Slashdot Mirror
Amazon Wants Patent For Inserting Ads Into Books
theodp writes "Three Amazon inventors set out to correct what they felt was a real problem: that 'out-of-print or rare books ... typically do not include advertisements ... the content is fixed and, therefore, has not been adapted to modern marketing.' Their solution is spelled out in newly-disclosed Amazon patent applications for On-Demand Generating E-Book Content with Advertising and Incorporating Advertising in On-Demand Generated Content. From the patent apps, here's what the future of reading may look like: 'For instance, if a restaurant is described on page 12, [then the advertising page], either on page 11 or page 13, may include advertisements about restaurants, wine, food, etc., which are related to restaurants and dining.' So, what would a delightfully-tacky-yet-unrefined Hooters ad do for your Hemingway experience?"
This is totally pointless. I mean, if you already paid for the book, why should there have to be ads? Heck with digital distribution why even have ads on free stuff because the price of the device itself more than makes up for the minuscule price of transfer.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
I TRUSTED THE KINDLE!! Oh what a fool i am. capsssss
So, what would a delightfully-tacky-yet-unrefined Hooters ad do for your Hemingway experience?"
End it immediately, because I'd go ogle some babe in a push-up and hot pants while chowing down on a plate of buffalo wings while some sporting event plays in the background.
This would be quite an improvement.
I wouldn't mind a tasteful, text-only add in its own table that doesn't interrupt the flow of the text I'm reading. I would mind full-image or full-page ads.
I suggest doing it the way authors like Terry Pratchett and Douglas Adams used footnotes. Put an asterisk, add a footnote advertisement, and make it funny and in context with the text. Then I might actually buy whatever crap they're hawking.
The reason why patents, such as this fine example, exist is simple. It's so fucking retarded that whenever you want to argue against it you don't even know where to begin. Mark my words, soon you'll read a /. article saying that breathing oxygen has been patented, and that you'll have to pay royalties in order to exercise it.
I am the lawn!
Seriously. It means that anyone else with this idiotic idea will have to pay a royalty fee, which should discourage them. Unless you want to fight a prior art campaign against Amazon, claiming magazines with ads are prior art. Either way the money will discourage people from trying and this idea will die a lonely death.
Except for Amazon of course, since they hold the patent. But they can try it, and then they can see for themselves just how great this idea is when they launch it. It'll tank, hard. Nobody will want this.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
from the it-was-the-best-of-times,-it-was-comcastic dept.
I laughed at that one.
Calm down, and let us enumerate its qualities in regard to novelty and usefulness.
Go ahead, you clowns first.
Fuck systemd. Fuck Redhat. Fuck Soylent, too. Wait, scratch the last one.
Amazon can't force other distribution networks to infiltrate propaganda in their texts, so your indoctrination doesn't affect the us in this regard.
I am so sick of ads. Just yesterday I swore off using youtube, what with all their ads overlaid on top of videos now.
I also recently compared the same exact video on hulu (which has ads) to itunes. The video from itunes was much, much better (sharper, better framerate) and no ads. Hulu video was complete crap - now way I could stand watching that. I'll gladly pay a reasonable price for a superior product.
To a Kindle near you
So to them a book is nothing more than a marketing instrument.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
I wondered what sorts of ads Google would put in Tom Sawyer. Cave tours? Paint companies? Anatomy textbooks? But I see that Google itself offers no paid links when I search on "Tom Sawyer."
I wondered what sorts of ads Google would put in "The Pit and the Pendulum." Rat poison? Grandfather clocks? Surcingles... whatever a surcingle is? But I see that Google itself offers no paid links when I search on "The Pit and the Pendulum."
"To Kill a Mockingbird?" No paid links. "Gargantua and Pantagruel?" No paid links. "Lolita?" No paid links.
Inserting relevant advertising into books may be sooner said than done.
"How to Do Nothing," kids activities, back in print!
Reading books with ads in them? No thanks. I'll be off to the pirate ba... shit.
It honestly makes me weep just a little for our future that this is the best that the greatest minds over at Amazon can come up with - let's basically repackage a technique that has been around for ... well .. since publishing printed material ... and be smart enough to convince patent attorneys that it's been significantly altered such as to warrant legitimate consideration for being granted a patent. Honestly they should be ashamed and monumentally embarrassed of themselves!
I think I'd like to "adapt" the inventor's face to the realities of modern marketing... With a cluebat.
that this sort of bullshit would be in any way acceptable would be if the book was free for the asking. Ads (for other books, or closely related areas) at the end of the book is entirely acceptable. Solid pages of ads for [whatever] in the middle of the text? And you expect me to pay for it? What substances are you abusing?
Note to Amazon. The printed page != web pages.
The world is covered in far too fucking many adverts as it is.
Trying to associate Microsoft with "fun" is like trying to associate Satan with aromatherapy. -Tycho
I think I saw something like this about 25 years ago in some German trashy SF. The story had seomthing about food and then the next page there was an ad for "Heisse Tasse" by Maggi or such a thing.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
I dont really ever remember seeing and advertisement in ANY BOOK I have ever purchased. I'm sorry Amazon. Blow it out your ass. I'll stick to paper backs rather than your greed infected E-book.
The problem with socialism is that they always run out of other people's money. - Margaret Thatcher
I've already started going through old software patents and adding "in the real world" to them. My one-click vending machine should allow me to buy an island.
i don't know if i'm a medical phenomenon, but i've always been extremely good at ignoring adds. a couple of months ago, i ended up in a group discussing a mildly controversial billboard, and i was the only one that hasn't seen it. on my way home, i've noticed that same billboard was *virtually* ~5 meters away from my flat, so i must have passed by it dozens of times on way to my buss stop. you've already learned how to ignore lots of stuff (like your own smell or traffic noise), so learn how to ignore adds as well.
"Patent" my ass. What I would like to send them is a bag of burning dog shit on their front porch for even suggesting such an idea! It seems that every day we really are coming closer and closer to the insane world of the movie Idiocracy; these bastards want to put fucking advertisements on bloody everything! Them, them, fuck them!
Are YOU using the TOOL, or is the TOOL using YOU? Think about it!
U click on google ads, hello data mining, this in accordance with prophecy.
I cannot say "Hell no." and "I hope the people who came up with this idea are tied down and are burned alive by dripping phosperous." enough.
I claim MY patent for "a method of monopolizing obvious ideas for which there is lots of prior art by means of convincing the Patent Office that the same old idea, when done with a computer, is somehow radically different and worthy of being treated like a new and innovative invention."
The way I see it, I should make billions. BILLIONS!!
It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. - Einstein
When all marketeers will be burned at the stake. Hell to get in the spirit of things, we can put advertisements on them, and then burn them.
Eh, there'll be an Ad Block Plus for ebooks soon if this goes through. Just another reason to stay away from Amazon.
That's one more reason to endorse the institution of a National Marketing Weasel Hunting Season.
No limits, tags, or licenses needed.
I guess for safety's sake, we'd have to use nerf guns, or maybe supersoakers loaded with red ink.
The more adventurous could shoot them with cameras and post the photos on a Webpage of Shame with hints on where to find them for further nerf action.
>^_^\
Open your every day pulp fiction novel. Go to the back of the book. You'll see ads there for other books from the same publisher. Sometimes they are ads for books from the same author you just read, sometimes they are ads for similar genre books.
Viagara ads.
... not to pay $500 for a Kindle DX, then even more for the content. Fuck you, Amazon.
There were (are?) real books with ads.
Maybe it was only done by a handful of (German?) publishers, but I remember going through my parents bookshelves and flipping through some paper back whodunits and some had one or two pages with ads, sometimes in context to the story. i.e. making a reference to the story.
A little bit like with old time radio shows: "While $detective leans back with a $cigarette, waiting for the guy to leave the house again, why not get yourself a $cigarette with their unique flavor and our special brand of cancer.."
Is a kick in the teeth. Good way to lose business.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Absolutely, totally, without question, no f***ing way! I am a huge proponent of the eBook concept and have a number of them in my collection already. However it is because of such moronic thinking that they are all either in an open format or are unmodified PDF's. I will never purchase an eBook that has been modified in such a crass and unspeakable manner. Why don't we just recut all of our classic media - movies, newspapers, books, music, etc. and put in ads for everything from Hooters to Joe's Pizza Shack? So far my eBook reader of choice has been the Fujitsu p1630 series tablet but I have been eyeing the Kindle for its size, weight and library of books. This right here just changed my mind - the Kindle and its bloody advertising can just keep Bezos warm in his office, I'm sticking with the Fujitsu!
I just pulled an paperback from 2003 off of my shelf, it has the following ads in the back:
Mercedes Lackey (19 distinct books)
Eric Flint (15 distinct books)
Classic Masters of Science Fiction Back in print! (15 distinct books)
A page for 1632 and 1633
Mary Brown (5 distinct books)
Amazons 'r Us (The Chicks Series, 5 distinct books)
Harry Turtledove (7 distinct books)
Doranna Durgin's Fantasy (6 distinct books)
Andre Norton (5 distinct books)
Baen's Bar!
So, at least for fiction it seems to be normal to have ads for the other books of the authors (this was 'The Shadow of The Lion' by Mercedes Lackey, Eric Flint nad David Freer), other authors from the same publisher and some additional resources from the publisher.
If for example, Amazon were to insert ads for other HP Lovecraft books into the back of an HP Lovecraft book along with books inspired by the Mythos, this seems reasonable.
Realities just a bunch of bits.
I remember ripping ads out of the center of paperbacks thirty years ago. Without "on demand" they'd have that pesky prior art thing to deal with.
I hope they have a good explanation of the difference between a magazine and a book, because non-fixed media magazines with changing ads are incredibly common. Of course, I've read several books online with ads in them also, so either way, the prior art in this is massive and common.
I wondered what sorts of ads Google would put in "The Pit and the Pendulum."
Zoloft.
Have gnu, will travel.
I wondered what sorts of ads Google would put in Tom Sawyer.
Rush song clips and Rock Band DLC offers?
Not sure if this serves as prior art re e-books, but Chris Whittle was including ads in books in the late 1980s, before Amazon was launched and e-books existed in a meaningful commercial form.
RichM
Data Center Knowledge
Exactly. People get their panties in a bunch over the idea of in-program ads in TV shows (rather than between them), or ads in books, or wherever they aren't already, but a lot of the old shows from the beginning of broadcast television had actors or their characters do amusing and sometimes even witty product placements. More recently, I've seen things like Arrested Development's Burger King endorsements in an episode where it was so ridiculous that I wondered if it was actually a sponsorship or a satire of a sponsorship.
It's not the fact of having ads that's bad, it's how they're done. Personally, if Arrested Development had to do multiple sponsorships per show but it would have saved the from cancellation, I would have told them to go for it. (I'm looking forward to the movie, but much of what makes it such a great show comes from its masterful use of the serial format of TV.)
That's not so bad. From the way the headline read, my first though was that they would actually do product placement within the story.
So instead of King Arthur drinking a a glass of wine he'd be drinking a can of Coke.
~Warning!~ The above is encrypted using rot676!
Sure, it's a stupid patent. Sure, it merely applies existing general techniques to a specific domain they were already applicable to. But as far as I'm concerned, Amazon can have this patent and have it forever. Then I'll know if I get e-books from a competitor, there won't be any stinking ads in them.
... that MAGAZINES are not sufficiently unique from books in this context, and there are MOUNTAINS of prior art for inserting advertising into them.
I think people have already invented this. It is called Readers Digest. Merely switching from a magazine format to a book format is irrelevant, particularly because it is coming in electronic format, not paper.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
They will patent 'inserting ads into newspapers' and magazines.
There goes my day job.
I sincerely hope they get to patent it. Just so THEY can sue the fuck out of anyone else doing it. Limit the damage to one publisher, right?
It's not all that surprising that no one's interested in buying space on the search terms you listed (Amazon won't allow affiliates to do that, fyi). If you put the text of those books on a page with an adsense box, I'm sure Google would find something to put there.
And I'm not getting it out.
as soon as it's patented (if it is heaven forbid), they'll be some sort of 'cut out the ads' software available....
but if it is patented, then they've just lost another potential customer....
Doesn't it?
I am a Statistician. One false move and you are a Statistic
Leela: Didn't you have ads in the 20th century?
Fry: Well, sure, but not in our dreams. Only on TV and radio. And in magazines and movies and at ball games and on buses and milk cartons and T-shirts and written in the sky. But not in dreams. No, sir-ee!
This is plenty different from cable tv. The media types are different as well as original method of content delivery, expectations by the consumers of the media, and lastly, the infringement on the flow of cognition within the reader, as originally planned by the (original) author/s and copyright holders.
Or were you being sarcastic?
For every present, there is a past
One more reason not to jump onto the e-book hype! ;-) (Not that I hadn't had enough reasons already.)
the new COMPLETELY LAME slashdot script filters out all caps. you will never know what Billy had to say... fucking lame as shit.
"Filter error: Don't use so many caps. It's like YELLING."
Oh REEELY?
How about putting ads inside ads? Take a look at an ad, any ad. Open a magazine and look at an ad. Look at all that space in there. Plenty of room to jam another ad right in the middle. TV? Sure, lots of space to cram another ad inside an ad. Use picture in picture. Heck, you could cover the first ad entirely with other ads using picture in picture and depending on the size of each extra ad I bet that you would more than double your money! Radio? Heck yeah. Lot's of space. Just cram the words for another ad into the spaces between the words of the first ad. The possibilities are endless!
Ads inside ads. I'm running to the patent office right now!
The german Heyne Verlag used to insert adds with a similar technique into early BattleTech books. There was only one such add in them but it was so obtrusive that I swore never to buy the advertised product - an instant soup of some kind.
"It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
One more reason to be glad that Kindle is still not sold in Europe. Amazons eBook strategy is just disgraceful in all aspects and every day the Kindle start in Europe is delayed is a good day for eBooks and it gives the competition here another day head start.
I just hope that by the time Amazon's Kindle makes it out of the US they have lost so much ground that they never be able to catch up.
.. but Amazon has not yet started to sell eBooks in Europe. Actually Amazon has Mobipocket to sell world wide - but - Amazon started to kill off Mobipocket even before starting to sell Kindle world wide. Which will leave them without an world wide eBook strategy quite soon.
Yes, but the new Idea is that if you download the book as eBook you get an up-to-date advert with the current flavor of "Heisse Tasse".
But then German SF won't be sold for Kindle anyway. After the way Amazon has treated Mobipocket the scene has created such a resentment towards DRM that the world largest SF series will be sold as DRM free ePUB pretty soon.
The problem fixed itself:
50% Funny
30% Interesting
20% Offtopic
The earlier we have a way to let some idiot sue everyone on the planet for putting ads in their books, the better.
Now all we have to do, is not buy amazon ebooks, and anonymously inform amazon, that their sales go down because of other companies selling cheaper books with ads in them.
Any sufficiently advanced intelligence is indistinguishable from stupidity.
Fuck off, you moronic twat.
If you were trying to be funny, take the above sentence as a funny comment. If it helps, shout it out as you read it. Americans seem to think shouted abuse is hilarious.
If Amazon monopolizes placing ads in books, I'm all for it. A lot of their other patents are on equally annoying behaviors, so they are good because they keep other companies from doing these stupid things.
I wonder who owns the patent for suppressing vomit at learning of the notion of ads in books.
People get their panties in a bunch over the idea of in-program ads in TV shows (rather than between them), or ads in books, or wherever they aren't already, but a lot of the old shows from the beginning of broadcast television had actors or their characters do amusing and sometimes even witty product placements.
Such placements can really date the show if the company concerned has changed their branding radically or ceased to exist.
I've got books going back to the 1920's at least that have adverts at the back for various semi-related products. I've not seen ads in the main book text before but adverts in general have been there for quite some time.
I want a list of atrocities done in your name - Recoil
About 30-40 years ago, a German publisher inserted ads in their (rather cheap)
paperback SciFi books. Those ads are (present tense - the books still exist) annoying as hell,
because they were adapted to the story: A right page would first look and read as if
it were still part of the story, but subtly insert stuff about the hero using the
product advertised (shavers, national bank bonds(!) etc.), and the following left page would be a full page ad.
Fortunately, this means that ripping out one sheet of paper got rid of the inserted ad.
I haven't seen this since, so apparently it wasn't worth the customer annoyance. I'd hate to
see this make a comeback though.
Wow, what an innovative idea! Aren't patents supposed to go to new ideas? This wins a patent hands-down! In Hell!
Oh, how my heart yearns to see this happen.
I suppose Macbeth would fare even worse:
I have to leave the stage to Bill Hicks and his thoughts on marketing
Just yesterday I have learned that Amazon DELETED some books by Ayn Rand that people purchased for their Kindle. No, I am not talking about deleting the allegedly copyright infringing books from Amazon server, I am talking about deleting said books from the Kindle devices of individual buyers. Amazon just connected (by means of whispernet) to individual kindle devices and deleted the books. Now we learn about advertisements automatically inserted into books. Way to go Amazon!
... the E in E-Book stood for electronic. Turns out it's Evil.
I can't believe how far corporations are willing to go to achieve a little extra income. As a previous posters has pointed we are already paying for books, I DON'T want advertisement on my books, period.
"I wouldn't mind a tasteful, text-only add in its own table that doesn't interrupt the flow of the text I'm reading."
I would. Books are the last advertisement-free stronghold, the last place we can turn for entertainment that does not come loaded with advertisements. There is no possible way to place a tasteful ad in a book, and the concept should be immediately dropped. Honestly, how greedy can these publishers get?
I will not buy a single book from any publisher that engages in this practice (unless it is a used copy without ads).
Palm trees and 8
If I'm going to pay for the ebook plus the downloads, I'm not going to pay for their friggin' ads. I'll patronize my local library or buy books and do without Kindle.
I am rapidly starting to think that "marketing" (and purveyors thereof) might well surpass the "evil quotient" of lawyers.
Before you design for reuse, make sure to design it for use.
In a book, Adding unrelated content breaks the flow of the story. Its like having someone trying to draw your attention away from it all the time. This has all the making of a copyright violation. Art disfigurement is one of the only copyright violation that the AUTHOR can sue for regardless of who owns the art.
Amazon isn't the owner of the art, so imagine what happens next....Footgun time!
and make it very broad so no other company will be able to pollute texts lest they violate Amazon's patent rights. Then I can shop for e-books from anyone but Amazon knowing the other vendors can't impose this "invention" on me.
Very often, people confuse simple with simplistic. The nuance is lost on most. - Clement Mok
1. tr/manna/Gatorade/
2. Song of Songs, brought to you by Trojan... (cue Trojan Man)
I've never had an issue with the pages in the front or back of the book telling you what other books the author has written, in fact I like it. So long as the advertising of other books is done in the same way it is now I won't mind. But the first time I see an advertisement while reading is the last time I buy a book from that publisher.
Prior art over here? http://wikademia.org/Books
contribute at wikademia
Books are the last advertisement-free stronghold, the last place we can turn for entertainment that does not come loaded with advertisements.
I agree with everything you said except this. I'm guessing you haven't had a good hike or picnic in a while?
I live in New York City; a nice hike or picnic in a public park is not an escape from advertising, although the ads tend to be less annoying -- more of the billboard or posted variety. I guess things are different in suburban and rural areas?
Palm trees and 8
Hopefully with exceptions made for the between chapters fictional ads you get in some science fiction? (Slant for instance)
Realities just a bunch of bits.
Ensure that I never purchase an ebook....
This is a complete outrage. The most annoying thing about magazines is the difficulty in finding content between advertisements. If literature will someday bombard me with marketing strategies as the rest of the world does, I may have to blind myself and give away all my possessions to wander the country as a bard.
i think most people here are missing the point.
The reason Amazon wants to put ads in books, is so they can make then available for free, and still make money.
This is a shift from information / books for a fee versus ad sponsered content.
Those smart suits should be given a HUGE bonus! Then immediately taken outside and shot...
Pre-chewed, ad-strewn industry content: rejected.
Artistically pure pirated content: sign me up!
Who -THE FUCK- do people think they are, when they believe they should alter someone's art and it could possibly be better? If you work in advertising.... fuck you. Get a job where you don't have to assrape the planet for increased revenue. Or stay in your job and be evil.