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I've moved!

Thanks for stopping by, but it appears you are using a (very) old address for my blog. I've moved to a Wordpress site and you'll need to update your bookmarks for Books on the Knob

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Saturday, January 16, 2010

Amazon Kindle DTP goes International

As of today, the Amazon Digital Text Platform, which enables publishing on Kindle, is open to International Authors and no longer restricted to US authors. Non-US authors will have taxes withheld according to US law and IRS guidelines (see below, from the FAQ page), which means at a 30% rate unless you are from a reciprocal filing country, obtain a US taxpayer id and file the proper tax forms with Amazon. Sounds like a lot of hoops to jump thru, but they are the same as any non-US person or business jumps thru in order to do business inside the US (which you are doing, even if the only market for your books in a non-English language are outside the US).

I foresee even longer delays in the DTP process for non-US authors who choose to publish in languages other than English, now that Amazon is insisting on verifying copyright of every listing ahead of time, rather than responding to take-down notices as pretty much everyone else in the digital world has chosen to do. However, the complaint that there are no Portuguese language books for those in Brazil can no be answered by responding that the opportunity is there for those that wish to publish them (although doing so will limit the sales of the book, since English is, for now, the unifying language of those who have purchased a Kindle). Also, although it appears that any source language may be published (although the announcement actually only mentioned English, German and French, surely they mean to support Spanish or variants thereof, as that's the second most commonly used language in the US and one that's been asked for almost since the introduction of the Kindle and there is nothing on the FAQ or Terms page that specifies any restrictions), for practical purposes it is limited to those using a Roman based alphabet and specifically those using characters in the 'Latin-1' character set.
2-1 What are the sign up requirements?
Anyone can sign up for a Digital Text Platform account; all you need is Internet access and an email account...

2-4 Why do you need a social security number/taxpayer ID for US publishers?
In order to pay US publishers for sales on the Kindle Store, federal law requires us to collect taxpayer information and report sales income to the federal government.


2-5 Is tax withheld for publishers outside the US?
Royalties paid to a foreign entity or person are subject to tax withholding in the U.S. A foreign entity or person is someone who is not a resident or citizen of the U.S. or a green card holder. The general rate of tax withholding is set by U.S. tax rules and regulations and is currently 30% of royalties paid. This withholding tax rate can be reduced if the recipient (you) is a resident in a jurisdiction that has a valid income tax treaty with the U.S. This reduced rate is only available if we receive the appropriate documentation from you. Without this documentation, the 30% withholding tax rate will apply. This documentation is either Form W-8BEN or Form W-8ECI issued by the Internal Revenue Service and includes a valid U.S. tax-payer identification number (obtained by filing Form W-7 or SS4). For more information on these forms and instructions and description of which form may be appropriate for you, please refer to the Internal Revenue Service website at www.irs.gov. We are required to receive a new form from you every three years. If you are eligible for reducing your tax withholdings, please contact us with the appropriate forms.

Friday, January 15, 2010

Free Game - Word Monaco

You can get a free copy of Word Monaco ($6.99 Amazon Game Downloads) directly from Sandlot Games this week.

Game Description
  • A Unique Word Solitaire.
  • 50,000+ Entries In A Massive Word List.
  • 5 Decks From Easy To Champion.
  • 75 Progressively Challenging Levels.
Welcome to Word Monaco! Relax under the warm sun of the Mediterranean and play a unique blend of word-creation and solitaire. Create words by moving letters from column to column and use power-ups for bonus points. When all of the letters are used, you'll move on to the next of 75 progressively difficult levels in 6 different locations! With a word list of over 50,000+ words and 5 decks of varying difficulty, there are endless possibilities.

Click HERE to sign up for the free download. For step by step purchase and installation instructions, see this post.

Free Book (Smashwords) - Cutting the Cheese

Edward C. Patterson has updated Cutting the Cheese and has set up a coupon to get the book free at Smashwords thru the end of the month, since those who have purchased the book on Kindle or other readers are unable to simply download the latest version. Use coupon code FB57N at checkout.

Be sure to read the descriptionm, to make sure the genre is one you are interested in, before downloading If not, there will be another free book along soon, no doubt.

Book Description
Luke Oliver has just come out of the closet and confronts a brave new world - a meeting of the Gay and Lesbian Activist Association of New Birch and Sipsboro (GLAABS) - your run of the mill, gay political caucus. Run of the Mill? . . . my @$$. Stepping across the threshold of the Otterson estate exposes Luke to horny and hilarious shenanigans that give the Boys in the Band a run for its money.

Update - Flip from Random House Australia

As I reported earlier, Random House in Australia is giving away the EPUB version of book Flip ($9.59 Kindle), by Peter Sheahan, in return for signing up for one of their newsletters. Unfortunately, when they first set up the web page, the links they sent out for download the book didn't work. Once they fixed that (not for a week and after their next newsletter came out announcing the book), the links only generated error messages (various ones, usually that someone else had used the license).

Today it seems they have corrected the problem, as I managed to get the book to download, although it still took a couple of tries, either because my Sony Reader software tried to do the download the first time or because the old .acsm files were still being tried by Adobe Digital Editions. In any case, if you received the links in email before and were unsuccessful, go ahead and try again. You don't need to re-register, but I'm including that link below, for those that didn't do so earlier.

Click HERE to sign up for the free book (EPUB, not Kindle compatible).

Thursday, January 14, 2010

Music to Read By

There are a couple of new classical samplers free at Amazon, which can be loaded into the \music directory and played as background music when reading or just for listening at other times - we got the Logitech Squeezebox Internet Radio as a joint gift to each other this past for Christmas and love it. Not only will it play internet stations, but it will connect to (free) software on your PC and play any MP3's you have stored there (by artist, genre or iTunes playlists). Best of all, it uses WiFi, so to move it to a new room only requires picking it up and plugging it back in.

Analekta: Classical Gems is from Groupe Analekta Inc. and focuses on the c.1770-1830 period. Composers included are Beethoven, Handel, Vivaldi, Bach, Rachmaninov, Morricone and Peter Heidrich.

I Love the 80s, Vol. 1 would be a fantastic bargain, even if it were not not free: five hours and good performances and great composers.
  • Performers: Slovak Philharmonic Orchestra, Michael Halasz, Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, Imrich Szabo, Royal Scottish National Orchestra, Gustav Mahler, Stephen Gunzenhauser, Anton Bruckner, Alexander Porfir'yevich Borodin, Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, Antonin Dvorak, Johannes Brahms, Antoni Wit, Georg Tintner, Camille Saint-Saens, London Philharmonic Orchestra, Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra, Marin Alsop
  • Composers: Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, Gustav Mahler, Johannes Brahms, Camille Saint-Saens, Antonin Dvorak, Alexander Porfir'yevich Borodin, Anton Bruckner
  • Conductors: Antoni Wit, Michael Halasz, Marin Alsop, Georg Tintner, Stephen Gunzenhauser