removed my open audition titles today.



> Regrettably, I returned my open audition titles (Sexting Curves and Curve Contract) to Rights Not Posted today due to ACX's recent announcement on royalty reductions. I do not wish to waste the time of potential narrators while I consider whether (and how) I will pursue audiobook production given the very non-competitive rates now offered by ACX.
> 
> I would offer my best regards, but I'm not really feeling it right now.
> 
> ...


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## Guest (Feb 27, 2014)

A thought:

If you have a paperback edition listed on Amazon, why not offer your "used" copy.
Describe it as "Audio Book" in "New" condition and set your price.


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## Robert Bidinotto (Mar 3, 2011)

Google, for one, ought to be salivating over a lucrative new business opportunity. "Find a need and fill it" is the marketing mantra, right? Well, the dissatisfactions being expressed LOUDLY today certainly reveal a big market demand for a better deal.


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## wildwitchof (Sep 2, 2010)

It's the combination of low payout and high risk that makes this so bad.

To get the 40% flat "royalty", you have to pay for everything, then give ACX exclusive rights for 7 years. That's a generation (or more) in internet terms. Who knows what will change over that time? We can't imagine.

I've just done the same thing Rosalind did, though with only one book. I contacted my narrator, she's willing to roll, we'll get the offer signed before March 11. But I'll wait a long time before I decide on any others.


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## Christa Wick (Nov 1, 2012)

Gretchen Galway said:


> To get the 40% flat "royalty", you have to pay for everything, then give ACX exclusive rights for 7 years. That's a generation (or more) in internet terms. Who knows what will change over that time? We can't imagine.


Unless they further changed the terms, the seven-year exclusivity requirement has always been for royalty share arrangements only. If you go exclusive and paid the flat per finished hour fee, the exclusivity requirement was one year. If they changed that, too, they are all kinds of crazy.


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

Christa Wick said:


> Unless they further changed the terms, the seven-year exclusivity requirement has always been for royalty share arrangements only. If you go exclusive and paid the flat per finished hour fee, the exclusivity requirement was one year. If they changed that, too, they are all kinds of crazy.


I believe it IS 7 years and has been for a while now.


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

LeeBee said:


> The statement you were quoting was not that ACX "delivers no value." It was that they are arbitrarily making a huge cut in the potential rewards of using their service without ADDING any other value ("delivering no value add").


Perhaps Blake was referring to incremental added value or additional added value. That's reasonable, and I would accept his evaluation.

Pricing can get complicated.. Would anyone refrain from increasing a book price because there was no incremental added value? It usually has more to do with market conditions than marginal costs for sellers or marginal benefit to buyers.


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## Joe_Nobody (Oct 23, 2012)

I've got my guys working on going direct.

They've only been on it a few hours, but so far they haven't come up with any reason why it can't be done.

Here's what they are thinking so far:

1. Go to Elance to hire the narrator. Eventually word will get around the narrator crowd.
2. Upload the audio book directly to Amazon via an Amazon Seller account. This is easy to set up.
3. Upload directly to iTunes. If you sell on iTunes already, then you already have an account.
4. Look into cloud based storage for selling directly off of our website so we won't have bandwidth fees or issues.

As I look at my a-book statement, I'm not clear on the percentage of sales via Amazon versus Audible's web site. So far we haven't come up with a way to list directly with Audible. Worse case is you don't select the exclusive distribution and take the 35% while uploading direct to the other sites. It's only 5% less after these changes go in.

Another idea that we're floating around is listing all upcoming titles on ACX before the deadline, and then choosing the option where we are providing the book ourselves. This would be an executed contract if our understanding is correct and hold the current royalty percentage once you upload the book later.


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## Christa Wick (Nov 1, 2012)

markecooper said:


> I believe it IS 7 years and has been for a while now.


Ugh - I guess it depends on what "produced through ACX means" -- if it means: you used the site to hire the narrator for a flat fee, the narrator uploaded the chapters to ACX, then ACX compiled into the audiobook and put it up for sale, then *%$# -

Because (1) I emailed them and asked about the length of the exclusivity period for flat production fee and (2) I was looking at paragraph 13 of the agreement (but WTF does the paragraph exist in an ACX agreement at all? you will always be producing through ACX if the above scenario is all it takes).



> Designation of Exclusive or Non-Exclusive Distribution Rights to Audible and Change of Designation
> If you elect to pay the Producer who produces an Audiobook a one-time production fee, you have the option of granting Audible exclusive or non-exclusive distribution rights to the Audiobook, and if you grant Audible exclusive distribution rights, you can change your grant to non-exclusive at any time after the one year anniversary of the date that Audible first makes the Audiobook available for sale by emailing [email protected] with a request for the change. If you make this request after this initial one-year period, Audible will change its distribution right to the Audiobook to non-exclusive effective within 60 days from the date of its receipt of your request. Audible will notify you in writing when the change is made and the date of Audible's written notification will be the effective date of the change. Until the effective date of the change, the applicable Audiobook remains exclusive to Audible and you cannot distribute the Audiobook to other retail outlets or through other distribution channels. From and after the effective date of the change, you will be entitled to royalties on sales of the Audiobook by Audible in accordance with Audible's standard ACX Royalty Payment Terms and Procedures for Pay-for-Production Deals (Audible Non-Exclusive Distribution Rights) in effect as of the date Audible receives your notice requesting the change. Click here to see the current version of the ACX Royalty Payment Terms and Procedures for Pay-for-Production Deals (Audible Non-Exclusive Distribution Rights)


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

Joe_Nobody said:


> I've got my guys working on going direct.
> 
> They've only been on it a few hours, but so far they haven't come up with any reason why it can't be done.
> 
> ...


I have 2 WIPs that won't be published anywhere near in time now. It's a shame because the way ACX works you need to claim your title from a list, and of course that list is supplied via amazon. So if your title isn't there yet you can't claim it and get a narrator to sign a contract even if you planned to set the audio release way off in the future.

You know how the narrators upload individual chapters to ACX to fall in line with the whisper synch specs? How does iTunes handle files? Do we need to combine all those chapter files somehow into one mp3 file?


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

Christa Wick said:


> Ugh - I guess it depends on what "produced through ACX means" -- if it means: you used the site to hire the narrator for a flat fee, the narrator uploaded the chapters to ACX, then ACX compiled into the audiobook and put it up for sale, then *%$# -
> 
> Because (1) I emailed them and asked about the length of the exclusivity period for flat production fee and (2) I was looking at paragraph 13 of the agreement (but WTF does the paragraph exist in an ACX agreement at all? you will always be producing through ACX if the above scenario is all it takes).


Produced through ACX is pretty much what you do when you find a narrator through them, do the audition etc. If you have a narrator make the book completely outside of ACX you handle stuff like contracts and payment completely separate of ACX, then I guess you become a supplier AND producer. The 7 year thing would not then apply is my guess.


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## Jay Allan (Aug 20, 2012)

Do any of you really think you're going to come out ahead with all these schemes and plans to get around ACX?  Keep in mind you don't have to lose all that many sales before you're coming out behind where you'd be on the new pricing structure.  On top of that, how many words can your write in all the time you will waste?

I don't like getting my royalties cut any more than anyone else, but I think most people are just going to waste more time and money and take an even bigger hit.


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## JeffreyKafer (May 22, 2011)

Michael Kingswood said:


> There are other distributors who can get you into Audible, and thus into iTunes.


Yep, and you'll get FAR less of a royalty than what ACX can give you, even at the reduced 40%.


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## JeffreyKafer (May 22, 2011)

There's a petition going around already. Fat lot of good it will do, but it can't hurt: https://www.change.org/petitions/www-acx-com-reverse-changes-to-the-royalty-share-policy


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

Jay Allan said:


> Do any of you really think you're going to come out ahead with all these schemes and plans to get around ACX? Keep in mind you don't have to lose all that many sales before you're coming out behind where you'd be on the new pricing structure. On top of that, how many words can your write in all the time you will waste?
> 
> I don't like getting my royalties cut any more than anyone else, but I think most people are just going to waste more time and money and take an even bigger hit.


What schemes are you referring to? All Ihave done is moved up the publishing to audio schedule of two titles that I had on ACX but not live for my narrator to access. He has signed on now so im not scheming at all.

As for the future, there's nothing stopping anyone creating audio books outside ACX right now and never was. ACX just put narrators and authors in the same place and made it super easy. With some effort the same result can be achieved without ACX in the loop as Joe was saying. I have access to iTunes. I could sell on there. Its more likely I'll just stop producing new audio beyond 2014 but who knows? I'm not burning any bridges.


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## Hugh Howey (Feb 11, 2012)

Is ACX worldwide? If not, is this a move to simplify their royalty structure ahead of announcing a global push?

Even so, why not go with a flat 50% or 60% rate? 60% seems fair to me, with a 1/3, 1/3, ~1/3 royalty split for co-produced works.


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

Hugh Howey said:


> Is ACX worldwide? If not, is this a move to simplify their royalty structure ahead of announcing a global push?
> 
> Even so, why not go with a flat 50% or 60% rate? 60% seems fair to me, with a 1/3, 1/3, ~1/3 royalty split for co-produced works.


Considering what ACX considered fair before (25/25/50) I can't see them offering thirds.


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## zzzzzzz (Dec 6, 2011)

Hugh Howey said:


> Even so, why not go with a flat 50% or 60% rate? 60% seems fair to me, with a 1/3, 1/3, ~1/3 royalty split for co-produced works.


Because they don't have to.


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## blakebooks (Mar 10, 2012)

I see no reason that anyone with an Amazon account couldn't sign up with ACX as a narrator, and select 100% of an author's listed backlist for production. After an "audition" file is accepted, you've made it on all your published titles, and merely need to coordinate with narrators in order to get one. No money goes through ACX for narration, so it's really between the narrator and the author. But good luck getting a stipend.


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## Jay Allan (Aug 20, 2012)

markecooper said:


> What schemes are you referring to? All Ihave done is moved up the publishing to audio schedule of two titles that I had on ACX but not live for my narrator to access. He has signed on now so im not scheming at all.
> 
> As for the future, there's nothing stopping anyone creating audio books outside ACX right now and never was. ACX just put narrators and authors in the same place and made it super easy. With some effort the same result can be achieved without ACX in the loop as Joe was saying. I have access to iTunes. I could sell on there. Its more likely I'll just stop producing new audio beyond 2014 but who knows? I'm not burning any bridges.


I didn't mean schemes in any nefarious context. I mean all the people looking for alternate distribution or talking about selling their audiobooks on their own websites, etc.

Again, I don't see anyone increasing their income by sidestepping ACX.

Certainly, moving up a project, if possible, is a smart thing to do.


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## randw (Feb 27, 2014)

Can one sell a book on one's website for a lower cost than the same audiobook on Audible?


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## Guest (Feb 27, 2014)

I just cancelled my Audible.com membership. And since it didn't give me an option to provide a reason, I decided to be passive-aggressive and alert Audible's customer service department as to why. I informed them that I had cancelled my membership, and when they asked me why I told them because ACX just reduced royalties payable to content providers and removed all incentives for quality narrators to use the service. Since my income through ACX was being reduced by 20%, I was cancelling my membership.

Her response was: "They did what?"


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## LilianaHart (Jun 20, 2011)

Hugh Howey said:


> Is ACX worldwide? If not, is this a move to simplify their royalty structure ahead of announcing a global push?
> 
> Even so, why not go with a flat 50% or 60% rate? 60% seems fair to me, with a 1/3, 1/3, ~1/3 royalty split for co-produced works.


That was my suggestion when I talked to them this morning. I don't see what's in it for me if they're taking the majority share of royalty and I'm STILL having to pay the upfront production costs. That's bad business all around. I told them if they'd reverse it to where authors got 60% flat royalty then they wouldn't be getting so many angry emails right now.


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## C.F. (Jan 6, 2011)

Jay Allan said:


> Do any of you really think you're going to come out ahead with all these schemes and plans to get around ACX? Keep in mind you don't have to lose all that many sales before you're coming out behind where you'd be on the new pricing structure. On top of that, how many words can your write in all the time you will waste?
> 
> I don't like getting my royalties cut any more than anyone else, but I think most people are just going to waste more time and money and take an even bigger hit.


Here's the thing, 7 years of exclusivity is a long time. You know what didn't exist 7 years ago? _The Kindle._ Now imagine 7 years ago you signed an exclusivity agreement with an ebook service that would preclude you from selling on Kindle. A lot can happen in 7 years.

This does not lead me to believe that ACX takes their relationship with authors seriously and is trying to remain competitive. No, they don't have any real competition today, but pulling stuff like this certainly leaves the door open for a competitor to step in. They might not be big this year or next year, but 3 years from now? In 3 years there could be a much better option than ACX, but we'll still have four years of exclusivity left.

If you want me to remain exclusive, you're going to have to do a better job of convincing me that's it a good longterm move. If they keep trending their royalties downward and another option comes along that gives me control of pricing, I'm not sure I want to have to tell my readers that they can get certain of my titles cheap and the others they have to get screwed on because I signed an exclusivity agreement.

Tl;dr We might not come out ahead today or this year, but over 7 years we could.


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## minxmalone (Oct 28, 2012)

Jay Allan said:


> Do any of you really think you're going to come out ahead with all these schemes and plans to get around ACX? Keep in mind you don't have to lose all that many sales before you're coming out behind where you'd be on the new pricing structure. On top of that, how many words can your write in all the time you will waste?
> 
> I don't like getting my royalties cut any more than anyone else, but I think most people are just going to waste more time and money and take an even bigger hit.


Personally I don't think of it as a "scheme" to make plans to sell audiobooks on my own site. Tons of my readers have told me they like audiobooks when they're cleaning house, etc. but they learned about me through my _ebooks_. So, for an existing series with a fan base, it's hardly a far-fetched scheme to tell your readers that future audiobook titles will be sold direct for a reduced price.

Considering that the existing 50% is on NET anyway, my royalty for audiobooks so far has only been about $5.50 per audiobook (with a $19.98 retail price). So I would only have to sell them at $6 each to come out ahead. I'm pretty sure my existing fan base would be really excited to get it that cheaply without having to sign up for a monthly audiobook plan.

Do I think it'll be harder for people who are just starting out? Yes. And that's the really sad part.


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## Guest (Feb 28, 2014)

caethesfaron said:


> If you want me to remain exclusive, you're going to have to do a better job of convincing me that's it a good longterm move. If they keep trending their royalties downward and another option comes along that gives me control of pricing, I'm not sure I want to have to tell my readers that they can get certain of my titles cheap and the others they have to get screwed on because I signed an exclusivity agreement.


Unfortunately for me it has been the opposite. Audible has been heavily discounting my titles recently. Which would be fine if they were eating that discount. But they aren't. I am eating it. The narrators are eating it. So far, I've only used ACX with the royalty share until I was comfortable with it. I hate the interface. The reports make no sense. But I was preparing to go "all-in" with the next project because I've started to see sales and made friendships with my narrators.

But now I'm looking at 40% exclusive. 25% non-exclusive. And now I have to ask myself if I can afford a few grand up front for 40% of whatever price Audible decides to sell my book for. Because right now _A Game of Blood_ is selling for $3.49 with "special pricing". It is over 8 1/2 long. Neither the producer nor I walked into this based on that price.


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## FictionalWriter (Aug 4, 2010)

Narrators are now opting out of royalty share. Big surprise.


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## 31842 (Jan 11, 2011)

Hugh Howey said:


> Is ACX worldwide? If not, is this a move to simplify their royalty structure ahead of announcing a global push?
> 
> Even so, why not go with a flat 50% or 60% rate? 60% seems fair to me, with a 1/3, 1/3, ~1/3 royalty split for co-produced works.


I was thinking something similar, but on the opposite end of the spectrum. They are looking for ways to increase their profit margins quickly, which seems (to me) to indicate that they are in financial trouble or about to lose market share somewhere large. The last story I could find says that Audible and iTunes had an extension on their exclusive agreement until 2010, but prior to that, it was on a four year cycle (2003, renewed in 2007, extension until 2010). Pure speculation, but I wonder if iTunes is about to sever their relationship with Audible. Interesting things are afoot with the DOJ and Apple this week...


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## randw (Feb 27, 2014)

I just cancelled my Audible membership as well. That's a few hundred a year that will go toward reducing the cut.


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## minxmalone (Oct 28, 2012)

1001nightspress said:


> $3.49?? Are you kidding ...


Every single one of mine are at $1.99 with the Whispersync pricing. It's really hard to earn back the production cost with all these discounts. I wish they would just do it on the first in the series and that's it.


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## wildwitchof (Sep 2, 2010)

minxmalone said:


> Every single one of mine are at $1.99 with the Whispersync pricing. It's really hard to earn back the production cost with all these discounts. I wish they would just do it on the first in the series and that's it.


Mine is also $1.99 with Whispersync. And because of the vague or delayed reporting, I don't yet know what percentage of my sales lately is bringing me only $1. Pessimistic me thinks: all of them. That first month at full price was great, but now... I don't know. I'll continue with the second book's production, but I'm not sticking my neck out for more.

btw, the word "scheme" is a nefarious plot to most Americans, but just a "plan" to British ears. I've learned that by listening to the BBC. They made everything sound so sinister!


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## Incognita (Apr 3, 2011)

I was lucky enough to get stipends for all three of my titles, but since I was pretty sure they wouldn't be lobbing another one of those my way, I was thinking about financing the next one if I could squeeze the money from somewhere. But with these crazy discounts and a lower royalty? No, thanks. I don't sell a ton of audiobooks anyway (I never could figure out how to market them), so I think I'm just going to back away from the whole thing for now and wait to see how it shakes out.


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## randw (Feb 27, 2014)

I just cancelled my Audible membership as well. That's a few hundred a year that will go toward reducing the cut.


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## mrv01d (Apr 4, 2011)

Bards and Sages (Julie) said:


> But now I'm looking at 40% exclusive. 25% non-exclusive. And now I have to ask myself if I can afford a few grand up front for 40% of whatever price Audible decides to sell my book for. Because right now _A Game of Blood_ is selling for $3.49 with "special pricing". It is over 8 1/2 long. Neither the producer nor I walked into this based on that price.


Ha. Try outranking the Fifty Shades of Gray audiobook and receiving a check for only....wait for it...$100. Seriously. The discounting is BS.

M


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## Pnjw (Apr 24, 2011)

I just got this answer back from my email expressing my displeasure:



> Hello Deanna,
> 
> Thank you for contacting ACX regarding our decision to modify our royalty rates. I am sorry for your frustration with this change, and I have forwarded your feedback to our Production Coordinators.
> 
> ...


Gee thanks for reiterating what the email said. 'Cause I'm sure reading it again will help.


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## wildwitchof (Sep 2, 2010)

"the royalty changes that have occurred to accommodate our business needs."

"We are giving you less money so that we can keep more."

/fixed


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## Pamela (Oct 6, 2010)

I just canceled my membership in Audible--$14.95 a month.  I have five books on audio with them.  Maybe if authors who are members do this they will rethink their strategy.


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

Perhaps I'm too cynical, but I can't imagine they care.

I'm focusing on getting all my books signed at the higher rate. It's a little scary to commit to doing all six of the remaining audiobooks without being able to see any results (my first isn't out until Saturday), but I've decided this is one of those risks I need to take. 

I'll admit, though, that I'm wondering why the heck I wrote a 117,000-word contemporary romance....That 50K length is sounding good right now!


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## Monique (Jul 31, 2010)

Deanna Chase said:


> I just got this answer back from my email expressing my displeasure:
> 
> Gee thanks for reiterating what the email said. 'Cause I'm sure reading it again will help.


LOL. I think this just might "accomodate more audiobook production" elsewhere.

I have a book up taking auditions and just sent a note to a producer who replied back that he's leaving ACX over this. I'm sure he's in good company.


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## Ty Johnston (Jun 19, 2009)

Well, this certainly frees up some of my time this year. One of my goals for the year had been to place all my novels on ACX. Now that's nixed. Though maybe I'll look elsewhere.


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## AngryGames (Jul 28, 2013)

How awesome that today I decided "Okay, time to start being serious about audio books" since I've had readers express interest. I suppose it's a good thing that I always check Kboards before I go wandering elsewhere on the net (like acx.com to get started). 

As a lifelong tech nerd, I've a feeling that someone with a good sized brain will see this as an opportunity (maybe Mark Coker?) and give us a second real option. It won't happen overnight, if it happens at all. 

If enough producers and authors get together (fat chance getting even five authors to agree on anything) and talk to someone with a big brain, maybe something will happen. 

It sucks but I doubt ACX will fold on their decision, so maybe best to stop worrying and start trying to find or organize an alternative.


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## Vivienne Mathews (May 7, 2013)

Bards and Sages (Julie) said:


> ACX just ... removed all incentives for quality narrators to use the service.


That's the big one. To me, at least. Upset as I am over the thought of losing royalties, my husband is a producer and VO talent who tends to favor the royalty share option for its earning potential. They just took aim at his entire bread and butter. This makes me grumpy.

Good on you for canceling your Audible account. I'll be hitting up friends and family to recommend they do the same.


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## jcalloway (Jan 10, 2014)

I have used Gumroad to sell ebooks on my website. They take 5% + $0.25 on every transaction, the rest goes to the seller. You can sell ebooks, music, and video through them. Just checked, and their file size limit is 4GB. 

Seems reasonable that you could list your audiobook as "music" and sell through them while maintaining 95% of the profits.

Just thought I'd throw that out there for anyone considering selling their audiobooks independently. Obviously you would be missing out on the exposure you get through Amazon or iTunes, but if you have a healthy mailing list and loyal fans, this could be an option.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

I've written ACX and taken my book off offer.


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## randw (Feb 27, 2014)

With the exclusive royalty cut down to 40% and the non-exclusive royalty at 25%, it makes it much easier to imagine making up the difference by finding additional distributors for an audiobook. Is this not so? It seems that the 15% difference could be made up by selling through other outlets even if they do not have Audible's reach.
What are the other channels out there for audiobook producers?


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## Anna K (Jul 2, 2011)

minxmalone said:


> Every single one of mine are at $1.99 with the Whispersync pricing. It's really hard to earn back the production cost with all these discounts. I wish they would just do it on the first in the series and that's it.


The majority of my audiobook sales are for my $1.99 Whisper-sync discounted title. I have been open to the discount BECAUSE of the escalating royalties. Even though I only make fifty cents per purchase (due to royalty share and the ebook being permafree), I figured each purchase was getting me closer to a higher royalty. I can see authors changing enough material that audio titles won't qualify to be Whisper-sync enabled if there is no chance of higher royalties in the future.


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## Guest (Feb 28, 2014)

Your Kindle ebook is already an audio book.
Just click the text-to-speech function  on the Kindle. 
Works for me.


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## Vivienne Mathews (May 7, 2013)

jcalloway said:


> I have used Gumroad to sell ebooks on my website. They take 5% + $0.25 on every transaction, the rest goes to the seller. You can sell ebooks, music, and video through them. Just checked, and their file size limit is 4GB.
> 
> Seems reasonable that you could list your audiobook as "music" and sell through them while maintaining 95% of the profits.
> 
> Just thought I'd throw that out there for anyone considering selling their audiobooks independently. Obviously you would be missing out on the exposure you get through Amazon or iTunes, but if you have a healthy mailing list and loyal fans, this could be an option.


Thank you for the tip, I'll definitely be looking into this!


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## Elophib (Feb 28, 2014)

Here are direct email addresses for senior Audible employees if you want to tell them directly what you think about their decision to lower your royalty rate:

Greg Voynow is the Vice President of Content Business Acquisition at Audible:

[email protected]

Jessica Bassuk is Senior Leader--Rights and Licensing--Amazon

[email protected]


And these are just a guess based on the rest of their email nomenclature:

Beth Anderson is Vice President, Publishing

[email protected]

Donald Atz is Chief Exucutive Officer/Owner/President

[email protected]

Brian Fielding is Executive Vice President Corporate Development

[email protected]


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## Meg T (Oct 26, 2013)

This is disappointing from a reader perspective as well. I cancelled my audible subscription a few years ago, because there was not enough choice and this will not help.

A good option for funding audiobooks, now that narrators are opting out of royalty share, would be Kickstarter. It would be great for authors with an existing fan base. You can even use your amazon account to pay so its an easy transition for readers. Its probably not so good for new authors starting out which is unfortunate as they are worst hit by this change. Popular authors always have options, because a certain amount of readers will follow them anywhere.


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

Gretchen Galway said:


> Mine is also $1.99 with Whispersync. And because of the vague or delayed reporting, I don't yet know what percentage of my sales lately is bringing me only $1. Pessimistic me thinks: all of them. That first month at full price was great, but now... I don't know. I'll continue with the second book's production, but I'm not sticking my neck out for more.
> 
> btw, the word "scheme" is a nefarious plot to most Americans, but just a "plan" to British ears. I've learned that by listening to the BBC. They made everything sound so sinister!


OMG... have I made a mistake? If Audible start selling my series at that price I will never make the $12000 back I invested in production! I was estimating a year or two to make it back. At $1 it could take me ten years or never!

EDIT: Is there any way to avoid this heavy discounting I am now hearing is the death of my dreams? Can I tell my narrator to do something that will force Audible not to do it?

EDIT 2: We can break whispersynch by modifying our kindle editions enough to throw it off. In Audible FAQ it tells us how NOT to break whispersynch, so logically doing the things it tells us not to do WILL break it. That will stop the discounting won't it?


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## Zelah Meyer (Jun 15, 2011)

I'm probably a year or two off looking at audio if they don't open up to Europe and improve the royalty rate.  However, after this little fiasco, I am not willing to look at exclusive - even if it made sense before because they already covered the major markets.  I'd rather sell the audio book files on POD CD & MP3 from the various outlets (as long as that's not against terms & conditions) - and be free to walk away and change course at any point if the market changes.

As people have said, yes, NOW it's the only real game in town.  However, in seven years time, who knows what the market is going to be?  We might have moved over to app versions of our books that you can set to play the audiobook version and show you the text at the same time.  (With the option to read at your own pace without the audio if you prefer, or have the screen darken and the audio playing if you're at the gym, etc.)


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## Pamela (Oct 6, 2010)

Mark - I'm so sorry you spent so much.  That's heartbreaking, and your plan to break whispersync might work.  Good idea! 

I noticed I was only getting $.50 per audiobook sale because I have a royalty share with the narrators and all five of my audiobooks have whispersync.

I bought my own book on Amazon and here's what it says for people who bought the Kindle book (Midnight Reflections)

Kindle Edition $2.99   
Paperback $12.95
Audible Audio Edition, Unabridged $1.99	
_________________________________

Here's the price on on the Audible site:  Regular Price:$24.95
Special Price:$1.99
________________________________


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

Pamela said:


> Mark - I'm so sorry you spent so much. That's heartbreaking, and your plan to break whispersync might work. Good idea!
> 
> I noticed I was only getting $.50 per audiobook sale because I have a royalty share with the narrators and all five of my audiobooks have whispersync.
> 
> ...


All is not lost. I have the entire series in production on the old terms, but its this discounting that worries me. I don't know how I missed what it could do to me. My book is already being discounted at audible and its only been out 9 days. Full price is $28 and its discounted to $20. That is actually ok because I had assumed $20 would be full price when I started and forgot that discounting and pricing wouldn't be under my control.

But what if? I can't do anything about any of it so there's little point in worrying about it, except it totally throws my plans of audiobook world domination out the airlock. I have three more books in my main series to write and was going to ACX with them, but now I wonder if those three should go to CD somehow. I personally hate it when a favourite author only has half a series on audible and the other half on CD, but now I see why this has been happening a lot lately. I noticed it with Illona Andrews Kate Daniels series, and Chloe Neil's Chicagoland among others. Its annoying, but I totally understand it now.


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## EC (Aug 20, 2013)

I don't get how they can discount down to $1.99, that seems totally off to me.  The only thing I've noticed in the replies is that it's KBoard members that have a royalty share deal that seem to being priced at that point. 

Am I picking this up wrong?


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## FictionalWriter (Aug 4, 2010)

Honestly, the pricing alone right now, has completely turned me off doing audio. That my digital book at $3.99, is more expensive is egregious. If the narrator wasn't already working on my next audio, I'd cancel it.


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

Drew Gideon said:


> Tuesday I purchased Kim Harrison's _The Undead Pool_ on ebook and got the synced audiobook for $14.95.
> I was surprised that it wasn't $2 like the other audiobooks I've been purchasing this year. Those have all been indie titles.
> 
> So what's the difference? Do TradPubs have some kind of minimum floor pricing structure that Audible can't go below? Is it that the book wasn't royalty-share? Or is Audible simply pricing that book higher because it was just released this week and they'll lower the price later?
> ...


Well, we will need a range of people answering, but I paid up front to a narrator through ACX and went exclusive. My book is out now and has already been discounted from $28 to $20. Now is that because I am exclusive with them, and they can price it however they like? Is it because they are price matching iTunes which has the book at $21.95? I suspect it's the second one, but without a greater sample of authors with different terms we can't know.


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## nobody_important (Jul 9, 2010)

Drew Gideon said:


> Tuesday I purchased Kim Harrison's _The Undead Pool_ on ebook and got the synced audiobook for $14.95.
> I was surprised that it wasn't $2 like the other audiobooks I've been purchasing this year. Those have all been indie titles.
> 
> So what's the difference? Do TradPubs have some kind of minimum floor pricing structure that Audible can't go below? Is it that the book wasn't royalty-share? Or is Audible simply pricing that book higher because it was just released this week and they'll lower the price later?
> ...


My guess is that Amazon / Audible has a separate distribution agreement w/ traditional audiobook producers / publishers, which might be forcing them to eat the discount, hence the teeny discount on non-indie audio books.


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## FictionalWriter (Aug 4, 2010)

NadiaLee said:


> My guess is that Amazon / Audible has a separate distribution agreement w/ traditional audiobook producers / publishers, which might be forcing them to eat the discount, hence the teeny discount on non-indie audio books.


Probably like the agreement they have for digital books. And because Amazon has to purchase those at a set price, they'd be losing money if they sold it for $1.99. We are, unfortunately, at their mercy. They can sell our audio books for a dime and then give us our nickel. After March 12 it will be our 4 cents.


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## minxmalone (Oct 28, 2012)

theblether said:


> I don't get how they can discount down to $1.99, that seems totally off to me. The only thing I've noticed in the replies is that it's KBoard members that have a royalty share deal that seem to being priced at that point.
> 
> Am I picking this up wrong?


I don't do royalty share and I got the $1.99 pricing, too. Amazon attempts to Whispersync every book they can. For my next book, I'm going to deliberately change the kindle version so it won't sync up to the audio. They can still discount it but at least it won't happen automatically.


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## EC (Aug 20, 2013)

minxmalone said:


> I don't do royalty share and I got the $1.99 pricing, too. Amazon attempts to Whispersync every book they can. For my next book, I'm going to deliberately change the kindle version so it won't sync up to the audio. They can still discount it but at least it won't happen automatically.


Hmmm, seems a bit off to me as I said. The ROI looks woeful, ( for many ).


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## Guest (Feb 28, 2014)

For those looking for audiobook outlets who are not trapped in an exclusive deal with ACX:

Drivethrufiction.com recently opened their doors to romance, westerns, and thrillers and have plans to expand to more genres soon. Originally, they only handled horror, fantasy, and sci-fi. They don't have a huge audiobook selection, but they do have the ability to support audiobooks. And they pay 65% monthly via Paypal. And you have 100% control of your price, can set sale prices whenever you want, and offer coupon codes. 

Drivethrufiction.com is a lot smaller than Audible. But if you are looking for an alternative that doesn't require selling off of your own site, they are good people there. 

Oh, and did I mention the ability to do CROSS PUBLISHER BUNDLES? For those of you that want to cross-promote and run group sales?


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## N. Gemini Sasson (Jul 5, 2010)

theblether said:


> I don't get how they can discount down to $1.99, that seems totally off to me. The only thing I've noticed in the replies is that it's KBoard members that have a royalty share deal that seem to being priced at that point.
> 
> Am I picking this up wrong?


Nope, you are reading that right. I don't get it either. I get that they're trying to convert more readers to audiobook, but _$1.99_?

ACX helped finance the production of my audiobook for _Uneasy Lies the Crown_. At 117,000 words, I wouldn't even have considered paying that all up front myself. It does sell, but at a steady trickle, perhaps because it's the only audiobook I have out.

Working with the narrator, Kyle McCarley, was a *wonderful* experience. He was the most professional and talented individual I've ever encountered. Took time to research all the pronunciation for some difficult Welsh words. I learned a LOT working with him. I'd use him again in a heartbeat. The whole experience was very positive.

What this change in royalty rates does is vastly reduce the chance that those of us who are midlisters will recoup production costs in a reasonable amount of time. If ever.


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## tensen (May 17, 2011)

Drew Gideon said:


> So what's the difference? Do TradPubs have some kind of minimum floor pricing structure that Audible can't go below? Is it that the book wasn't royalty-share? Or is Audible simply pricing that book higher because it was just released this week and they'll lower the price later?


Actually I wouldn't be surprised if it was a title that Audible themselves contracted and produced. They bought the rights to a lot of books last year.


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## FictionalWriter (Aug 4, 2010)

Personally, I'm taking this as a wake-up call. Time to really start thinking outside the box.


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## Guest (Feb 28, 2014)

This comment was posted on the blog by someone. If true, this is very unsettling:



> FROM ACX FACEBOOK PAGE
> IT THIS TRUE - ?
> From an Audible Approved narrator: "I find it ironic that ACX is cutting funds on the royalty share side, while increasing the money they're throwing at us on the Audible Approved side. ACX offers generous incentives to valuable authors to produce through their services. ACX pays the first $5000 in production costs, mandating that the narrator must be paid $300 per finished hour. That is well above the SAG-AFTRA minimum of $225 pfh that I normally ask. So, they're obviously cutting costs on the royalty share side to make up for the generous subsidies that they're extending to us on the other side."


If I am reading that correctly, ACX is paying the bulk or full cost of production at generous rates for big named authors. While screwing over the indies and small press publishers.

Sounds to me like indies were simply used to inflate their catalog, and now they don't need us anymore.

And since this is an Amazon company, you can make of this what you will.


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## Pnjw (Apr 24, 2011)

Yes, I have heard of Audible footing the bill for production on some titles.


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## Lisa Grace (Jul 3, 2011)

I'm paying my narrators out right to keep distribution open to other channels. I've been saying since 2011, that eventually, Amazon would lower royalties paid to authors. It's just what business does, nothing personal.

Now that it's happening in audio, I'm sure they will cut commissions on ebooks from 70% to 60% within the next year. And what will we do about it?


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## PhoenixS (Apr 5, 2011)

***********


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## adanlerma (Jan 16, 2012)

LisaGraceBooks said:


> I'm paying my narrators out right to keep distribution open to other channels. I've been saying since 2011, that eventually, Amazon would lower royalties paid to authors. It's just what business does, nothing personal.
> 
> Now that it's happening in audio, I'm sure they will cut commissions on ebooks from 70% to 60% within the next year. And what will we do about it?


Lisa Grace, can you say what some of those other channels are? Thanks!


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## Lisa Grace (Jul 3, 2011)

adanlerma said:


> Lisa Grace, can you say what some of those other channels are? Thanks!


Two were already mention in this thread. Just Google competitors to Audible and you'll get five or six right on the front page.


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## zzzzzzz (Dec 6, 2011)

Does Audible have any competitors with a significant market share?


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## ChrisKohout (Jan 3, 2014)

Just to confirm, the $1.99 pricing is NOT the MatchBook feature?

When I checked my book, I was logged in to Amazon, and since I had made a test purchase of my book, the audiobook version was MatchBooked to $1.99.



minxmalone said:


> I don't do royalty share and I got the $1.99 pricing, too. Amazon attempts to Whispersync every book they can. For my next book, I'm going to deliberately change the kindle version so it won't sync up to the audio. They can still discount it but at least it won't happen automatically.


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## adanlerma (Jan 16, 2012)

ChrisKohout said:


> Just to confirm, the $1.99 pricing is NOT the MatchBook feature?
> 
> When I checked my book, I was logged in to Amazon, and since I had made a test purchase of my book, the audiobook version was MatchBooked to $1.99.


I'm not super sure Chris, but when I elected to do Matchbook in KDP (2 books) it said it was for the print version.

Maybe it's been expanded to audio? I don't know though. Good question!


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## ChrisKohout (Jan 3, 2014)

I forget, too. But when I logged out of my Amazon account and refreshed my book page, the audiobook price went from $1.99 to $21.95.



adanlerma said:


> I'm not super sure Chris, but when I elected to do Matchbook in KDP (2 books) it said it was for the print version.
> 
> Maybe it's been expanded to audio? I don't know though. Good question!


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

ChrisKohout said:


> I forget, too. But when I logged out of my Amazon account and refreshed my book page, the audiobook price went from $1.99 to $21.95.


Because you've bought your Kindle book, so you can get the audio version for an additional $1.99. When you logged out, you hadn't bought it, but Amazon told me you could get the audio version cheap if you did.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/feature.html/ref=kics_hp_dp_lm?ie=UTF8&docId=1000827761
With Audible, authors don't have any control over prices. With MatchBook, you control prices.


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## wildwitchof (Sep 2, 2010)

The Whispersync price (often $1.99) is only available to those who already purchased the ebook version of your title. If you've bought a copy of your own ebook, you'll see the discount audiobook price on the listing page on Amazon.

The question for the Rights Holder (whatever we're called) is: will Whispersync make you make more money via volume? Should you think of it as a bundled deal, like ebook+paperback, that brings in casual customers you wouldn't have otherwise? It's not like those three purchases at $1.99 are a guaranteed, or even likely, three purchases at $14.95. It might be $3 or nothing.

I haven't been doing this long enough to determine that. I wanted more time. Now they're giving us 2 weeks, and I'm annoyed and undecided.


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## adanlerma (Jan 16, 2012)

ChrisKohout said:


> I forget, too. But when I logged out of my Amazon account and refreshed my book page, the audiobook price went from $1.99 to $21.95.


Makes sense. Gretchen above mentions it's probably the "Whispersync price (often $1.99)". And when you logged out, it didn't read the page as an item you'd already purchased (thus qualifying for the bundled discount.)


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## adanlerma (Jan 16, 2012)

Gretchen Galway said:


> The Whispersync price (often $1.99) is only available to those who already purchased the ebook version of your title. If you've bought a copy of your own ebook, you'll see the discount audiobook price on the listing page on Amazon.
> 
> The question for the Rights Holder (whatever we're called) is: will Whispersync make you make more money via volume? Should you think of it as a bundled deal, like ebook+paperback, that brings in casual customers you wouldn't have otherwise? It's not like that three purchases at $1.99 are a guaranteed, or even likely, three purchases at $14.95. It might be $3 or nothing.
> 
> I haven't been doing this long enough to determine that. I wanted more time. Now they're giving us 2 weeks, and I'm annoyed and undecided.


I like the idea of a bundled price. But whether $1.99, as you say, will make us more money via volume, I don't know either. I'm too new to this.

I do think though, as a reader, if I'd purchased the ebook, say $4.99 for my Texas Shorts book, much higher than $1.99 for the audio book starts to sound like too much. Plus at these new rates, as long as my ebook royalty rate doesn't go down from 70%, I make ok between the two. And hopefully, this will lead to more pure audio book sales at reg price.

Kinda a mess. All I can do right now is rubber neck the scene, and hope everyone comes out alright.


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## leestrayer (Feb 28, 2014)

Hi all. Longtime lurker, first-time poster 

I'm on both sides of the fence here, as I originally found ACX looking for a way to publish my own work as audiobooks. Since I spent a decade in radio and commercial production before starting businesses with my wife, I had done plenty of this kind of work, and thought I could easily produce my own stuff and possibly work my way in. Instead, I ended up narrating for several indie authors over the past 10 months, mostly on royalty share, with about 25 audiobooks for sale at this point. Some haven't been worth the time I spent doing them, but I've had several wonderful experiences with authors and small publishers, and I've done a number of great books that stack up against anything on Audible's best seller lists. And nobody is getting hammered in this equation like the narrators. Authors can't afford to pay us upfront now, and we can't afford to do royalty share. I had already started doing hybrid pay-royalty arrangements with some of my authors before this all happened, as I see another author noted here, and I'm assuming that will be one way to make it work at ACX. But I, for one, really don't see what value Audible is providing for their 60% of the take.

I agree with some of the other posters here that there are several ways around getting your audiobooks sold, and in many ways, you would be better off pursuing them. While they aren't as point-and-click simple as using ACX, they offer you a lot more control. As far as that goes, there are a lot of ways coming around every day to sell your ebooks as well. Gumroad, as mentioned above, is one good idea. There are SaaS shopping cart software providers such as Shopify and Big Commerce that allow you to sell digital files as easily as you would sell mixers or shoes, from your own website. You can also make data CDs for next to nothing, or pay a little more and POD files on a CD as sold. There are even a few companies who will print the CD, a cover, send the disk and collect the payment, sending you your portion immediately. (I'm sorry, I'd have to go back through my files to pull the names, as they're not coming to mind right now) And of course you can submit directly to iTunes or offer your catalog through some other online retailers. I am always willing to provide any of these services for my authors, and I'm sure most of the professional producers will now be offering it as well now, if they don't already. I'm waiting for Amazon-hater Mark Coker at Smashwords to jump into this fray and start offering audio distribution. Can anybody here put a bug in his ear? Feel free to contact me, Mark, and I'll be glad to help 

When it comes down to it, I think that indie authors and small publishers need to realize that outlets like Amazon and their bastard stepchild, Audible, are really just purchasing mechanisms, not the market. Retailers offer a service. They are taking money from your audience and passing it on to you. Yes, Amazon can make it really easy to get your book in front of a lot of people, as bookstores and traditional publishers used to do, but as all of you great authors prove every day right on this board, you sell based primarily on how good of a book you write and how well you market on your own, and none of that has anything to do with Amazon. There are free, open source tools available to produce everything you need, and there are many professionals out there who can help you put together a retail-ready product. It may be a little harder to get "social proof" like reviews on your own, but a lot of bad writers just buy the reviews on Amazon that you talented writers slave away to earn honestly anyway, so it's getting harder and harder to put a lot of value on that, either. I find that I read or listen to the samples available, and make my own decision when I buy, or take a recommendation from a friend.

Companies like Amazon will continue to take advantage when they can. As one poster put it above, it's just business, nothing personal. As entrepreneurs, you simply need to decide what your response is going to be. Just remember that _you_ own the most valuable asset in this equation; an imaginative, well-told, well-written story. I've read a lot of bad manuscripts in looking for authors to work with, believe me. A great book with a following of fans is not a commodity, it's a rarity.

If your fans want audiobooks, there are several ways to give them what they want and still get paid to do it. As a longtime audiobook fan before I started narrating, I would hate to see this take audiobooks off the table for indie authors. Although it's hard to see sometimes, content creators need to remember that no one owns the delivery network anymore, but a great storyteller will always own their audience.

Sorry for the length of this post, but I laid awake half the night thinking it, and I felt that it needed to be said. Thanks for letting me vent


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## Guest (Feb 28, 2014)

adanlerma said:


> Makes sense. Gretchen above mentions it's probably the "Whispersync price (often $1.99)". And when you logged out, it didn't read the page as an item you'd already purchased (thus qualifying for the bundled discount.)


Except I don't remember authorizing a special bundle discount for Whispersync. Amazon required explicit permission to do so with MatchBook. And since the narrator gets zero on my print or ebook sales, I doubt the narrator agreed to such a bundle as well. I would think if producers knew in advance Audible was going to do this, they would have been even less likely to consider royalty-share deals.


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

Bards and Sages (Julie) said:


> Except I don't remember authorizing a special bundle discount for Whispersync. Amazon required explicit permission to do so with MatchBook. And since the narrator gets zero on my print or ebook sales, I doubt the narrator agreed to such a bundle as well. I would think if producers knew in advance Audible was going to do this, they would have been even less likely to consider royalty-share deals.


The terms with Audible are different, though. They set the pricing. That's the deal.


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## EC (Aug 20, 2013)

leestrayer said:


> Hi all. Longtime lurker, first-time poster
> 
> I'm on both sides of the fence here, as I originally found ACX looking for a way to publish my own work as audiobooks. Since I spent a decade in radio and commercial production before starting businesses with my wife, I had done plenty of this kind of work, and thought I could easily produce my own stuff and possibly work my way in. Instead, I ended up narrating for several indie authors over the past 10 months, mostly on royalty share, with about 25 audiobooks for sale at this point. Some haven't been worth the time I spent doing them, but I've had several wonderful experiences with authors and small publishers, and I've done a number of great books that stack up against anything on Audible's best seller lists. And nobody is getting hammered in this equation like the narrators. Authors can't afford to pay us upfront now, and we can't afford to do royalty share. I had already started doing hybrid pay-royalty arrangements with some of my authors before this all happened, as I see another author noted here, and I'm assuming that will be one way to make it work at ACX. But I, for one, really don't see what value Audible is providing for their 60% of the take.
> 
> ...


Appreciate it, thanks very much


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## Lisa Grace (Jul 3, 2011)

I wonder if Mark Coker at Smashwords or the guy that owns Draft2Draft would be interest in setting up an audio book download site? 1 stop delivery...


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## Guest (Feb 28, 2014)

Rosalind James said:


> The terms with Audible are different, though. They set the pricing. That's the deal.


I understand that. But people agreed to those terms because it is an Amazon company, and they made decisions based on Amazon's past behavior. Which has generally been to treat content providers fairly. Createspace, for example, has lowered its prices three times since I joined them years ago, allowing me to make more money per title. KDP offers tangible benefits for both exclusive and non-exclusive members. What Audible did was the equivalent of a trade publisher offering authors 60% royalties to sign an ebook deal, then set the sale price for the ebook to ten cents in order to bring in customers for other books.

I don't expect an Amazon company to go out of its way to screw me over. I don't pretend they always have my best interest at heart (ye gods know I've made that point enough times). But I do expect them to follow a certain degree of fair play. This isn't fair play. This is very, very foul. Particularly for the narrators who went into royalty split deals in good faith and now are getting pennies on the project.


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## adanlerma (Jan 16, 2012)

Bards and Sages (Julie) said:


> ...What Audible did was the equivalent of a trade publisher offering authors 60% royalties to sign an ebook deal, then set the sale price for the ebook to ten cents in order to bring in customers for other books.
> 
> I don't expect an Amazon company to go out of its way to screw me over. I don't pretend they always have my best interest at heart (ye gods know I've made that point enough times). But I do expect them to follow a certain degree of fair play. This isn't fair play. This is very, very foul. Particularly for the narrators who went into royalty split deals in good faith and now are getting pennies on the project.


Gotta agree. And without substantiation of how production would be increased, and somehow off-setting this move, it's impossible to try to take well.


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## adanlerma (Jan 16, 2012)

LisaGraceBooks said:


> I wonder if Mark Coker at Smashwords or the guy that owns Draft2Draft would be interest in setting up an audio book download site? 1 stop delivery...


Mark has said in his blog (re 2014) there's things he can't even mention (yet). I guess one can hope.


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

> The terms with Audible are different, though. They set the pricing. That's the deal.


The terms of the KDP contract give Amazon the right to set eBook retail prices anywhere they want. They do pay royalties on list price.

However, they can change the terms of KDP anytime they want. They could easily grandfather all existing books under current terms, and pay royalties for newly published books based on retail price.

They could change the royalty terms for all books next Tuesday if they want.

They could pay $2 per book flat fee, and sell it for any price they choose.

They can do lots of things, and they will. History does not give many examples of markets that don't change. This one will change, too.

I operate under the idea that Amazon can and will change what they choose. So will I.


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

Terrence OBrien said:


> The terms of the KDP contract give Amazon the right to set eBook retail prices anywhere they want. They do pay royalties on list price.
> 
> However, they can change the terms of KDP anytime they want. They could easily grandfather all existing books under current terms, and pay royalties for newly published books based on retail price.
> 
> ...


I agree, but at least with KDP you have choices. You aren't in a 7 year exclusive deal and you can sell in all the other players like Google, kobo, Barnes, iiTunes. Audible is pretty much the only serious audio channel in town. Add iTunes I guess but I don't think I have ever bought a book there. I have no idea how popular it might be.

If Google gets in the game then Audible might do what kdp had to when apple stepped up, but it will do whatever it wants while competition remain nonexistent ]


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## Scottish Lass (Oct 10, 2013)

LisaGraceBooks said:


> I'm paying my narrators out right to keep distribution open to other channels. I've been saying since 2011, that eventually, Amazon would lower royalties paid to authors. It's just what business does, nothing personal.
> 
> Now that it's happening in audio, I'm sure they will cut commissions on ebooks from 70% to 60% within the next year. And what will we do about it?


Maybe this is where Hugh's idea of an indie author collective/union might be of help to us?

(I'm sure I ticked a box or something to sign up to that idea when I read the author earnings report)


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## FictionalWriter (Aug 4, 2010)

The natives are discontented and restless. 

It's the perfect opportunity for someone else (company) to step up.


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## 31842 (Jan 11, 2011)

leestrayer said:


> Hi all. Longtime lurker, first-time poster
> 
> I'm on both sides of the fence here, as I originally found ACX looking for a way to publish my own work as audiobooks. Since I spent a decade in radio and commercial production before starting businesses with my wife, I had done plenty of this kind of work, and thought I could easily produce my own stuff and possibly work my way in. Instead, I ended up narrating for several indie authors over the past 10 months, mostly on royalty share, with about 25 audiobooks for sale at this point. Some haven't been worth the time I spent doing them, but I've had several wonderful experiences with authors and small publishers, and I've done a number of great books that stack up against anything on Audible's best seller lists. And nobody is getting hammered in this equation like the narrators. Authors can't afford to pay us upfront now, and we can't afford to do royalty share. I had already started doing hybrid pay-royalty arrangements with some of my authors before this all happened, as I see another author noted here, and I'm assuming that will be one way to make it work at ACX. But I, for one, really don't see what value Audible is providing for their 60% of the take.
> 
> ...


Thank you for such a fantastic, proactive post! Here! Here! *bangs table appreciatively*


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## Alan Petersen (May 20, 2011)

There are many ways of going direct, but without a large following and web traffic, there is little we can do about it. The site with all the traffic (customers) wins and ACX has that market cornered.

Now if I had a huge following and a website that gets a huge amount of traffic going the Non-Exclusive Distribution route might be the best option since I could make up for the lower royalty rate from direct sales on my own, but for me that's just not a realistic option at this juncture of my writing career.

I published my first audiobook in December. I'm still deep in the hole in recouping my production costs (I didn't go the royalty share option). My break even outlook is months away, so the audiobook ROI is a longterm goal. I knew that going in. But now, I doubt very highly I will produce an audiobook for my upcoming books under these changes. That's money better spent marketing my books.


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## adanlerma (Jan 16, 2012)

romanceauthor said:


> The natives are discontented and restless.
> 
> It's the perfect opportunity for someone else (company) to step up.


The first wave of titles from Smashwords is going live on Scribd right now. Don't know whether or how this might help the audio book situation, but can't help but feel it either will, or lead to something that will. Just an opinion / feeling.


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## 555aaa (Jan 28, 2014)

1) There is no pre-set SAG-AFTRA union rate for audiobooks. They are negotiated individually between the producer and the union.

http://www.sagaftra.org/audiobooks

2) Cd baby is apparently offering 90% royalties on digital download sales which I believe includes albums (audiobooks being a big album). They provide you a sales widget on your website that lets customers either order disks (discs?) or downloads. You set the price.


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## thesmallprint (May 25, 2012)

leestrayer said:


> Hi all. Longtime lurker, first-time poster
> 
> I'm on both sides of the fence here, as I originally found ACX looking for a way to publish my own work as audiobooks. Since I spent a decade in radio and commercial production before starting businesses with my wife, I had done plenty of this kind of work, and thought I could easily produce my own stuff and possibly work my way in. Instead, I ended up narrating for several indie authors over the past 10 months, mostly on royalty share, with about 25 audiobooks for sale at this point. Some haven't been worth the time I spent doing them, but I've had several wonderful experiences with authors and small publishers, and I've done a number of great books that stack up against anything on Audible's best seller lists. And nobody is getting hammered in this equation like the narrators. Authors can't afford to pay us upfront now, and we can't afford to do royalty share. I had already started doing hybrid pay-royalty arrangements with some of my authors before this all happened, as I see another author noted here, and I'm assuming that will be one way to make it work at ACX. But I, for one, really don't see what value Audible is providing for their 60% of the take.
> 
> ...


Thanks. This is one of the best posts I've read on KBoards.

Market forces will fix this issue. Silicon Valley is bristling with genius. Someone might produce an app allowing people to download a chapter at a time at an ever-reducing cost based on how much the customer wants to hear, the total price equalling the 'normal' whole book price.

Maybe SoundCloud or Audioboo will see an opportunity. Perhaps B&N will adapt the Nook to accommodate audiobooks. As one poster said, seven years is a long time to sign away a property. Google is more powerful than Amazon. Who's to say they won't launch an audiobook service with no tie-ins and 90% royalty?

In these hi-tech days, problems usually bump into solutions very quickly.

Good luck all.
Joe


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## Michael Kingswood (Feb 18, 2011)

Roz Marshall said:


> Maybe this is where Hugh's idea of an indie author collective/union might be of help to us?
> 
> (I'm sure I ticked a box or something to sign up to that idea when I read the author earnings report)


Except that you can't have an author's union, at least not in the sense that most people think of when they say union, because we're selling product, not labor.


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## AutumnKQ (Jul 27, 2013)

I wrote to them yesterday and they replied.

ME:
How does the new royalty structure affect Author as Narrator  
royalties? It seems like those authors would have a different royalty  
structure since they're not using your service to find narrators.

I'm in several indie publishing groups, and it seems many of them  
won't be creating audiobooks any longer because of the royalty change.  
I was already considering recording my books myself, but I'm not sure  
if it will be worth the cost and time spent.

THEM:
Thank you for contacting ACX.

I understand that you would like more information on how the royalty changes impact authors as narrators for Do-It-Yourself (DIY) projects.  I can certainly provide you with more information to help.

You can look at the structure for the Pay-for-Production deals as this is the same for DIY titles.  Since you are the author uploading your own audio, you won't have to share any royalties with a narrator.  If you select the Exclusive distribution option, you will receive 40% of royalties earned.  If you select the Non-exclusive distribution option, you will receive 25% of royalties earned.  

If you are interested in posting your own finished audio to ACX instead of entering into an agreement with another party to produce the audio, you must agree to the Book Posting Agreement for that specific title by 11:59PM ET on March 11, 2014.  Doing so will keep that title under the current royalty structure.  Agreeing to the agreement any later than that will cause the book to be published with the new royalty rates.

I hope that this information was helpful.  Please don't hesitate to contact us again if you have any other questions or concerns.  Have a nice weekend.


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## Robert Bidinotto (Mar 3, 2011)

Hugh has posted publicly on this. Maybe Somebody in Seattle will take notice.

http://authorearnings.com/acx-lowers-royalty-rates/#comment-728


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## daringnovelist (Apr 3, 2010)

In regards to the $1.99 Whispersync versions of audiobooks:

Has anybody else here bought any of these?  I was suckered into buying these twice, and discovered that they aren't fully operational audio books -- you can only listen to them through your Kindle... IF you have an advanced enough Kindle to handle it.  I don't have an advanced enough Kindle, and I don't want to listen to these while reading on my Kindle!  (When I'm sitting with my Kindle, I want to read.)

I presume a part of the answer to the question of "how can they manage this?" is that they are offering a limited access special edition. They hope to expand the customer-base of Audible customers by signing up people who don't usually buy regular audio books.

(And if anybody has successfully downloaded an mp3 -- or any format that can at least be played on my computer-- file of those special $1.99 audio books, please let me know.)

Camille


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## wildwitchof (Sep 2, 2010)

That's a great point, Camille. I wasn't convinced I was losing money from Whispersync--but I don't have the recent report yet. The first month is full price, because it takes time for the discounts to go through. The fact that any of the sales are more than $1.99 suggests you're right--the MP3 downloads still cost more.

Sure wish they'd, you know, clarify all this. Pffft.


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## David Peterson (Feb 8, 2014)

daringnovelist said:


> In regards to the $1.99 Whispersync versions of audiobooks:
> 
> Has anybody else here bought any of these? I was suckered into buying these twice, and discovered that they aren't fully operational audio books -- you can only listen to them through your Kindle... IF you have an advanced enough Kindle to handle it.
> 
> ...


I don't think that's the case. You need to listen to them through the Audible app, though (unless you want to go through a lot of extra steps that are a pain). At the bottom of the audible website there is a menu item for Listening Apps.


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## daringnovelist (Apr 3, 2010)

David Peterson said:


> I don't think that's the case. You need to listen to them through the Audible app, though (unless you want to go through a lot of extra steps that are a pain). At the bottom of the audible website there is a menu item for Listening Apps.


It may be that I don't like the way Audible handles all files... but I do know that as I tore my hair out trying to figure out how to play file, they did actually say something about only certain devices were possible and these did not include my computer. But I'll take another look.

I have to admit, as a user, this repeated experience has turned me off Audible completely. I'm sure I'm not the only one.

Camille


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## Tommie Lyn (Dec 7, 2009)

JeffreyKafer said:


> I thought this, too.
> 
> I was soo sooo wrong. Delivering an audiobook is a HUGE technical hurdle. You have to give MP3s AND .M4Bs for regular MP3 players and ipods. Plus you've got to make sure you're serving the audio correctly, or it will timeout due to file size issues. PLUS you have the oh-so-fun task doing customer service when someone's ancient legacy player doesn't work correctly or whatnot.
> 
> I've done this. Trust me. It sucks.


Exactly. Not only do they have to handle those technical issues, they have to make sure the audio quality is consistent, among other things. Judging that they have nothing to do but make the audio files available for retail is similar to the attitude sometimes expressed by someone who has never written a book: "It can't be that hard...bet I could do it. Piece o' cake."


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## minxmalone (Oct 28, 2012)

daringnovelist said:


> In regards to the $1.99 Whispersync versions of audiobooks:
> 
> Has anybody else here bought any of these? I was suckered into buying these twice, and discovered that they aren't fully operational audio books -- you can only listen to them through your Kindle... IF you have an advanced enough Kindle to handle it. I don't have an advanced enough Kindle, and I don't want to listen to these while reading on my Kindle! (When I'm sitting with my Kindle, I want to read.)
> 
> ...


I've bought them before and I listen to them on my iPhone (using the Audible app). I'm not sure how they work on any other device though.


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## Christa Wick (Nov 1, 2012)

AutumnKQ said:


> If you are interested in posting your own finished audio to ACX instead of entering into an agreement with another party to produce the audio, you must agree to the Book Posting Agreement for that specific title by 11:59PM ET on March 11, 2014. Doing so will keep that title under the current royalty structure. Agreeing to the agreement any later than that will cause the book to be published with the new royalty rates.


Thank you!!! Off to check this out!


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

daringnovelist said:


> It may be that I don't like the way Audible handles all files... but I do know that as I tore my hair out trying to figure out how to play file, they did actually say something about only certain devices were possible and these did not include my computer. But I'll take another look.
> 
> I have to admit, as a user, this repeated experience has turned me off Audible completely. I'm sure I'm not the only one.
> 
> Camille


Go into your audible account and find the book you want. Click download instead of the send option. It will download the file to your computer using the audible downloader. If you have the box ticked in the downloader, the file will import automatically into your itunes.


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## adanlerma (Jan 16, 2012)

markecooper said:


> Go into your audible account and find the book you want. Click download instead of the send option. It will download the file to your computer using the audible downloader. If you have the box ticked in the downloader, the file will import automatically into your itunes.


I'll have to try this out, thanks Mark!


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## adanlerma (Jan 16, 2012)

Robert Bidinotto said:


> Hugh has posted publicly on this. Maybe Somebody in Seattle will take notice.
> 
> http://authorearnings.com/acx-lowers-royalty-rates/#comment-728


Someone else below has quoted this also, but is said so well, thought I'd re-quote. Thanks Robert.

This is also made me aware of Hugh's site, and have signed up for his newsletter.

This is an excerpt from the post itself (above link is to a comment) :

"Time will tell. There will certainly be repercussions. Personally, I'm shocked that Amazon would do anything to fuel the speculation that once they grow big enough, authors will suffer. Whatever margins they hope to improve by this 10% move can't possibly be enough to cover the damage they've caused in public relations or they power they've granted to their detractors."

David Gaughran has an older article at http://davidgaughran.wordpress.com/2013/06/02/15-ways-amazon-can-improve-kindle-direct-publishing/ that talks about how Amazon has shown it does listen.

So it is possible this is either part of a larger plan that will increase production (and help both readers, narrators, and authors), or that Amazon will do something to repair the damage. Presenting some ideas as to "how" - in the initial announcement, would have gone a long way to re-directing the conversation.

I've verged on the snide in a few of my previous comments, and don't like it, and am pulling back into my more cautious mode. A few interactions with some other indie companies yesterday reminded me that heavy handedness, or lack of respect for small authors (or other people), is not centered in any one company or individual.

It's time for me to re-center and re-consider what and how I can live my own creative life within these changes.

Amazon was "the" industry disruptor for publishing, opening the door for other companies and other disruptive innovations, including subscription services. Audio and ebook. And even Amazon may be feeling the pressure of these changes. For being such a huge company, they still are exceptionally nimble. Except now, each move creates incredible ripples across our lives.

I think the majority of us have learned to trust Amazon, but trust is a fragile thing.

And as Hugh says, "Time will tell."


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## R. M. Reed (Nov 11, 2009)

I have two ACX books in the works. Reading the page that talks about the new terms, it looks like I don't have to finish by March 12th, the fact that they are in production before that date means the old rates will apply.


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

R. M. Reed said:


> I have two ACX books in the works. Reading the page that talks about the new terms, it looks like I don't have to finish by March 12th, the fact that they are in production before that date means the old rates will apply.


Correct. As long as you have agreed terms with a narrator and the deal is done, and the book is now listed under the "in production" tab you are fine. It does not have to be finished before that date.


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## VEVO (Feb 9, 2012)

[email protected]

if you email in to complain, that's the one to do it. Especially if you are canceling your Audible account.

http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-10-10/jeff-bezos-and-the-age-of-amazon-excerpt-from-the-everything-store-by-brad-stone

Within Amazon.com (AMZN) there's a certain type of e-mail that elicits waves of panic. It usually originates with an annoyed customer who complains to the company's founder and chief executive officer. *Jeff Bezos has a public e-mail address, [email protected] Not only does he read many customer complaints, he forwards them to the relevant Amazon employees, with a one-character addition: a question mark.*

When Amazon employees get a Bezos question mark e-mail, they react as though they've discovered a ticking bomb. They've typically got a few hours to solve whatever issue the CEO has flagged and prepare a thorough explanation for how it occurred, a response that will be reviewed by a succession of managers before the answer is presented to Bezos himself. Such escalations, as these e-mails are known, are Bezos's way of ensuring that the customer's voice is constantly heard inside the company.


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## Bookslinger (Jan 12, 2014)

Oh boy. I had no interest in doing audiobooks as I don't usually buy audiobooks. This doesn't exactly make it more enticing.


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## randw (Feb 27, 2014)

Here's Smashwords' reply to my inquiry as to whether they are considering adding audiobooks to their site;

Feb 28 at 11:19 AM
Good Morning.

Thanks for writing in.  No, we do not have any such plans at this time.  Our goal is to make the self-publishing and distribution of our authors' ebooks as fast and easy as possible.

Best!
Kevin
Service Team
Smashwords

Still, it seems like a good opportunity for someone.


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## Christa Wick (Nov 1, 2012)

Can anyone who has found information on this particular point weigh in, preferably with links to the reputable source discussing it:

Right now, Audible has an exclusive relationship with iTunes (i.e. to get your product into iTunes’ audiobook store, you have to go through Audible). (This is stated on the ACX site - so "fact" - although you can get audiobooks on Apple via an App for your audiobook store, such as audiobooks.com has.)

I've received one message noting that the iTunes distribution agreement is set to expire. This is unsupported fact, as my correspondent noted s/he was unaware of any substantiation.

If that exclusive contract really is expiring -- iTunes has to be looking at its iBooks and iTunes direct upload experience and be considering better profits by cutting out Audible. Apple's digital store IS BUILT ON SOUND. The company may not mind a small market share at present with ebooks, but I think it would sting to lose to Amazon on any level of audio. They let Audible/ACX get a stable going with increasingly shorter exclusivity periods of Audible supplying iTunes with audiobooks and when the time is right (NOW), they open audiobooks to direct upload. 

While we'd lose the escalator clause going direct to iTunes, we'd start at 70% and you have to sell over 10,000 copies of a title on audible before you reach 70% (under the exclusivity scale for rights holders). 

So maybe the whole purpose in giving us a limited window and ways to lock in royalties is meant to keep us exclusive to Audible and lock down our ability to go direct for 7 years. Less than 2 weeks to decide on a seven-year relationship, plus the risk of time and/or capital, is causing me to back off again despite a little enthusiasm on a way for DIY rights holders to lock in legacy royalties.


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## Christa Wick (Nov 1, 2012)

Following on -

The last renewal date between Amazon and Apple's signing sticking in my mind was 2011. I don't know how accurate that date is. According to a Wired article, Apple allowed indies to first begin uploading directly in mid-2010, but they didn't really ease the indie way until October 2012 when they dropped the ISBN requirement. And I don't believe they released iBooks Author until the beginning of 2012, to further help indies in producing quality ebooks.

While a lot of the principles are the same between creating an audio file of music (a single or an album) and an audiobook, indie musicians had a long history of self-recording. Indie authors certainly didn't have that experience in 2010. So why not one last shorter exclusivity contract with Audible to grow the stable of both narrators and DIY authors? They will still get Audible books stuck in exclusive to Audible after the contract expires because I don't think Bezos is willing to cut out that large of a segment from the audiobook market (no matter how small the market actually is) and decrease the number of authors signing contracts with ACX because their books wouldn't be on iTunes.

Faced with extreme scarcity of a resource (time to sign and lock in legacy rates), are they intentionally trying to induce us into panic buying?


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## adanlerma (Jan 16, 2012)

Christa Wick said:


> Following on -
> 
> The last renewal date between Amazon and Apple's signing sticking in my mind was 2011. I don't know how accurate that date is. According to a Wired article, Apple allowed indies to first begin uploading directly in mid-2010, but they didn't really ease the indie way until October 2012 when they dropped the ISBN requirement. And I don't believe they released iBooks Author until the beginning of 2012, to further help indies in producing quality ebooks.
> 
> ...


Anyone know the # of audiobooks sold on Amazon & Audible vs on iTunes?


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## Christa Wick (Nov 1, 2012)

adanlerma said:


> Anyone know the # of audiobooks sold on Amazon & Audible vs on iTunes?


No, but a July 2013 report (can only look at overview) from IBISworld states no company has a "dominant" market share.

ETA the inevitable caveat - that report is for the total audiobook market, which was 2bn for the year surveyed. However, information from the Audiobook Publishers of America (which may or may not be tracking indies), for 2012 showed that the US *downloadable* audiobook market was worth $87 million in 2012, and that it has seen an annual growth rate between 20% and 30% for the past several years.

Most of us, for the next few years, at least, will only be concerned with the downloadable market.


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## adanlerma (Jan 16, 2012)

Christa Wick said:


> No, but a July 2013 report (can only look at overview) from IBISworld states no company has a "dominant" market share.


That's interesting, because for Amazon, from what I've read, they like books (incl audio books) which are 7% of their sales, as a window to the 93% of merchandise they carry (including some of my own gift items!), while, for iTunes then, we're looking at something that could increase their main stream product.

Either way, I'd rather a co-operative deal that kept our old royalty schedule, and the two giants co-operated as we played and created new content. But we'll see, I'm sure, soon enough.


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## daringnovelist (Apr 3, 2010)

markecooper said:


> Go into your audible account and find the book you want. Click download instead of the send option. It will download the file to your computer using the audible downloader. If you have the box ticked in the downloader, the file will import automatically into your itunes.


Hmmmmmmm.

I think I've figured out the problem, and that will still be a problem for most people buying those Whispersync books.

I no longer have an Audible account. (I'm not sure I ever did -- I was so frustrated trying to buy a book from because they insisted that I "subscribe" even if the first month was free -- that I ditched them. When Amazon started offering that Whispersync, I thought "Cool, I can now actually buy an affordable edition straight from Amazon." But it turns out it's not so cool.")

I don't want to have to sign up for a whole new service for something that was a one-click -- and especially not if they insist on it being a monthly fee service. (I realize they could be like GoDaddy and they are simply so busy trying to sell you things that it is hard to get to the point where you can see what you're really buying.)

So, I stand by my premise: Audible is a problem for Amazon because they are a user-unfriendly service. (Just as automated book distribution systems were a problem for Big Publishing because they were unfriendly to the customer too.)

This is an opportunity for someone.

Camille


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

daringnovelist said:


> Hmmmmmmm.
> 
> I think I've figured out the problem, and that will still be a problem for most people buying those Whispersync books.
> 
> ...


Hmmm not sure I agree. Audible is linked to your Amazon user and password. You can just log in like you would with Amazon on audible.com

There is no subscription required to buy a book. You can just pay using your Amazon account... Meaning the cc info you have on file with them. It works out cheaper though if you buy a set of credits. I usually buy 24 and they last ages, but like most readers I use the credits only only the most expensive books. I wouldn't use a credit on a $12 book for example. This of course enrages authors and me when I have my writer head on, because royalties take a hit, but as a listener its awesome.

I do use my Cc for cheaper books.


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## daringnovelist (Apr 3, 2010)

markecooper said:


> Hmmm not sure I agree. Audible is linked to your Amazon user and password. You can just log in like you would with Amazon on audible.com
> 
> There is no subscription required to buy a book. You can just pay using your Amazon account... Meaning the cc info you have on file with them. It works out cheaper though if you buy a set of credits. I usually buy 24 and they last ages, but like most readers I use the credits only only the most expensive books. I wouldn't use a credit on a $12 book for example. This of course enrages authors and me when I have my writer head on, because royalties take a hit, but as a listener its awesome.
> 
> I do use my Cc for cheaper books.


Persistence is useful. Thank you. I am now less pissed off at Audible.

Camille


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

daringnovelist said:


> Persistence is useful. Thank you. I am now less p*ssed off at Audible.
> 
> Camille


Haha... in a way, Audible being so good IS a reason to be p*ssed off because if it was a bad venue, I wouldn't care so much about having my stuff available there. I buy a lot of audio books, so I know how important Audible is to me as a writer.


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## EC (Aug 20, 2013)

Christa Wick said:


> Following on -
> 
> The last renewal date between Amazon and Apple's signing sticking in my mind was 2011. I don't know how accurate that date is. According to a Wired article, Apple allowed indies to first begin uploading directly in mid-2010, but they didn't really ease the indie way until October 2012 when they dropped the ISBN requirement. And I don't believe they released iBooks Author until the beginning of 2012, to further help indies in producing quality ebooks.
> 
> ...


Could be, on the other hand I know a few authors who are in overdrive to get projects qualified before March 12th. It's certainly been a motivational announcement .


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## Alan Petersen (May 20, 2011)

VEVO said:


> [email protected]
> 
> if you email in to complain, that's the one to do it. Especially if you are canceling your Audible account.
> 
> ...


Aside from those who are canceling their audible memberships, in this scenario we're not customers, we're content providers, vendors basically. It's the equivalent of a Walmart vendor complaining about changing in terms. I would be very surprised if Jeff Bezos was unaware and hadn't given it his okay when it comes to a financial decision like this one in one of his companies.


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## leestrayer (Feb 28, 2014)

Christa Wick said:


> Can anyone who has found information on this particular point weigh in, preferably with links to the reputable source discussing it:
> 
> Right now, Audible has an exclusive relationship with iTunes (i.e. to get your product into iTunes' audiobook store, you have to go through Audible). (This is stated on the ACX site - so "fact" - although you can get audiobooks on Apple via an App for your audiobook store, such as audiobooks.com has.)


I haven't found anything anywhere on their agreement, but if you look at Apple's Approved Aggregator page at iTunes:
https://itunesconnect.apple.com/WebObjects/iTunesConnect.woa/wa/displayAggregators?ccTypeId=3
they aren't listed, though I don't know if they ever were. CDBaby is, for instance, but their publishing arrangement is different from the way ACX works, as you contract with them and pay for their services, unlike ACX, which acts more or less as a small publisher upload front end for Audible. Audible then, in turn, sends it's catalog to iTunes, along with ACX books.

But, this two-step process is very much the way Smashwords operates, and they ARE listed as an Apple Approved Aggregator:
https://itunesconnect.apple.com/WebObjects/iTunesConnect.woa/wa/displayAggregators?ccTypeId=13

And then there's the whole "Apple Plotting With The Big 6 to Bring Amazon to Its Knees" thing, which I'm sure doesn't make agreements between the two companies any easier to keep in place 

It would be nice to have Audible weigh in a little more publicly on some of these questions on their blog, so that we can stop speculating. My questions would be:

Could we see what the new contract is going to look like? Although they have said "flat 40%", have they specifically addressed the escalator?
What is the distribution contracted as in the new contract? I'm no lawyer, but if I agree to a contract for exclusive distribution that includes certain named venues, those venues would need to stay active for the life of the contract, or the contract would be void. If they would end their agreement with iTunes, for instance, and iTunes removed all of those titles from their store, then Audible would be restricting me from selling through Apple, which I never agreed to. In fact, I contracted with them to provide distribution through Apple, which I would no longer be receiving. I would hope that they have some agreement to keep titles in place if the agreement for new titles would end, but I would love to have an answer to that. Seven year contracts cut both ways, which is probably the ONLY reason they didn't cut existing contracts to a flat 40% as well.
The bigger question in the end may be the ridiculous discounting that Amazon does when pairing the audiobook with the ebook, and I would like to know where that is addressed in the contract. I know we give Audible power to set prices on the titles they sell, but it seems a little gray when Amazon starts setting prices from their site, as Audible is still a wholly-owned subsidiary and not really Amazon itself. Again, I'm not a lawyer, but it seems a little hazy to me. Of course, as a narrator, this is actually the part that kills me more than even the new royalty, as my work gets turned into the joke book at the bottom of the box of Cracker Jack, and I get paid accordingly. Authors who pay for their production get hit pretty hard, too, but narrators who take a royalty share arrangement get absolutely nothing from the bundled purchase. If that practice is going to continue, I don't see any narrators spending time on a royalty share project if they can find anything else to fill their time, which will just put everything back to the way it was before ACX, more or less.

I agree with Christa that the whole thing seems unnecessarily rushed with very little information. If Audible is trying to head off something with Apple, though Audible would have to have more knowledge about what Apple is planning than is publicly available. To publish audio, most indie authors would need to work with an aggregator to get into iTunes (unless you have 20 audiobooks), and right now, nobody on the approved aggregator list really has a program for audiobooks, which are MUCH longer than a music album and wouldn't distribute through most other music retailers. Since we're already in app development at Atomic 27, I'm going to try and work out an inexpensive program to specifically aggregate self-published audiobooks for iTunes, if the need arises and anyone is interested. I think that Audible has to be commended for starting this idea, but I would hate to see it die just because they decide to choke it out of existence.


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## rxena77 (Mar 13, 2011)

"It's time for me to re-center and reconsider what and how I can live my own creative life within these changes."

Felipe, that is wise. To become enraged at a business for conducting itself to gain as much profit as possible no matter how much it inconveniences its vendors is to become mad at the rain for being wet.

I trust Amazon ... to squeeze as much profits from its ventures as possible.  It needed Indie authors to fill its inventory for new Kindle buyers.  Now, the Kindles are self-sustaining.  B&N and its Nook are no longer threats.  Amazon does not need Indie authors.  It needs the Bestselling authors.  To get them, Amazon must tempt them with paying for the production of their audiobooks.  When you no longer need training wheels for your bicycle, you discard them.  Consider ourselves being discarded.  Nothing personal.  Just business.


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## rxena77 (Mar 13, 2011)

"That's not true. No business at all works like that."

Steven, In regards to audiobooks, Amazon is a monopoly for all intents and purposes.  We, the Indie authors, are the vendors who are no longer needed.  Technically, Amazon is not a monopoly but realistically, it is, making it tempting to do what it is doing.  It is not pleasant for we little fish, but sharks do just fine in the ocean.

I understand that you believe firmly what you write.  I can see your logic.  It just doesn't matter to sharks.

Basically, I was just affirming the wisdom of living with what is happening with as much composure and calm deliberation as we can muster, looking for ways to thrive in a changed business environment.  Good to meet you, Steven.


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## FictionalWriter (Aug 4, 2010)

Alan Petersen said:


> Aside from those who are canceling their audible memberships, in this scenario we're not customers, we're content providers, vendors basically. It's the equivalent of a Walmart vendor complaining about changing in terms. I would be very surprised if Jeff Bezos was unaware and hadn't given it his okay when it comes to a financial decision like this one in one of his companies.


And what is happening to Walmart now? Too many vendors were making little or next to nothing, all in an effort to get their products in Walmart, so many just stopped selling to them. What's the point when you're not making money because you have to sell a product so low? Walmart started to inch their prices up to customers and customers realized they AREN'T the cheapest game in town and began shopping elsewhere.

When you run a company on razor-thin margins, something has to give. Your suppliers feel it first and inevitably, the customers do. And once THEY do...well I think we all know what happens then.


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## Guest (Mar 1, 2014)

StevenCampbell said:


> That's not true. No business at all works like that.


WalMart does. Ye gods. Does WalMart. It's WalMart's entire MO. The will always start with what are considered "fair" terms. And then you get incentives for volume, which encourages you to put more and more of your advertising dollars into WalMart. As WalMart because a larger percentage of your overall business, then they start to squeeze you. Each contract renewal is a bit of profit creep. You need WalMart because you've forgotten how to sell anywhere else, or you alienated all of your other outlets by focusing so much ad money on WalMart. There are companies WalMart has literally forced into bankruptcy because they became so dependent on WalMart. And WalMart doesn't care, because for every company that goes bottom up or leaves there are five clamoring to do business with them.


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

rxena77 said:


> "It's time for me to re-center and reconsider what and how I can live my own creative life within these changes."
> 
> Felipe, that is wise. To become enraged at a business for conducting itself to gain as much profit as possible no matter how much it inconveniences its vendors is to become mad at the rain for being wet.
> 
> I trust Amazon ... to squeeze as much profits from its ventures as possible. It needed Indie authors to fill its inventory for new Kindle buyers. Now, the Kindles are self-sustaining. B&N and its Nook are no longer threats. Amazon does not need Indie authors. It needs the Bestselling authors. To get them, Amazon must tempt them with paying for the production of their audiobooks. When you no longer need training wheels for your bicycle, you discard them. Consider ourselves being discarded. Nothing personal. Just business.


Given the data Howdy (Sorry) Howey has been releasing recently, Amazon needs independents just as much as it needs best sellers. Independents are a significant and growing component of total book revenue. If Amazon's objective is increasing revenue and market share, it needs both. The businrss objective needs both.

However, that doesn't mean Amazon will treat both sets of vendors the same. One set is made up of players who each control lots of books. The other set is made up of players who each control a few books. Its reasonable to expect them to deal with each group in a different manner.

Amazon still doesn't call to confide, so I didn't know what they will do. But any contract that says Amazon can change it at any time is not something I would count on beyond next Tuesday. The nature of markets is to continually change.



> When you run a company on razor-thin margins, something has to give. Your suppliers feel it first and inevitably, the customers do. And once THEY do...well I think we all know what happens then


Well, what happens? I don't know. If evetyone elser knows, I'm just not as smart as everyone else. Are those suppliers selling to someone else cheaper than they sell to Walmart? Have the competitors of those suppliers dropped Walmart, too? Are the suppliers content giving up market share?


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## FictionalWriter (Aug 4, 2010)

Terrence OBrien said:


> Well, what happens? I don't know. If evetyone elser knows, I'm just not as smart as everyone else. Are those suppliers selling to someone else cheaper than they sell to Walmart? Have the competitors of those suppliers dropped Walmart, too? Are the suppliers content giving up market share?


No suppliers sell it at a price where they can make a fair profit because it comes down to either selling higher volume and barely breaking even, or selling less and making a workable profit. It's like an idie trying to make a living selling only .99 books. Very few can make a living doing it long-term.


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## rxena77 (Mar 13, 2011)

> Amazon needs independents just as much as it needs best sellers. Independents are a significant and growing component of total book revenue. If Amazon's objective is increasing revenue and market share, it needs both.


Yes, Terrance -- but Amazon does not need US. As Julie, Wal-Mart, and any American Mall proves: for every dreamy vendor leeched and tossed to the wayside, there are a long line of vendors waiting, product in hand to take their place.

Amazon is merely fine-tuning to obtain the most profit possible, knowing there is a vast ocean of authors dreaming of writing that break-out novel and audiobook to harvest. They do not need us which their "here-today/changed tomorrow contract" proves. We need them which is proven by our accepting a status that locks us in for seven years in a world where technology can change things within months.

Amazon is not a villain. Amazon is a business. Business concerns itself with customers not with vendors. I merely point this out so that perhaps we will look upon this situation with calm deliberation and reasoned actions. Really good to meet you, Alan, Steven, and Julie.


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## FictionalWriter (Aug 4, 2010)

The one thing that's always going to remain constant is there will be a producer who has a basic product to sell and a consumer who is willing to pay for that product. What is constantly changing is how and who gets that product to the consumer. Authors used to need a publisher. We don't anymore. Now we only need a distributor. No one knows what tomorrow will bring.

_Necessity is the key to invention innovation. _


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

I'm locking in all my existing books over the next 10 days, spreading the due dates out at the rate I originally planned to do them--so no real change, other than that I'm getting the agreements done now.

As for future books--well, they're in the future, and we'll see what the future brings, right?

I know that sounds Pollyanna-ish, and I did my own share of freaking out at the time, but all we can do is play what's in front of us, make the best choices for today's circumstances. And the fact is, the terms that were a good deal a week ago are still a good deal this week, and there's still time to get a narrator lined up and an agreement made.


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## Alan Petersen (May 20, 2011)

StevenCampbell said:


> That's not true. No business at all works like that. If they make it so that it simply isn't profitable, no one will publish. If they receive 100% profits of 0 books it's still 0. Only a monopoly, that is a monopoly along every part of its chain from production to distribution, can wantonly declare its terms without recourse.
> 
> Which is why monopolies are illegal.


In an old life, I worked for a company that setup EDI connections for Walmart's smaller vendors that didn't have the tech know-how. Walmart changed their terms all the time with little notice (and fines if they didn't comply).

The vendors had to comply or hit the bricks, and we (a third party company not Walmart) had to deliver the news. Man did I get cussed out a lot.

Walmart wouldn't do that with big companies like Proctor and Gamble, they had their own departments, etc. but little vendors, oh yeah. Sound familiar? We're the little vendors, Simon & Schuster and the big publishing houses are not.

This reminds me of those small vendors. We either take the changes or we hit the bricks. As has been noted by others, there are plenty of others lined up to fill that void.

Personally, I'm hitting the bricks, I won't produce new audiobooks this year, unless the one I have now picks way up in the sales department. I highly doubt ACX/Amazon is crying in their beer that I won't produce a couple more audiobooks for them this year.


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## Michael Kingswood (Feb 18, 2011)

StevenCampbell said:


> Which is why monopolies are illegal.


Point of order - monopolies are NOT illegal.


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## 555aaa (Jan 28, 2014)

There may have been a few events which led up to this decision. First, I seem to recall that last year Audible offered books at different quality settings with a different pricing structure. Later in the year, they introduced an additional high quality (higher bit rate encoding) option as a new improvement. Now, when I look on the Audible site, these seem to all be gone, so I assume the only option is the high quality (larger file size) one. The second factor which may be playing into this is the Verizon lawsuit decision (against the FCC) in January, which struck down the FCC's ability to implement "net neutrality" via its regulatory authority. This is expected to cause higher data costs for Amazon (http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-01-14/verizon-wins-net-neutrality-court-ruling-against-fcc.html).

Audiobook downloads, particularly with high quality encoding, are quite large. Consider that 'Wuthering Heights' sells for about 4 cents per minute, which works out to about 4 cents per MB download at 128Kbit/sec encoding. In comparison, a MP3 album download averages about 18 cents/minute, and a single song sells for roughly 13 cents/MB or 28 cents/minute. If Amazon is only making 10% off of that Wuthering Heights sale, then they need to spit out that 700Mbyte download for much less than 0.3 cents/MB. If it's coded at 64Kbits/sec, then at a 90% royalty, they need to deliver at 0.6 cents/MB, and so forth. Video, by the way, is bargain priced, with 50 minute TV episodes selling for around $2.00, but consuming roughly 500MB (for a modest 1200kbit/sec data rate) - that corresponds to about 0.4 cents/MB.

Makes you think about the 15 cents/MB download surcharge KDP charges!


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## Gennita Low (Dec 13, 2012)

Then why price it on sale for $1.99?


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

romanceauthor said:


> No suppliers sell it at a price where they can make a fair profit because it comes down to either selling higher volume and barely breaking even, or selling less and making a workable profit. It's like an idie trying to make a living selling only .99 books. Very few can make a living doing it long-term.


OK. So what happens? I sure don't know.



> Yes, Terrance -- but Amazon does not need US. As Julie, Wal-Mart, and any American Mall proves: for every dreamy vendor leeched and tossed to the wayside, there are a long line of vendors waiting, product in hand to take their place.


Us? I don't know. What is us? If the objective is market share and revenue, they need independents. Since I don't know what comprises the set of us, I don't now how the set of independents and the set to us intersect.

They need independents whose books will appeal to consumers. It doesn't much matter what their names are.



> Point of order - monopolies are NOT illegal.


Agree. Maybe someone can give us an example of a retail monopoly so we can see how Amazon compares.


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## FictionalWriter (Aug 4, 2010)

Terrence OBrien said:


> OK. So what happens? I sure don't know.


What happens is sales at stores like Walmart start declining because customers start shopping elsewhere--their price advantage is no longer. They simply can't keep their prices as low as they first were without it negatively impacting their bottom line. Vendors are either not choosing to have their products there for the same reasons or they are charging Walmart more. If Walmart "needs" the product, they have to charge their customers more, if not, they stop doing business with said vendor.

The business model of being the cheapest (of identical products) by squeezing the vendor or selling on razor-thin margins is one that can only last for so long. Companies need to sell at a decent or healthy margin to stay in business over the long haul.


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## zzzzzzz (Dec 6, 2011)

It's the producers who are hitting the bricks. We, as rights holders, are simply left without quality narrators who will work at rates we can ever recoup.


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

romanceauthor said:


> What happens is sales at stores like Walmart start declining because customers start shopping elsewhere--their price advantage is no longer. They simply can't keep their prices as low as they first were without it negatively impacting their bottom line. Vendors are either not choosing to have their products there for the same reasons or they are charging Walmart more. If Walmart "needs" the product, they have to charge their customers more, if not, they stop doing business with said vendor.


So vendors have stopped competing to sell to Walmart? They are all acting in concert? When one vendor leaves Walmart, no other vendor takes that market share and employs economies of scale? Other retailers are getting the same goods for less than Walmart? Year after year, companies whine about Walmart, and they keep coming back because they are losing money? If vendor prices rise over time, Walmart is no longer getting the lowest price? The vendors who don't like Walmart are selling to other retailers at a higher price, and that somehow lets those retailers under cut Walmart?

Thats not how history shows competitive markets working.



> The business model of being the cheapest (of identical products) by squeezing the vendor or selling on razor-thin margins is one that can only last for so long. Companies need to sell at a decent or healthy margin to stay in business over the long haul.


Thats what Amazon is doing, and it seems to be working pretty well. We don't see them raising what they pay vendors. I think this thread is about how they are cutting what they pay vendors. For the past 12 months, Amazons operating margin has been 1%. Walmarts is 5.6%.

People taik about the long term a lot. I really don't know what they mean. There is no long term if companies don't survive the short term.



> It's the producers who are hitting the bricks. We, as rights holders, are simply left without quality narrators who will work at rates we can ever recoup.


I wonder if we will see more authors doing their own narration. Also, we might see a new group of folks enter the narration market. I expect lots of folks will be testing things. When one player in a market moves, its rare for the other players to sit on their hands. They are pretty smart people, and I suspect they will innovate.


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## blakebooks (Mar 10, 2012)

It substantially changes my ROI calculations. And when you throw in the $1.99 discounting, it's quite possible that the roughly $5 per audiobook I've been seeing could net out to more like $3 or so after blending them in. At $3 a pop, I'd have to sell 1000 before I've recouped my production cost. That could take a couple of years, easy, for some titles. Maybe more. At $5 a pop, it will take a lot less units.

What it does is it reduced the attractiveness of investing in the medium for me, and the discounting makes it more of a roll of the dice than a business proposition. When I look at investing, I look at risk/reward. In this scenario I take 100% of the risk, and my reward is unknowable due to the discounting and the lower royalty.

I'd much rather invest my money in something with a determinable rate of return from here on out. And it does make me nervous about the tens of thousands of dollars I've invested in producing about fifteen audio books by June. Frankly, the discounting is what makes me the most nervous, because those are all subject to the 50% royalty, and so unaffected by this announcement.

I can guarantee that the companies who were looking at audiobook development as a decent business model are shaking their heads now. It just became 20% less profitable. For most businesses, that would kill the attraction. It certainly does for me.

I suspect I'm not alone. This decision can only result in one outcome: far less audiobook development by indies. That tells me that ACX doesn't particularly care about that. If they're paying big bucks out of pocket to produce the trad pubbed titles so they have a draw of recognizable names to suck in new customers, they clearly plan to have indies subsidize that with the lower royalty rate - that's the only possible way this decision would result in greater audiobook development. Greater development of big names, less by everyone else.

I have plenty of other places to spend my money than subsidizing someone's business model, thank you. Tequila, fast cars, and loose women come to mind. If I'm going to do something with no way to predict an ROI, might as well call it what it is: a flyer, not an investment. And I prefer my flyers deliver some kind of fun factor, because with a flyer you might well never see your investment back.


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

> I suspect I'm not alone. This decision can only result in one outcome: far less audiobook development by indies. That tells me that ACX doesn't particularly care about that. If they're paying big bucks out of pocket to produce the trad pubbed titles so they have a draw of recognizable names to suck in new customers, they clearly plan to have indies subsidize that with the lower royalty rate - that's the only possible way this decision would result in greater audiobook development. Greater development of big names, less by everyone else.


This is where figures like Howey developed for aBooks would be very helpful. Is there any indication of ACX independent market share?

I agree it appears there will be less audio by independents. It looks more like they are catering to the independents who can make a buck under the new terms. These would be the top X% of independent audio sellers. Problem is, I don't know what X is.

It may be a very deliberate effort to reduce their offerings.


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## 28612 (Dec 7, 2010)

blakebooks said:


> What it does is it reduced the attractiveness of investing in the medium for me, and the discounting makes it more of a roll of the dice than a business proposition. When I look at investing, I look at risk/reward. In this scenario I take 100% of the risk, and my reward is unknowable due to the discounting and the lower royalty.


This



> I'd much rather invest my money in something with a determinable rate of return from here on out.


I'd much rather invest my money -- and my time -- in efforts with more promising and determinable ROI.


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## Guest (Mar 2, 2014)

We're getting a lot of comments here that there others waiting in line behind us to get their books on Amazon and/or Audible.
Very true.
That makes us (authors) easy prey to price cutting, and royalty cutting for our products.
Well, that's business. Nothing personal.
But let's look at another profession that got tired of being at the bottom of the profit chain.
If I am an aspiring actor, I can not audition on Broadway and try to get a part because I'm a newcomer and will work for nothing just to get the experience and exposure.
The acting profession banded together and established guilds that set minimum pay scales. It was a tough fight and a long time, but the actors did it.
Ditto the screenwriters.
As long as we devalue our work, and rationalize that there are indeed plenty of amateurs willing to take our place for peanuts, then we will continue to be lumped in with the amateurs.
Well, we've pretty much accepted our lot. Organizing is hard work and time consuming.
Let's quit whining.


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## LeeBee (Feb 19, 2014)

Okey Dokey said:


> The acting profession banded together and established guilds that set minimum pay scales. It was a tough fight and a long time, but the actors did it.
> Ditto the screenwriters.
> As long as we devalue our work, and rationalize that there are indeed plenty of amateurs willing to take our place for peanuts, then we will continue to be lumped in with the amateurs.
> Well, we've pretty much accepted our lot. Organizing is hard work and time consuming.
> Let's quit whining.


The question is, what form does any organizing take? Self-publishers are not labor; they are self-employed entrepreneurs. Can there be a "guild" for entrepreneurs?


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

LeeBee said:


> The question is, what form does any organizing take? Self-publishers are not labor; they are self-employed entrepreneurs. Can there be a "guild" for entrepreneurs?


Well, you could always organize and set your prices. 
Of course, that would be a cartel, and it would be illegal.

Or we could share information, pay it forward, and give a hand to each other. That's the route that, as entrepreneurs, each selling our own products (rather than services as pointed out above & below here) would seem to me to make the most sense. Each of us making our own decisions, but with access to some collective experience and wisdom from the community. That's what we're doing now, and personally, it's helping me.


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## Diane Patterson (Jun 17, 2012)

Okey Dokey said:


> The acting profession banded together and established guilds that set minimum pay scales. It was a tough fight and a long time, but the actors did it.
> Ditto the screenwriters.


As has been pointed out on the boards before, you can band together in a union (or a "guild"), if you are selling a service, not a product.

Screenwriters formed a guild because they gave up the copyrights to their work. They are selling their services as writers. They maintain no power over the resulting product (as many screenwriters will tell you).

Are you willing to give up the copyrights to your work?


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## FictionalWriter (Aug 4, 2010)

Terrence OBrien said:


> So vendors have stopped competing to sell to Walmart? They are all acting in concert? When one vendor leaves Walmart, no other vendor takes that market share and employs economies of scale? Other retailers are getting the same goods for less than Walmart? Year after year, companies whine about Walmart, and they keep coming back because they are losing money? If vendor prices rise over time, Walmart is no longer getting the lowest price? The vendors who don't like Walmart are selling to other retailers at a higher price, and that somehow lets those retailers under cut Walmart?


This is a process and we are -- with Walmart -- seeing its effects now. Walmart has been the big dog for a long time (relatively) and it's only recently started to effect their bottom line. And Walmart isn't going to just take any vendor and product. They NEED certain products, certain brands to compete. General Mills, Kraft etc... Just because you can sell them something cheap doesn't mean they will carry it. Consumers have to want it, have to purchase it. Walmart gives you visibility that's it. They can't make a consumer buy something they don't want.

And no, vendors are selling to retailers at a price they can actually make a decent profit, which means Walmart isn't carrying it, (if they won't accept the price) so there is no undercutting to be had.


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

romanceauthor said:


> This is a process and we are -- with Walmart -- seeing its effects now. Walmart has been the big dog for a long time (relatively) and it's only recently started to effect their bottom line. And Walmart isn't going to just take any vendor and product. They NEED certain products, certain brands to compete. General Mills, Kraft etc... Just because you can sell them something cheap doesn't mean they will carry it. Consumers have to want it, have to purchase it. Walmart gives you visibility that's it. They can't make a consumer buy something they don't want.
> 
> And no, vendors are selling to retailers at a price they can actually make a decent profit, which means Walmart isn't carrying it, (if they won't accept the price) so there is no undercutting to be had.


Walmart revenue, operating profit, and net profit for 2013 are all up from 2012. 2012 was up from 2011. 3Q13 was down from 2Q13, but up from 1Q13. Last Xmas was much better than expected for all retailers. This Xmas wasn't so good or anyone. Walmart did slump at Xmas13 compared to Xmas12, but they slumped with everyone else.

For all these years General Mills and Kraft were losing money at Walmart? Do they know?

Its an interesting theory, but the numbers don't support it.



> And no, vendors are selling to retailers at a price they can actually make a decent profit, which means Walmart isn't carrying it, (if they won't accept the price) so there is no undercutting to be had.


Think Walmart might have a competitors goods instead? If vendors are selling to other retailers for more than their competitors selling to Walmart, are those retailers now able to undercut Walmart because they pay more? Decent profit for suppliers doesn't matter in determining Walmarts competitive position.



> As long as we devalue our work, and rationalize that there are indeed plenty of amateurs willing to take our place for peanuts, then we will continue to be lumped in with the amateurs.


Well, I'm an amateur. I don't know what professional means. Perhaps amateurs are doing to non-amateur independents what independents did to publishers. The market really is harsh, and indepents are competing with each other.



> As has been pointed out on the boards before, you can band together in a union (or a "guild"), if you are selling a service, not a product.


Yes. Apple and the Big 5 recently tried that one. Didn't work too well.



> There may have been a few events which led up to this decision. First, I seem to recall that last year Audible offered books at different quality settings with a different pricing structure.


I bought a few ebooks last year where Amazon offered me the audio for $3. Package deal only. The Hunger Games #2 was one. Then the audio and eBook synched page numbet. Stop reading at page 56, and the audio starts up at page 56. The audio was top quality. Not sure what they were up to.


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## Zelah Meyer (Jun 15, 2011)

Something that is worth bearing in mind is that Amazon (not Audible, but Amazon) base their book selling model on having pretty much every in-print book that you might be looking for.  For a publisher, wanna-be authors might be interchangeable widgets.  For a vendor who wants to have everything a customer is looking for - they aren't.  If enough desirable authors aren't available on Amazon/Audible due to their royalties & can be found at one of their competitors, then the company isn't achieving what they want.

Audible doesn't have many real competitors other than iTunes, who they distribute to.  For now, Amazon still have competitors when it comes to book sales.

Yes, they are a business.  They will squeeze our profit margins when they can.  However, they are built on giving customers what they want - and if the customers want the latest Anne Other book and Anne isn't selling on there because they slashed their royalties to 40%, then they aren't succeeding in their key goal.  Plus, if customers want Anne's book enough to go to another vendor to buy it, they might buy Juan Moore's book too while they're there.  All of which is profit that doesn't go into Amazon's accounts.

I think our best long term bet is to ensure that competition remains alive and that we have a presence in other markets.  Even if that costs us a bit in the short term.


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## Deke (May 18, 2013)

Wouldn't it be refreshing if they just said, "We're increasing our cut due to the market dominance we have achieved."

I'm new to this and will look into setting up a project before the 12th.  I don't know what a "signed" deal is. I plan on recording the audio myself and uploading it.  

I have wondered if anyone sells audio from their own site.  This feels like the sort of added item that folks who already have bought and enjoyed the novel would buy.

At the AWP convention, someone in the Amazon booth mentioned they are linking audio and ebook so you can hear the book as you read it....anyone doing this?  Seems odd to me.


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

Deke said:


> Wouldn't it be refreshing if they just said, "We're increasing our cut due to the market dominance we have achieved."
> 
> I'm new to this and will look into setting up a project before the 12th. I don't know what a "signed" deal is. I plan on recording the audio myself and uploading it.
> 
> ...


What you're referring to is WhisperSync for Voice. That's the $1.99 deal others have talked about up-thread. Once somebody buys a Kindle book and Audible has done the WhisperSync deal (which takes a month or so), they start saying, if you bought the Kindle version, you can get an audio version as well for $1.99.

The way I look at the WhisperSync is: not about how many audiobooks I sell or the dollar I make on that, but an incentive for people to buy the ebook, and hopefully a way to sell more ebooks. I'm pretty sure that's why Amazon offers it, because they sure aren't making much on it. It's another tool to achieve, well, market share, or market dominance, if you will--offering an "enhanced" version of the book that you can't get on any other site. Another reason for customers to buy that book as opposed to somebody else's book without the audio option.

I don't think many people listen while they read. I think it's the idea that you can listen, and then at another time you can read--somehow it keeps track of where you "are" in the book, from what I understand, whether you're listening or reading. Not sure how it does that, and I may be wrong. And that if you like the book, you can listen in audio, too. I've listened to hundreds of audiobooks, and books I love, I like to have in both formats. (Not sure how excited I'd feel about a book I didn't love, though--I'm a re-reader, but only if I really like a book.)

I don't think you have to listen on your computer or anything. Pretty sure you can listen through your other devices, the way you'd listen to any audiobook.

A signed deal, by the way, is where you reach an agreement with a producer (or narrator) to produce the book--you post the book on the ACX website, make an offer with $$ terms and a completion date, and the offer is accepted. Not sure how it works with recording the book yourself, but presumably you could do that, but you'd probably have to have it done and uploaded by the 11th, which sounds like a tall order.

Hope that helps.


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## rxena77 (Mar 13, 2011)

> The way I look at the WhisperSync is: not about how many audiobooks I sell or the dollar I make on that, but an incentive for people to buy the ebook, and hopefully a way to sell more ebooks.


With the new flat rate of 40%, if I pay $3000 for an audiobook to be made, and I am whispersynced, I will only get 80 cents per sale. I will have to sell 3750 audiobooks just to break even. If I do Royalty Share, the poor narrator will only receive 40 cents! How many copies will have to be sold before his investment in my book is returned to him/her? This is Amazon asking me to invest $3000 that I will never get back to improve their business plan. I could go to Las Vegas and have a slim shot at returning wealthier than when I left.


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

rxena77 said:


> With the new flat rate of 40%, if I pay $3000 for an audiobook to be made, and I am whispersynced, I will only get 80 cents per sale. I will have to sell 3750 audiobooks just to break even. If I do Royalty Share, the poor narrator will only receive 40 cents! How many copies will have to be sold before his investment in my book is returned to him/her? This is Amazon asking me to invest $3000 that I will never get back to improve their business plan. I could go to Las Vegas and have a slim shot at returning wealthier than when I left.


Yeah, I'm not telling anyone to do it, just saying that's the way I look at it, and the way I see it working for me. Plus, I'll only do this if I can get it all set up while I still get the 50% + escalator, and I don't do royalty share. (I suspect narrators/producers are taking a long hard look at the idea of "royalty share" right now.)


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## JeffreyKafer (May 22, 2011)

You all are freaking out about Whispersync and you needn't. Since Whispersync was introduced many moons ago, I've not seen any deviation on the average $5-$6 per unit royalty. I just don't think enough people are using Whispersync for it to really matter.


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## C.F. (Jan 6, 2011)

Christa Wick said:


> Following on -
> 
> The last renewal date between Amazon and Apple's signing sticking in my mind was 2011. I don't know how accurate that date is. According to a Wired article, Apple allowed indies to first begin uploading directly in mid-2010, but they didn't really ease the indie way until October 2012 when they dropped the ISBN requirement. And I don't believe they released iBooks Author until the beginning of 2012, to further help indies in producing quality ebooks.
> 
> ...


This is not outside the realm of possibility. The more I think about it, the more it seems likely.

We've established that ACX is going to do what they feel is in their best interests. That's why they're changing the "royalty" rates-to make themselves more money.

So why the window to let us lock in the old rate? It's not out of the goodness of their hearts. It's in their best interests in some way. I would have expected an announcement like this to be effective as of the date of the email. From the beginning I thought it was odd that they were giving advance notice.

They knew they'd get a lot of panicky authors locking in that exclusivity. Why would they actively encourage authors to take an action that would net them less money? The only answer is that they know something we don't...like maybe that they're not going to have an exclusive arrangement with Apple anymore. It's in their best interests to get as many titles exclusively tied to them as possible, and they may know that it won't be so easy to do that in the future.


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## Michael Kingswood (Feb 18, 2011)

JeffreyKafer said:


> You all are freaking out about Whispersync and you needn't. Since Whispersync was introduced many moons ago, I've not seen any deviation on the average $5-$6 per unit royalty. I just don't think enough people are using Whispersync for it to really matter.


This. Speaking as a data point of one, if I get the audiobook of a book, I get the audiobook. If I get the ebook, I get the ebook. I never get both. I almost never get an ebook and a print book of the same title - I have exactly one book in both ebook and print, and that's Wool. And that's only because I won the print copy in a raffle in Mysterious Galaxy (I had already read the ebook when that happened). I have no data to back this up, but I suspect a fair number of others will behave similarly.

Of course, that could just be my inflated ego speaking.


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## ricola (Mar 3, 2014)

NadiaLee said:


> Yeah. I kinda rolled my eyes at that part. And how this reduction accommodates us better somehow.


That's how traditional publishers described the cheap rights grab for digital years ago, too.


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

JeffreyKafer said:


> You all are freaking out about Whispersync and you needn't. Since Whispersync was introduced many moons ago, I've not seen any deviation on the average $5-$6 per unit royalty. I just don't think enough people are using Whispersync for it to really matter.


It's not the whispersync itself that freaks me, its the idea that Audible can and does discount to such a low level without any barriers to it. I know, I know we sign away our rights for 7 years, so we have no voice, but it was with the understanding that we would get 50% of something worth having and so we invest $4000 in a model we felt was worth doing.

There is nothing stopping Audible from discounting an entire line or series as a loss leader forever to $1.99. Not something they WOULD do, but they COULD. And some might say they would never do that! But just imagine they wanted to push a new category to people that had a lot of 47 North books in it (an Amazon imprint) and they wanted to generate buzz. They have a look in there and decide, hey, this genre needs fans. Lets manufacture some by giving away a ton of books in that category.

It could happen. After all, aren't we indies already "manufacturing" our fans by giving away our book1s in series? I know I am.

I guess wispersynch doesn't scare me because I know I can break the link easily by modifying my ebook. I won't, but I could if desperate enough. What I can't do is affect anything that Audible does if they decide to discount my books for 6 months to $1 to get new members! All I can do is not take the deal next time, or halve my production costs, or never use royalty split, or... something else I haven't thought of.


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## adanlerma (Jan 16, 2012)

I guess I'm settling in, with what I'm able to control and do.

Rush all my titles to contract, or hold back?

ACX is downsizing our (indies) profit potential, or rushing us because they'll have less sway?

Maybe neither, maybe both.

Me, I have some titles I'm glad to have placed under contract since the announcement, and I'm glad I have other titles for later.

One of the (few) benefits of being at the base of the totem pole is, I can only dig myself so much lower before I choke myself off anyway, and I have lots of room above me to grow.

Today I gladly return my attention to a new mystery suspense short story with my usual six young cousin characters I've put on hold too long.  It's a relief.  A refuge.  An escape and an escape hatch.  It's where I hide and can emerge from.

Essentially, I'm a reader of my own work.  And I'm glad to be back at it.

For all of us, narrators and authors, indies, newbies, midlist and higher, I wish us all the best.  For us (narrators and authors) who have a tie to content, there is no zero sum game.  Someone else's win in the creative world, is not our loss.  But our encouragement.  There's obviously a lot to be encourage about.


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

Although disappointed for the future, I am in a place now where I have decided to look for the positive... errrrr so, I wanted to have four books this year in audible and was willing to take the 50% pay up front 7 year exclusive deal. Because that's true, I can hardly bitch about having to rush 8 into that deal now can I? I mean, if the deal was acceptable last week for four titles it must still be acceptable for 8 this week right?

The only thing to bitch about then is cramming all the cost into one year instead of two, and needing to look for a new alternative for future titles in my series. So yeah... I'm attempting to smile now... see


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## FictionalWriter (Aug 4, 2010)

I found this article ironic -- and timely.

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/amazons-new-killer-app-for-books-2014-03-06



> *If you want Amazon AMZN -0.29% CEO Jeff Bezos to respond to your emails, take a tip from Rabbi Dan Moskovitz, 43, of Vancouver, British Columbia, and use the subject line: "Thank You! You're Awesome."*
> 
> "I just want to compliment you on the most amazing piece of technology I have enjoyed from Amazon," Moskovitz wrote Bezos in December. "Your Whispersync System for Kindle and audiobooks is incredible."


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

romanceauthor said:


> I found this article ironic -- and timely.
> 
> http://www.marketwatch.com/story/amazons-new-killer-app-for-books-2014-03-06


If this becomes as huge as it could, there are going to be a lot of starving narrators unless there is an opt OUT button for content providers. I know of only one way to opt out at the moment, and that is to purposely make the ebook different enough from the audio to screw it up. Different chapter breaks will do it, or an extra paragraph here and there.


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## David Peterson (Feb 8, 2014)

JeffreyKafer said:


> You all are freaking out about Whispersync and you needn't. Since Whispersync was introduced many moons ago, I've not seen any deviation on the average $5-$6 per unit royalty. I just don't think enough people are using Whispersync for it to really matter.


As a reader and audible member, I have bought books through whispersync, but I suspect that's a good thing for you. I go out to buy an ebook and after my purchase is complete, I see that I can get the audio for $1.99, so I buy it in case I want to listen to the book instead of read it. I wasn't going to buy the audio book otherwise. So, at least for buyers like me, you are not losing a $15 credit sale (or whatever) you are gaining a $2 upsell that you would have not sold otherwise.

I suppose the downside would be if people look at audible, find the audio books they want and then go through Amazon\whispersync to get them cheaper. Not sure how often that happens.


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## FictionalWriter (Aug 4, 2010)

markecooper said:


> If this becomes as huge as it could, there are going to be a lot of starving narrators unless there is an opt OUT button for content providers. I know of only one way to opt out at the moment, and that is to purposely make the ebook different enough from the audio to screw it up. Different chapter breaks will do it, or an extra paragraph here and there.


The thing is, if you're a smart audio listener, you'll purchase the ebook first and get the audio almost for nothing if we're talking a matchbook price of $1.99.


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

I thought about this both ways, and decided:
Either the person goes in to buy the Kindle book, sees they can also get the audiobook for cheap, and is perhaps more likely to buy the Kindle book, 
or
They go to buy the audiobook, are a savvy purchaser as mentioned, buy the Kindle book first, then get the audiobook for cheap.

Either way, I may have sold an audiobook or a Kindle book I wouldn't have sold otherwise, an incremental sale for sure in one case, and possibly in the other case. It's all part of visibility, which works for me. At least I hope it does, because I've got agreements in place to do the next 6 of my books. However, I spread them out over about 15 months. Hopefully will get some critical mass going, and have a chance for the past books to pay off before I have to pay for the next one. 

Oh, well. It's a risk, but it's a risk I've decided to take. We will see.


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## SawyerPentecost (Jul 11, 2013)

Is there a reason that people dont just record their stories, and set them up in one of Libsyn's apps? They let you brand them and sell your audio files in the google and apple app stores.


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

jtbullet said:


> Is there a reason that people dont just record their stories, and set them up in one of Libsyn's apps? They let you brand them and sell your audio files in the google and apple app stores.


For me, it's because I'm not an actress, and the person reading my books is. Makes a big difference, I find, listening to an audiobook. Of course, it probably depends on the kind of book you write. If it's nonfiction or memoir or something, I'm sure the author can do fine reading it.


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

My narrator had an interesting idea about this drop to 40%. He said an actors/narrator forum he belongs to were debating reasons behind ACX telling everyone they're doing it to increase the available audio catalogue. I know what most of us thought about that LOL! We said it would reduce it not increase it, right? Well the actors decided to pretend good will on ACX's part and try to figure out what was meant. They came up with something that is definitely possible. Here it is (bearing in mind ACX has promised this since forever)

What if, like Barnes. ACX are finally going to bring in international authors to ACX? They have been promising this since the year dot, and it WOULD have the effect of roping in a lot more titles thereby increasing the available catalogue as they maintain is the reason for this. Because of fees, accounting, exchange rates etc etc, they may have wanted to find ways to fund their new stance. Hence the actor's guess that the drop to 40% is ACX's way of paying for the change.

What do you think? Possible, probable, none of them?


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## Guest (Mar 18, 2014)

Mark E. Cooper said:


> What if, like Barnes. ACX are finally going to bring in international authors to ACX? They have been promising this since the year dot, and it WOULD have the effect of roping in a lot more titles thereby increasing the available catalogue as they maintain is the reason for this. Because of fees, accounting, exchange rates etc etc, they may have wanted to find ways to fund their new stance. Hence the actor's guess that the drop to 40% is ACX's way of paying for the change.


International authors are going to have the same financial problems as domestic ones. Increasing the catalogue of LOW PAYING gigs doesn't seem to be a win for narrators.

This also doesn't fit with how Amazon's other services (KDP and Createspace) operate. Those services have the same issues with fees, accounting, exchange rates, etc. And if these were really issues, the reduced rate should be COUNTRY SPECIFIC. Why do I have to be penalized because ACX wants to open the door to other countries? That is THEIR business decision, not mine. If they want to open up to international they could have done so by offering international authors the reduced rate.


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

Bards and Sages (Julie) said:


> International authors are going to have the same financial problems as domestic ones. Increasing the catalogue of LOW PAYING gigs doesn't seem to be a win for narrators.
> 
> This also doesn't fit with how Amazon's other services (KDP and Createspace) operate. Those services have the same issues with fees, accounting, exchange rates, etc. And if these were really issues, the reduced rate should be COUNTRY SPECIFIC. Why do I have to be penalized because ACX wants to open the door to other countries? That is THEIR business decision, not mine. If they want to open up to international they could have done so by offering international authors the reduced rate.


I completely agree that "we" shouldn't be penalised. I include myself here because Joe helped me get into the club before the change occurred. They COULD offer international authors the same deal as previous--let's not forget we are still speculating as they haven't actually done this and may not--but if I was ACX and trying to decide whether to do something I would definitely look for ways to fund it.

It's a little bit like my decision to do audio editions at all. I always wanted to do it, but couldn't fund it until last Dec and Jan blew up big (sales wise) and gave me the money to indulge myself. ACX have always maintained they want to do it, a bit like KDP wanted to give everyone EFT and eventually did so. I just find the actor's idea of why ACX said they are doing it to increase their audiobook catalogue intriguing especially when none of us could fathom what the heck they were thinking.

I have no idea if the truth will be close to this or not. I kind of hope so, as my workaround using paypal cost money in fees that I could recoup if ACX DOES let me go direct. That way, although the 50% is still gone, the 40% won't seem "as" bad for new titles as it does to me right now.


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## daringnovelist (Apr 3, 2010)

SM Reine's experience may be why they are relating this to growing the catalog.  Instead of redistributing more income to the minority of bestsellers, they're leveling the playing field in anticipation of trying to get more long tail titles into the system. 

In that sense, I think Mark is right -- maybe not about his specific speculations, but in that Amazon is probably thinking of this in conjunction of some other effort they are making.  They are always a bit opaque in communications, and tend to leave out critical information, after all.  

Camille


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## Paul K (Jan 11, 2014)

Just some thought on the whispersync stuff mentioned above.

I have been an audible subscriber for a few years. Here is the thing, I get four credits each month as I essentially have two separate subscriptions. Over the years I have bought (with money as opposed to credits) maybe five books total. And those have been with credit gifted to me by audible for whatever reason.

Authors have lost out on exactly $0 due to whispersync discounting. 

I would think that 99% of audible purchases are from subscribers who use their credits. I may be wrong, but this is my suspicion.


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## NoCat (Aug 5, 2010)

Sockmerchant, only about 40% of my sales through ACX are people using credits. As a data point.


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## Paul K (Jan 11, 2014)

Hah that surprises me. Who the hell pays that much for books ! Sheesh


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## daringnovelist (Apr 3, 2010)

I suspect that Amazon is also hoping to greatly expand the Audio Book customer base via the Whispersync offers -- and make up the difference in volume. (And that would be especially important if they want to bring the "long tail" titles into it.)

Camille


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## Atunah (Nov 20, 2008)

I never had a audible subscription and I buy some audiobooks on sale or if they are part of the thing where I own the kindle book and get the audible for sale. Is that what the whispersync is? Its about the only way I buy audio books. I am still trying to get into them and using them with books I have read already I thought might make it easier. I am having a real hard time though with some of the narrators. If the narrator isn't good, I can't stand listening to it. I have been able to get several audio books for a fantastic price this way. I got Outlander for example for $3.99. That thing is like 36 hours long. I got the kindle book for sale to a few years back. 

Thankfully I can listen to the samples first. There have been many books were I knew right away I wouldn't be able to handle the narrator. Sometimes they don't know how to do voices well of both females and males.


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

Atunah said:


> I never had a audible subscription and I buy some audiobooks on sale or if they are part of the thing where I own the kindle book and get the audible for sale. Is that what the whispersync is? Its about the only way I buy audio books. I am still trying to get into them and using them with books I have read already I thought might make it easier. I am having a real hard time though with some of the narrators. If the narrator isn't good, I can't stand listening to it. I have been able to get several audio books for a fantastic price this way. I got Outlander for example for $3.99. That thing is like 36 hours long. I got the kindle book for sale to a few years back.
> 
> Thankfully I can listen to the samples first. There have been many books were I knew right away I wouldn't be able to handle the narrator. Sometimes they don't know how to do voices well of both females and males.


Yeah, honestly I buy a lot of audio mostly series that i loved in paper, but I have most of them now so I am buying new stuff but using my credits. I only use my credits on books around 12 hours or longer. I never buy shorter, but if I did I would pay cash.

I cannot understand HOW some of the books I sample were ever narrated using the chosen narrators. I am sure they're all good at something, but not the book I was sampling. I mean, I have heard an obviously middle aged narrator with a deep voice narrating a teenager and mangling it really bad, and the opposite as well. Where a young narrator is trying his heart out to sound like an elderly gent, but just can't be convincing. It's not even the narrator's fault. The author or publisher simply did not choose wisely.

Narration can make or ruin a good book. I have bought stories where the voice acting was excellent, but the reading speed was painfully slow. I swear I listened to a book once at double speed because I loved the story and couldn't give up on it despite the reading speed LOL!


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## JeffreyKafer (May 22, 2011)

Interesting you say that, Mark. I actually had to turn down a VERY high profile book a few weeks ago: Clive Barker's Sacrament. The reason? The publisher hadn't read the book in years and didn't realize that easily 75% of the book takes place in England. Yorkshire, no less, which is an even more difficult accent for us Americans. It hurt a LOT to bow out of that project, but I had to.


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

JeffreyKafer said:


> Interesting you say that, Mark. I actually had to turn down a VERY high profile book a few weeks ago: Clive Barker's Sacrament. The reason? The publisher hadn't read the book in years and didn't realize that easily 75% of the book takes place in England. Yorkshire, no less, which is an even more difficult accent for us Americans. It hurt a LOT to bow out of that project, but I had to.


I'm sorry to hear that, mate, but a bad audio narration is worse than no narration I feel. I'm sure you would hate bad reviews as much as the publisher.


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## JeffreyKafer (May 22, 2011)

Yep, I figured doing a high profile title poorly was not in my best interest. Or the publisher's. Or Clive's.


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## Pnjw (Apr 24, 2011)

sockmerchant said:


> Just some thought on the whispersync stuff mentioned above.
> 
> I have been an audible subscriber for a few years. Here is the thing, I get four credits each month as I essentially have two separate subscriptions. Over the years I have bought (with money as opposed to credits) maybe five books total. And those have been with credit gifted to me by audible for whatever reason.
> 
> ...


I'm a subscriber. I buy books all the time. I get two credits a month. I also buy the extra credits any time they are offered to me. I also shop every single one of their sales and check out their daily deals. If I want a book to listen to and I see they have whispersync, I do check the ebook price and the whispersync price to see if I'd do better that way. If not and I reallllllly want to listen to that book, then I'll drop $13 to $20 on it. It's an addiction.

But yes, in some cases that whyspersync does cost people money. I am one of those users who will look. And the thing is, sometimes I'll only get it if the whyspersync is available and sometimes I don't care. But I am conscious of the fact that my audiobook budget can and does get out of control...not that it'll stop me.


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## Pnjw (Apr 24, 2011)

SM Reine said:


> After having a couple weeks to think about this, I realized that going from an escalating 50% to 40% isn't going to make a huge difference to my business. Frankly (and I am not so prideful that I can't admit this), I don't have a single audiobook that has hit 500 sales anyway, which is the point the royalty begins escalating. I'll break even on audiobook production well before I've made it a couple percentage points above 50%. I don't think I'd ever hit 60%, much less 90%. So this isn't really a drop from "potential 90%" to 40% for me; it's effectively 50 to 40. Which still stinks, but isn't really enough to stop me from making more audiobooks.
> 
> I'm sure the math is different for authors who sell a lot more and see it as a source of income rather than "hey, why not? it's a business deduction and I'll get the money back eventually." Heh.  But for me, it's not a huge deal.
> 
> ...


I think I'm in your same boat. I hate that they did this. But I still want my audio. And I have one book that has sold over 3000 copies. At least we'll continue to make money on that one.


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## daringnovelist (Apr 3, 2010)

I didn't think about audiobooks at all when I wrote some of my books -- and I realize several would have major problems casting.  One character has a strange accent that nobody can identify.  And the story shifts point of view among several characters.

Aside from reading it myself, I don't know how I would approach finding a narrator.

Has anyone used multiple narrators to do different points of view in the story?  (And would that be disorienting to the audience?)

As for listening: I like to listen to librivox recordings and radio podcasts while I draw, but I can't afford to buy audiobooks. These whispersync sales have allowed me to expand the kinds of books I listen to (though I haven't listened to many yet).

Camille


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## JeffreyKafer (May 22, 2011)

SM Reine said:


> ...but isn't really enough to stop me from making more audiobooks.


I, for one, am VERY glad to hear this.


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

daringnovelist said:


> I didn't think about audiobooks at all when I wrote some of my books -- and I realize several would have major problems casting. One character has a strange accent that nobody can identify. And the story shifts point of view among several characters.
> 
> Aside from reading it myself, I don't know how I would approach finding a narrator.
> 
> ...


So far I have not tried multiple narrators in one project. I figure to do this efficiently I would need the narrators to belong to one outfit so they can coodinate things. If you went with narrators that were not affiliated, can you imagine trying to get them in the studio together for dialogue and stuff? It wouldn't be a book, it would be a play!

So my books are multi viewpoint by chapter and from male and female pov too. I have so far been very pleased with using one male narrator for all of it. He doesn't put on a silly voice for female or anything, but he reserves intonation and way of speaking so that when you hear narrator voice you KNOW what it is, when he speaks the main female or main male parts you hear the difference.

The best way to decide I found was listening to audio books you liked and tracking down those narrators. HUNT 'EM down muhahaha and see if they are available. If not, go down your list. You'll get a lot of auditions to listen to and that's fun in itself. Make sure in the audition file you chose parts you NEED to judge the narration on. Male and female dialogue, a bit of description/exposition, and anything special like if you have rhyming spells in a fantasy or something.


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## Wansit (Sep 27, 2012)

Well, ACX definitely knows we exist. Now if only they'd listen.


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## Incognita (Apr 3, 2011)

Wansit said:


> Well, ACX definitely knows we exist. Now if only they'd listen.


I had some pretty scathing things to say in the "comments" section....


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## Christa Wick (Nov 1, 2012)

Sorta same for me, Christine. Told them I was very disappointed at lowering the bounty and reducing its availability, lowering the base royalty and getting rid of the sliding scale, and, most important to me, how vague the "produced through ACX" language is in terms of whether one must be exclusive. The slightly "scathing," bit was when I said points 1 & 2 make me completely uninterested in the answer to point 3. Maybe I should have been clearer and said "because I don't plan on ever running another audiobook through ACX."


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## X. Aratare (Feb 5, 2013)

I saw the shout-out to Kboards, too, and like the rest of you, I put some really scathing remarks in the comment's section. I realized after I submitted that I had MORE things to say but damn I had already pushed the submit button.  

One of the things that really bothered me (obviously the drop in royalty and all that jazz) was the codes.  These codes work for ANY book, not just mine.  So when I give those away, I'm advertising Audible not me.  Audible gets money whether someone buys my book or not (b/c hopefully they sign up and read more), but me, I get NOTHING.  In this day and age, are they serious that they can't generate codes JUST for my product b/c my crappy wordpress store certainly can!

And don't even get me started on Whispersync.  I have DEFINITELY seen a drop in earning by people using this.  It would be one thing if they reduced the price by a significant amount to reward Audible listeners, but to $1.99?  Really?  A $14.95 ebook to $1.99  That's ridiculous. If I was an Audible listener I would DEFINITELY take advantage of that. The ebook will never be anywhere near the cost of the audiobook even if its tradpub so it would always be a deal to buy the ebook and the audio even if I was only going to listen to the audio!

Rant off.

In other news, ACX clearly has suffered some kind of blowback if they are sending out a survey like this.  It definitely looks like they were fishing for responses on marketing, et al.


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## Wansit (Sep 27, 2012)

X. Aratare said:


> I saw the shout-out to Kboards, too, and like the rest of you, I put some really scathing remarks in the comment's section. I realized after I submitted that I had MORE things to say but d*mn I had already pushed the submit button.
> 
> One of the things that really bothered me (obviously the drop in royalty and all that jazz) was the codes. These codes work for ANY book, not just mine. So when I give those away, I'm advertising Audible not me. Audible gets money whether someone buys my book or not (b/c hopefully they sign up and read more), but me, I get NOTHING. In this day and age, are they serious that they can't generate codes JUST for my product b/c my crappy wordpress store certainly can!
> 
> ...


The way around the codes (thanks to Mark Cooper for the note) is to buy the book yourself under 'Give As A Gift' with the free code, then send it to the person.

RE Whispersync - that is precisely why I've financed my audiobooks under a lower PFH. Why should I pay $275 an hour when I'm only going to get .50 per a audiobook?


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

Regarding WS. Just break it and be done. The loss in earnings from my audio was shocking but not for long I can tell you that for nothing.

I did the survey and I think its a good sign they're asking us. I tried the old "we need control of pricing or discount days" ploy and pointed to Bookbub and other lists that need such a thing to promote to their subscribers. I wouldn'tbe surprised if they dont create some kind of countdown for audible exclusives or something like that... Special days at 50% off or special coupons etc maybe.


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## Usedtoposthere (Nov 19, 2013)

One thing about WhisperSync is that it can drive sales of your book, which can push your book higher up the list on its genre, which will lead to more sales, which will drive it ... etc. I don't know on balance which is better, but I always lean towards "exposure" if I have a choice, so I haven't broken the WS. (It's only on for one of my two so-far-done books anyway, from what I know. For some reason and who knows why, because the Kindle version definitely matches the audio version.)


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## Jill James (May 8, 2011)

Rosalind, I noticed that whispersync is only on one of my books, but they all match pretty close, maybe a word or two different.


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## Pnjw (Apr 24, 2011)

Count me in as one who didn't mince words much in the feedback section. :/


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## Christa Wick (Nov 1, 2012)

Mark E. Cooper said:


> Regarding WS. Just break it and be done. The loss in earnings from my audio was shocking but not for long I can tell you that for nothing.
> 
> I did the survey and I think its a good sign they're asking us. I tried the old "we need control of pricing or discount days" ploy and pointed to Bookbub and other lists that need such a thing to promote to their subscribers. I wouldn'tbe surprised if they dont create some kind of countdown for audible exclusives or something like that... Special days at 50% off or special coupons etc maybe.


Oh, Mark! Thank you for putting more thought into your answers than I did. Those are great suggestions. Hopefully they at least take it into consideration.


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## Pnjw (Apr 24, 2011)

I also asked for control of pricing, more opportunities for promotions, and control of metadata.


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## Christa Wick (Nov 1, 2012)

Deanna Chase said:


> I also asked for control of pricing, more opportunities for promotions, and control of metadata.


Seriously!!! Many of us have shown we can market our books better than the publishers can once we have control over pricing, metadata, etc. ACX would have great results if they gave us more control.


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## pauldude000 (May 22, 2013)

Actually, they do have some serious costs, but it is groups like Audible and Amazon that are socking ACX for bandwidth and server charges. Remember that an eBook is generally between a half to two megabytes in file size, yet an audiobook is between a book and a movie in file size. (Several hundred megabytes to over a gigabyte.)

Still, I agree with you that sixty percent is ridiculous and inexcusable considering the price of an audiobook is generally $19.95 at audible.com or $17.95 at Amazon for a novel-sized work. How they figure royalty is also in question. With a royalty split deal, both you and the producer split $7.98 per sale at audible ($3.99 each) or $7.18 per sale at Amazon ($3.59 each). 

That means ACX/Audible are taking fees of $11.97, and ACX/Amazon get fees of $10.77 PER AUDIOBOOK SALE...

There is no justification for such high margins with that kind and cost of overhead for either ACX or their sales outlets.

It is similar to Amazon charging $12 for a vendor priced $2 pen just because they have a box of pens in their warehouse and have to pay labor costs. Labor costs are higher than server/bandwidth costs any day of the week.


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## Christa Wick (Nov 1, 2012)

I'm not going to accept bandwidth costs as an issue when they're selling 14.95 audiobooks for 1.99.


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## JumpingShip (Jun 3, 2010)

I also commented on the survey. I was at work and should have waited until I got home because I was in a hurry when I replied. So many issues I didn't bring up, but I did say that I wouldn't recommend ACX to other authors because of the royalty cut. I told them that I used to recommend it to all the authors I knew (and I did) and I even talked a guy into becoming a narrator last year, but I would no longer mention it to anyone. 

I didn't tell them this, but really thought about whether I wanted to do my latest book in audio because I didn't think I'd find a good narrator. I got lucky though and it's in production already. It's the only one that didn't get in under the royalty deadline back in March.


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## Alan Petersen (May 20, 2011)

Wansit said:


> Well, ACX definitely knows we exist. Now if only they'd listen.


Too bad they don't listen to our concerns. I'm sure I'm not the only one that contacted them after their changes, so I was surprised about the survey. I doubt it will change anything, but I went though it, let them know how I feel about their clunky interface, crappy reports, and royalty changes. I won't be doing another audiobook in the foreseeable future. That might change, but the results of my first audiobook isn't worth the close to 2K I spent producing it.


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

Christa Wick said:


> I'm not going to accept bandwidth costs as an issue when they're selling 14.95 audiobooks for 1.99.


Not mine they're not!


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## pauldude000 (May 22, 2013)

daringnovelist said:


> I didn't think about audiobooks at all when I wrote some of my books -- and I realize several would have major problems casting. One character has a strange accent that nobody can identify. And the story shifts point of view among several characters.
> 
> Aside from reading it myself, I don't know how I would approach finding a narrator.
> 
> ...


In Surviving With Joe, one narrator handled multiple accents and switched between male and female points of view effortlessly. You just need to collect auditions, and make sure to state the things the narrator must be able to do, and choose a script section from your book that makes them show their stuff.

Get enough auditions, and you will find a great narrator like I did.


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