Greed vs Convenience

(updated) comiXology was my darling. It was the best way to discover and rediscover English and American comics. The special reading technology was marvelous for the iPad. Not to mention the brillance in presentation on a retina display.

Then amazon bought comiXology. Well, we all know, what happens, when a biggie like amazon, google oder facebook buys a small but innovative start up. Sometimes it can be heaven, often it can be hell, and sometimes, the small start up is assimilated (in the best StarTrekian sense).

comiXology was a very convenient thing. You read a comic and when you were through, you could instantly make an in-app purchase to go on with the series or further parts of the story. This was like heaven. But we all know, that greed eats convenience. comiXology started on iOS and apparently made money. It looked like a symbiotic friendship. We, the readers, had access to lots of American Comics, comiXology was building a very good reputation and Apple, well they made their part of it. All in-app-purchases had to undergo the 30% stake. Good, you can love it or leave it but fact is, that my iTunes account was always ready when reading on. It was so easy to hit the „purchase“ button to get to the next level of the story. No big interruption, no problems at all. And I bet it wasn’t the badest thing for those guys either – think of impulse purchases.

comiXology (amazon) removes in-app purchases

Enter amazon. All right, things are different now. There is now an EU-website (’cos sure everything has to be BIG now, but the website sucks), and the iOS app has changed completely. You cannot buy your comics in-app any more. It has to be the full-blown return-on-investment in as shortest time as possible, hasn’t it? I bought some 400-500 comics on comixology the last years and I bought ‘em, ’cos it was so easy. I didn’t visit their website more than two or three times, because it wasn’t necessary. Now those smartypants at amazon had the glorious idea to change everything. I will have to buy through the site and send the whole crap to my iPad. Well, this is so 1990.

But you know what, dear CFO? I lost my faith in your „start up“. I won’t buy my comics through your site, I won’t give you my creditcard number and I won’t read my new comics on comixology any more. Why? Because for me, convenience is more important. Yes, you had to pay your 30% stake to Apple. Doesn’t matter, because I would have paid it even on top, if it’s so important for you. But so? No chance, buddies, no chance. And I shit on your 5$ gift. You destroyed the experience. Completely. And what comes next? Will I have to buy a „kindle fire“? To get the best „experience“? Sorry, this is to hot for me. I don’t want to sink even more money in something that begins to annoy me and plays games with me.

I hope you get the receipt and many more people are thinking like me. And I hope, you lose more than 30% of your revenue on selling comics your amazon way. Oh, sure, there is the Android version. Well, hope those Android guys are as solvent as the iOS guys.

And if you’re returning to in-app purchases on iOS, I’m maybe back again.

Greed vs Convenience. OK – greed won. So I am out. Have fun with your amazon liaison.

Update: the uproar in the community isn’t so small (see Gerry Conways article), but I doubt, that it alters anything. The new guys at comiXology are not listening at all. So this means only one thing: we, the customers are just a piece of paying shit for them.

Read this statement of Comixology VP of Communications Chip Mosher. What is this? The good old reality distortion field?

 

 

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