Apple's decision to reject an e-book by Seth Godin because it contains hyperlinks to books in the Amazon store is just another example of how the oligopoly that controls the market for e-books is turning the landscape of reading into a walled garden.
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Just as a few massive chain stores eventually came to dominate the traditional printed book market in North America, the e-book marketplace is a kind of oligopoly involving a few major players — primarily Amazon, Apple and Barnes & Noble. And while bookstore owners of all kinds are free to decide which books they wish to put on their shelves, these new giants have far more control over whose e-books see the light of day because they also own the major e-reading platforms, and they are making decisions based not on what they think consumers want to read but on their own competitive interests. That is turning the e-book landscape into even more of a walled garden.
Author and digital-marketing maven Seth Godin highlighted this issue in a recent blog post, in which he described how his new book was turned down by Apple because it contained hyperlinks to books sold by Amazon (with whom Godin has a partnership). According to a letter that the author says he received from the company, the new title — Stop Stealing Dreams, a book about the transformation that Godin believes needs to happen in public education — was rejected by Apple due to what the letter described as “multiple links to [the] Amazon store.” Godin notes that the book had links to related works, including Too Big to Know from David Weinberger, co-author of The Cluetrain Manifesto.
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Heiko Idensen
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Don't you love my great title?
Ok, it's confusing but trust me, this article is not and makes a good job at explaining a simple but often misunderstood truth on content marketing: the intent is important.
Publishing content randomly won't help your brand or company at all. It's publishing content that adds value to your audience and brings it close to your brand or a buying decision.
So not all content is created equal.