I just ordered my first audio book: Joseph Campbell and the Power of Myth.
Those familiar with the six-part PBS series on Joseph Campbell will especially enjoy this audio production. Moyers follows the same format as the TV series: The journalist plies the tuning fork to the teacher's mind, and we listen as Campbell waxes rhapsodic on the hero, the nature of myth, storytelling, the goddess, and finally what we understand of eternity. The dialogue, like the video, is filled with Campbell's wonderful stories and punctuated with illustrative sound clips, ranging from STAR WARS to the Oum prayer of Tibetan monks. This production goes into greater depth than the video text, focusing more on Campbell's exciting ideas than his personality and work.
Anyway, I really don't need the CD, I just wanted to download the content and put it on my MP3 player. So, I started at Audible.com, what a joke. They only support a limited number of players. They didn't even have this title, so I couldn't have ordered it anyway, but if they did... they lost a potential customer tonight because they're are more concerned with security than making it easy to buy.
Sure, they offer you a free Audible Player (or Creative MuVo) BUT you have to agree to sign up for 12 months of audible service to get one of the approved players for free.
What is the cost to having this available? I mean, I can download music all day on Napster and transfer those tracks to my MP3 player... come on...
Well, I ended up ordering it from Amazon. I'll have to rip it to MP3 when it gets here next week.
I wonder how Audible stays in business? I'm curious if anyone has used this service? What do you think? Are there other audio book download places that aren't so restrictive?
UPDATE: I didn't see that Todd had an excellent post talking about nearly the same thing - "I want it now!":
The Internet has changed my tolerance for waiting. I can hear or read about a book and go order it on Amazon that moment. They can have it to me the next day. iTunes is even better. I can have the song I want in about 30 seconds.More often, I want to just know more about something. I have a greater intolerance for a lack of information. There is no reason I should not be able to find out about a product or service via the internet. Companies continue to underestimate the need and the intolerance.
.... (cut some text)
Advice to companies: People want to know about your products NOW and after they make a decision to purchase, they want them ASAP.
Todd, my apologies for not linking to this originally - GREAT POST!!!!
Sad. Audible.com sounds like a company that doesn't get out much these days. They certainly haven't read any current business journals, not even USA Today. Maybe they're too busy wondering where their customers have gone in the past few years? Or searching for more content they feel will entice their prospects to jump through their hoops. "If we could just get Brittany's latest concert on DVD...That would bring the customers, I bet."
I've never heard of them. I doubt many people will either.
Posted by: Zane Safrit | June 06, 2004 at 07:31 PM
Having never actually used them myself, I can't comment on personal experience. However, I have heard some amazing audio books that have been purchased from them (Hitman, Next and others), and I have never heard anything bad from the people who use them regularly.
Posted by: D'ave | June 07, 2004 at 04:52 AM