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What was once almost subverting the existence of paper books has now become another "tear of the times"!
The Kindle China e-book store ceased operations
On June 30, Amazon's Kindle China e-book store ceased operations.
In 2022, Amazon released the "Kindle China E-book Store Operation Adjustment", announcing that it would stop the operation of the Kindle e-book store in China after one year. In the blink of an eye, the period of one year has arrived.
This means that after today, Chinese users will not be able to purchase new e-books (e-books that have been purchased and downloaded locally will still be read).
After June 30, 2024, Chinese users can only read e-books downloaded locally, and the e-books purchased in their accounts will be emptied. At the end of May this year, Kindle official micro released a "farewell guide" ↓↓
The tweet answers follow-up questions, including member refunds, and reminds users to download purchased e-books to their local devices or Kindle Library until June 30, 2024.
Kindle customer service in China will also continue until June 30, 2024.
In addition, online translation, X-Ray, and quick page reading functions will not be affected.
It has set off a global e-book reading boom
In 2007, Amazon launched the Kindle, setting off a global e-book reading boom, and officially entered China in 2013, Kindle once became synonymous with e-books, but also a symbol of literary lifestyle. In 2018, Kindle reader sales in China exceeded one million, reaching its peak.
Now, Kindle has withdrawn from the Chinese market, and Chinese users have expressed regret. Some netizens expressed their gratitude for their companionship over the years.
Some "emotional fans" and "iron fans" said that they had purchased more than 2,000 e-books on the platform in recent years, and their accounts were gone overnight, which made him question the digital trend and make users who bought genuine copies to support the digitization of books chill.
Some netizens also ridiculed that the Kindle is really going to cover instant noodles.
Why did the Kindle withdraw from the Chinese market?
I'm afraid this starts with the two advantages of the Kindle. First, it is portable, much lighter than carrying paper books; The other is that it retains the "pure reading" atmosphere of paper books – only for reading, not for the Internet. But now both advantages are not obvious or even disappear.
In the past decade, the mobile Internet has developed rapidly, from 2G, 3G to 5G, mobile phone functions have changed greatly, the real portable reader is actually a mobile phone, which is replacing the product of e-books. Some netizens analyzed:
I actually rarely use the Kindle now, mainly because the phone never leaves my hand, and if you can do it with your phone, you don't want to pick up another device. It's as if mobile phones have replaced wallets, iPods, and transportation cards. The advantages of Kindle are less power consumption, light weight, ink screen, but compared with mobile phones, it is still a little bigger, if only read in fragmented time, whether it is ink screen is not very important.
Another advantage of the Kindle, "pure reading", can be replaced by paper books. Since there is a portable mobile phone, the information in it is huge, that person usually wants to calm down and simply pick up the paper book, the feeling of turning the page, fingertips and the paper is more real.
In addition to the Kindle's own advantages, external competition is also a big reason. Kindle has been in China for ten years, and domestic brands such as iFLYTEK, Huawei, Palmyue, Wenshi, and WeChat Reading have also appeared in the domestic e-book market, which has had a certain impact on the market share of Kindle. Users have different ways to deal with the Kindle's exit. Some people give up use, emotional products are used to instant noodles, and switch to mobile phone reading APP; Others hurry up to stock up on books overnight and spend a little more on the last day. Have you used a Kindle? Do you prefer to read e-books or paper books? Source: Qianjiang Evening News, Chao News, Shangguan News, Kindle Public Account, Sanlian Life Weekly, Beijing Youth Daily, etc
Editor of this issue Zou Shan