Amazon recently changed how they refer to lockscreen advertisements and banner ads that appear on some Kindle e-readers.
Now Kindles with advertisements are labeled as “Ad-Supported”. Amazon calls these ads Special Offers, so Kindles that had them were called Kindles with Special Offers, which was a bit more ambiguous. But now all current Kindles are either Ad-Supported or not—the term Special Offers is no longer being used to describe them.
For example, on the product page for the Kindle Paperwhite the headline now says Kindle Paperwhite – Now Waterproof with 2x the Storage – Ad-Supported.
Then down the page among the various configuration options, you now have the choice between “Ad-Supported” and “Without Ads”.
This is something only I would notice and think to question. Surely nobody finds it interesting, but to me it’s a clear sign that something is afoot. They aren’t going through the trouble to change something that’s been the same way for nine years now for no reason.
Why suddenly change the terminology from “Special Offers” to “Ad-Supported”?
The really weird thing is Amazon still uses the term Special Offers when referring to their Fire tablets, and even weirder Amazon’s international websites still all say Special Offers for Kindles as well.
I think the term “Ad-Supported” is more upfront and transparent. The term “Special Offers” is more misleading, trying to dress up advertising to make it sound more interesting and exclusive. It’s like saying TV shows come with Special Offers now instead of commercials.
I’d like to think the name change has something to do with a potential new upcoming feature that lets Kindle users set book covers on the sleep screen, as there are references to this hidden in the Kindle’s software code, as noted by Jhowell at MobileRead. But that’s probably just wishful thinking.
Being more transparent with the terminology would make it easier for customers to understand they need a Kindle without ads to set book covers as screensavers, or maybe they’re coming up with a way to let people still subscribe to Special Offers without having screensaver ads for those that prefer book covers on the sleep screen instead.
Either way, there has to be a reason for the sudden terminology change. I’ve been using the term ad-supported to describe Special Offers Kindles for years; it’s weird to see Amazon now doing the same.
I think it’s a better phrasing so that people understand why the unit costs $20 less. Special Offers makes you think you’ll be getting offers on things that other people might not get.. you know “special”. 🙂 Ad-supported is more in line with what it really is.
Agree. It also opens up the opportunity for Amazon to run any type of ad, not just book or kindle related products.
Weren’t they a little more “special” back at launch, too? I may be remembering wrong but I recall they would throw some odd deals for Amazon.com, not necessarily book-related, and at the time the store was a fresher concept. They’ve been plain-old ads for a long time now so the terminology makes sense, except “ad-supported” almost makes me think free.
I always thought the ‘Special Offers’ were skeezy. Kindles with ads cost the same as Kobos and Nooks without ads. So really, the biggest global player in the game is selling their readers for $20 more than everyone else.
I always disliked this fact too. It’s not a fair comparison when Kindle prices appear $20 cheaper than they really are. Amazon clearly makes more off of hardware sales than both Kobo and B&N.
Amazon missed an opportunity to have the ads be only to suggest books that the reader would probably be interested in based on the readers history. I never understood why the ads were for thing I would never buy.
In the early days, these really DID include special offers… big savings, fun promos, etc! Now, of course, they really are just boring run off the mill ads.
Hi Nathan, I am aware that this is not the incorrect tread to ask this question, but I am not sure where I can ask this:
1) how do I get the cover of the book for my sideloaded books to stretch across the kindle paperwhite 3 fully and neatly with no edges and no distortion?
2) Similarly for the kindle app on my google pixel 3XL.
I know that if I buy the ebook from kindle store, the cover of the book would fit in nicely and fill up the edges on the screen.
Is it possible to do it with sideloaded books as well?
3) also I do not get notifications in my email if there is a reply for my post. How do I activate that?
Thanks very much
Keith
Personally I’ve never cared about sideloaded covers so I wouldn’t know, but there are folks at MobileRead that keep up with that kind of stuff. And there are no email notifications; I prefer to use as few plugins as possible for better performance and reliability.
Thanks, Nathan,. I will check it out at MobileRead. I guess I am a bit of a perfectionist as I prefer my sideloaded ebooks to have covers that fill up the whole kindle screen. 🙂
I’m not Nathan but I think I can help.
If you mean the cover embedded within the ebook, this is what you do:
When you convert the ebook to azw or kfx within Calibre you should make sure that the output profile matches your device. If it is any 300 ppi Kindle just select the Voyage profile.
If you are annoyed at book covers not looking the same on the cover view of your library the solution to that is you have to add the asin metadata to each ebook within Calibre before you sideload them and then let Amazon pull the covers off of their server. This is assuming that you use the kfx format.
HI,
I meant when I sideload my own ebooks, the cover of the book (image) does not fit in the whole screen of the kindle paper white. I am left with edges not filled up completely.
I convert my ebooks to mobi format and send the ebooks to my kindle device using my kindle account email. There is no output format from my calibre that is Kfx or azw. There is azw3, though. But I believe I tried to convert my books to azws format but my kindle could not read it so I went back to mobi. My calibre version is 3.6.0 by the way.
So if it is mobi format, is there a way to get the book to fill up the whole screen?
I don’t quite get what you mean by ‘add the asin metadata to each ebook within Calibre before you sideload them and then let Amazon pull the covers off of their server. ‘
What are the steps to do that
Thanks a lot.
Keith, when your book is loaded in Calibre, select edit Metadata. From there you can have it search for different covers. Select one you like that is approximately 1400 x 2200 or similar. Then send it to your device. That should take care of your issue.
It’s a very good move, since advertisment is more and more considered as a mind pollution, it shouldn’t be hidden.
Maybe it has to do with citizen protection of the GRPD or of the California Consumer Privacy Act?
I never got special offers so I’m not really sure of this but I think I’ve seen forum or blog posts saying that most of the special offers have been ads for books or Amazon products. I wonder if they’re doing this because they’re going to get serious about selling ad space on Kindles to other companies. Maybe readers will start seeing car ads or aspirin ads or even Kobo ads. Just a guess, of course.
Barry
Quite frankly it’s more honest advertising. Special offers is clear marketing spin. Good choice.
Awhile back there really was some kindle/fire only offers that I feel were targeted and were not just books and freemiun game ads.. not so much now
Seeing the word ads is a whole different story. While special offers were not exactly ads, but kindle books ads… this change is announcing we will begin to see regular ads about products we buy on amazon. From paper towels to electronics, or even worse, any kind of tv ads. Let’s put it this way. Who watches ads anymore? I don’t even watch TV, mostly online content same as listening to live radio (unless you’re listening via TuneIn or the likes). So is ad content finding ways to penetrate to the new online community? Those were my 2 cents.
Might be a legal things especially if it didn’t change in other countries.
It is not uncommon that people sometimes confuse features for configuration settings, and vice versa. “Ad-Supported” sounds like some feature supported by the device and available to user to use or not to use, depending on his free choice.
But the correct term, in my option, would be “Ad-enabled”, since it is simply a pre-set configuration on a device at the moment of purchase, which you can later change at additional cost if you decide to disable it. Even if you buy device “Without Ads”, you still can enable it through configuration (for free), so the support of ads is stll there on all the devices, so they are all Ad-supported.
It is very strange that Amazon is replacing one misleading name with another one even more misleading.
The good thing is that you can call Amazon by phone and ask them to disable Special Offers for free.