Vic Wertz (our Technical Director) has made a number of posts on the subject. Here is one of them.
Essentially, it has to do with the terms of the contract Amazon requires Kindle publishers to sign.
However, we DO make Pathfinder Tales available in the ePub format, which is easily converted to the Kindle's native format, and works directly on most other e-readers.
There is a free, open-source program called Calibre that will, among other things, convert e-pub formatted files to mobi (Kindle-formatted) files. It's pretty intuitive; I have used it myself with good results.
There is a free, open-source program called Calibre that will, among other things, convert e-pub formatted files to mobi (Kindle-formatted) files. It's pretty intuitive; I have used it myself with good results.
Although I do not use a kindle, I also think Calibre is a good program to consider. I've used myself for getting things on my iPad and it works great.
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I tried converting one of your files repeatedly, but it didn't work. It is protected by DRM. Thanks for helping me waste my money on your useless format which I can't use.
Three questions.... do you mean you tried to convert one of the Paizo files? Which one? Were you using Calibre to do it?
Just to be clear, I KNOW... extended experience from the first files released... that converting epub files to mobi files works on every single epub Paizo has released. It's not as simple as click on file A and select "Convert to Kindle readable version."
If you tried to convert a PDF to a mobi, then you MAY have a problem converting. But I have never tried this so I can't state for certain.
Please give me a little more information so I can help. :)
I tried converting one of your files repeatedly, but it didn't work. It is protected by DRM. Thanks for helping me waste my money on your useless format which I can't use.
Can you explain what process you're going through to convert the files or what specific files you are trying? Calibre has repeatedly converted our ePubs successfully, so if there's something going wrong, we should know.
Chief Technical Officer
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If you tried to convert a PDF to a mobi, then you MAY have a problem converting. But I have never tried this so I can't state for certain.
Technologically speaking, converting an ePub to a mobi is trivial, and converting a PDF to mobi is quite complicated. If you have a choice between the two (and you do with all Pathfinder Tales novels), you should start with the ePub.
Vic Wertz (our Technical Director) has made a number of posts on the subject. Here is one of them.
Essentially, it has to do with the terms of the contract Amazon requires Kindle publishers to sign.
However, we DO make Pathfinder Tales available in the ePub format, which is easily converted to the Kindle's native format, and works directly on most other e-readers.
The post Ross linked to has a link that's now defunct. Live link.
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Chief Technical Officer
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Vic Wertz (our Technical Director) has made a number of posts on the subject. Here is one of them.
Essentially, it has to do with the terms of the contract Amazon requires Kindle publishers to sign.
However, we DO make Pathfinder Tales available in the ePub format, which is easily converted to the Kindle's native format, and works directly on most other e-readers.
The post Ross linked to has a link that's now defunct. Live link.
Actually, my biggest issues are with different parts of the contract than the SFWA folks have identified (though a few of the things the have identified are a bit unnerving). For me, the biggest problem is that it allows Amazon to sell at whatever price they choose, regardless of what the publisher sets as list. And since *most* resellers have clauses in their contracts that effectively allow them to sell at the lowest price that anyone else sells at, that means Amazon lowering the price on their site effectively forces the publisher to change the price *everywhere*, based solely on Amazon's whim, and without regard for the publisher's own needs. The pricing relationship between print and electronic editions of our products is an essential part of Paizo's strategy. Amazon does not know our business better than we do, and they do not have our best interests in mind when setting prices.
Most of the major book publishers had issues with this this same clause, and Amazon ended up making individual deals with them leaving out that clause, but they refuse to offer the same deal to small publishers like us.
I think it's also incredibly lame that they if they sell one of your books to a customer outside of Austria, Canada, Germany, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Switzerland, United Kingdom, or the United States, they only pay you 35% instead of 70% (minus a "network usage fee", which is also a ludicrous concept).
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I tried converting one of your files repeatedly, but it didn't work. It is protected by DRM. Thanks for helping me waste my money on your useless format which I can't use.
If you are unable to get your purchase to work, just let customer service know (customer.service@paizo.com) the paizo.com order number and we can work something out for you.
thanks,
Sara Marie
Customer Service
There is a free, open-source program called Calibre that will, among other things, convert e-pub formatted files to mobi (Kindle-formatted) files. It's pretty intuitive; I have used it myself with good results.
Having a Kindle and several of your epubs I saw the links to Calibre. I clicked on the link above and was invited to download version 0.8.17. I tend to avoid software that the makers are not comfortable to even label as version 1.0. How good is Calibre? Is it fairly stable, and consistent?
I have a Kindle and I use Calibre regularly. This method works great! I prefer this way to allowing Amazon to get involved.
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Having a Kindle and several of your epubs I saw the links to Calibre. I clicked on the link above and was invited to download version 0.8.17. I tend to avoid software that the makers are not comfortable to even label as version 1.0. How good is Calibre? Is it fairly stable, and consistent?
I've been using Calibre for about a year now. I've upgraded each time and have NEVER had a problem. I use both the Windows version and the Linux version and STILL have had no problems. Just for the record, I have the Kindle 3. If there are glitches with other readers, I don't know what they are and haven't encountered them. Seriously, Calibre is first rate.
I just load the PDF onto my kindle...
Exactly, .pdf on kindle is easy. Attach to email, put 'convert' in the subject line, and mail to your kindle email.
This won't work too well for books with complex formatting, but for basic text it's fine (couple conversion errors here and there, but not a big deal).