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Bias disclaimer: AWS is my current employer The meaningful difference between these two examples is that Apple is a gatekeeper to the iOS market. Anybody can

Bias disclaimer: AWS is my current employer The meaningful difference between these two examples is that Apple is a gatekeeper to the iOS market. Anybody can spin up a website hosting .mp3s like Audible does. Nobody can publish an app to the iOS App Store without going through Apple (and Apple doesn't allow alternative app stores or sideloading for consumers).

freedomben 3y ago
You're of course technically right, but I would argue that in practice Audible is also a gatekeeper due to their dominant and successful position (though of course to a lesser degree than Apple). I have family members and friends that will not even consider buying an audiobook if it's not on Audible. That's a testament to Audible's good work at making a good platform, and I believe Audible deserves to be in the position they are in. But, I do think they have effective gatekeeper status, and a lot of that is a result of their exclusivity practices. By ensuring that there can't be any other audiobook store out there that has all the books a person wants, and that you can't sideload a book into your Audible library that you purchased elsewhere, they force a high level of inconvenience on anybody who wants to buy a book somewhere else.
CharlesW 3y ago
> Anybody can spin up a website hosting .mp3s like Audible does. That's like saying anybody can sell iOS apps outside of App Store. Yes, it's technically true¹ (the best kind), but effectively there's no real alternative, and Amazon knows this and treats creators accordingly². ¹ https://buildfire.com/ios-app-distribution-without-app-store/ https://buildfire.com/ios-app-distribution-without-app-store... ² https://www.audiblegate.com/ https://www.audiblegate.com/
vanchor3 3y ago
> Anybody can spin up a website hosting .mp3s like Audible does. Sure, but audiobook publishers won't be there because of their exclusivity requirement with Audible, and they won't drop the exclusivity requirement because Audible has all the market share, and so the website never grows to compete. Once Amazon figured this out with the Kindle and started pushing exclusivity there, books very quickly started disappearing from other online stores.
- taeric 3y ago
  What books aren't available outside of the Kindle ecosystem?

freedomben 3y ago

You're of course technically right, but I would argue that in practice Audible is also a gatekeeper due to their dominant and successful position (though of course to a lesser degree than Apple). I have family members and friends that will not even consider buying an audiobook if it's not on Audible. That's a testament to Audible's good work at making a good platform, and I believe Audible deserves to be in the position they are in. But, I do think they have effective gatekeeper status, and a lot of that is a result of their exclusivity practices. By ensuring that there can't be any other audiobook store out there that has all the books a person wants, and that you can't sideload a book into your Audible library that you purchased elsewhere, they force a high level of inconvenience on anybody who wants to buy a book somewhere else.

CharlesW 3y ago

> Anybody can spin up a website hosting .mp3s like Audible does. That's like saying anybody can sell iOS apps outside of App Store. Yes, it's technically true¹ (the best kind), but effectively there's no real alternative, and Amazon knows this and treats creators accordingly². ¹ https://buildfire.com/ios-app-distribution-without-app-store/ https://buildfire.com/ios-app-distribution-without-app-store... ² https://www.audiblegate.com/ https://www.audiblegate.com/

vanchor3 3y ago

> Anybody can spin up a website hosting .mp3s like Audible does. Sure, but audiobook publishers won't be there because of their exclusivity requirement with Audible, and they won't drop the exclusivity requirement because Audible has all the market share, and so the website never grows to compete. Once Amazon figured this out with the Kindle and started pushing exclusivity there, books very quickly started disappearing from other online stores.

taeric 3y ago
What books aren't available outside of the Kindle ecosystem?