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PG: The Art of Funding a Startup is now free on Amazon

197 points| neya | 13 years ago |amazon.com | reply

85 comments

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[+] arihant|13 years ago|reply
I believe the reviews are bad because of people's high expectations. This is essentially an interview transcript. Most PG interviews are laid back and most Andrew Warner's are about getting the information out rather than creating a documentary. That combination gives an informative video, not a book.

This is still a good read for a short flight. Definitely better than the 2-star rating Amazon has for it.

[+] norswap|13 years ago|reply
If you read through the review, you'll see it got bitten because of:

- Paying for material available for free elsewhere. - Horrible formatting for some devices.

[+] wilfra|13 years ago|reply
This is very common in the App Store. Apps that decide to go free after charging typically take a full one-star downgrade to their rating.

Lots of people download them because they are free and don't care that much about them and are uber-quick to think they are terrible and move on to the next free app. Whereas people who pay are much more interested in what it has to offer, give it more time before they move on etc.

App.net is probably experiencing some of this with their backers. If it were free it would likely have much worse 'reviews' from people. Not that there is anything wrong with the product, just that people who spent $50 are much more likely to give it more than a quick once-over before making up their minds about it.

[+] davidw|13 years ago|reply
Formatting problems with your Kindle books? We can help:

http://www.liberwriter.com

[+] pc86|13 years ago|reply
I'm somewhat curious why this spam hasn't been downvoted into oblivion.
[+] adnam|13 years ago|reply
"Free on Kindle" <> free.
[+] brk|13 years ago|reply
How so? You can read it online, or in a number of free Kindle apps for other devices.
[+] pjmo|13 years ago|reply
I just got it, but would never actually pay to read an interview.
[+] raphinou|13 years ago|reply
Very good initiative, but giving an epub option would have been even better.
[+] lazyjones|13 years ago|reply
If I want to borrow it (for free) and not own it, I can borrow the book also. But generally I prefer buying physical books that I actually own.
[+] msutherl|13 years ago|reply
Hey PG, as a former painter, did you have a hand in designing the book cover? If so, can you tell us a bit about the color and layout choices? The electric blue and the not-quite desaturated photograph create a pretty striking effect and the layout seems kind of unusual with the photo taking up not-quite the bottom half of the cover.
[+] q_revert|13 years ago|reply
from one of the amazon reviews:

"The price to content ratio of this publication is enormous and much of the information can be gleaned from a web search. "

for a free book it seems harsh but probably fair

[+] Chico75|13 years ago|reply
The book probably wasn't free at the time of this review
[+] klausjensen|13 years ago|reply
I wonder if I was the only one, who read the headline and thought of some sort of Bizspark-like program for amazon (free hosting for startups).
[+] davidpayne11|13 years ago|reply
If you find yourself frustrated with the Kindle walled garden, and want the book in another format (PDF, EPUB, etc), then you can convert your kindle books to PDF/Whatever format by following this procedure. Please note - This may not be legal, and is demonstrated for educational purposes only!

1)Download and install Kindle for PC (Or Mac, if you have a Mac)

2)Download and install freeware Calibre (Open Source) (http://calibre-ebook.com/download)

3)Download and install DRM removal plug-ins for Calibre (if you use Kindle for PC app, you will just need to add the Kindle plug-in to Calibre)

4)Download your .AZW (Amazon's proprietary format) ebook onto Kindle For PC

5)Run Calibre

6)Find the folder with Kindle for PC ebooks (My documents/My Kindle Content)

7)Select DRM-protected AZW files and drag-n-drop them onto Calibre

8)Calibre will remove DRM protection from AZW ebook(s)

9)Convert your DRM-free MOBI ebooks to any other format (like ePub/fb2/LRF/Mobi/PDF/PDB/TXT/RTF/LIT) using Calibre if needed.

10)Enjoy reading the book in your new format. This is another way to say 'fuck you' to walled gardens like the Kindle.

[+] sp4rki|13 years ago|reply
I've been tempted to do just that: Convert all my Amazon kindle books into MOBI and get out of the "walled garden" as you put it. There was one thing stopping me though. I have an inherent need to support authors as much as I can since I not only wanted to be a writer when I was a kid, but I actually ended up writing a few short stories and a couple of novels. All unpublished off course since they where not mature (as in experience and style) enough. I fear that if I get out of the walled garden I'll end up buying a lot less books (and supporting authors less and less) because of how easy it is to get books online, and I don't necessarily mean pirating FYI.

So yeah, I installed Calibre and was amazed by the flexibility it gave me... and I uninstalled it an hour later because I realized that I couldn't support authors if it was that easy not to do so.

In any case this is great information, thanks for the walkthrough. maybe one day I'll go ahead with it and get out of Amazons lawn (get it get it? garden && lawn?)

[+] ccoggins|13 years ago|reply
As an aside, Calibre does a pretty good job of converting epub and the like into the kindle format. It can also create the "Collections" on your kindle, which makes finding your books much easier on the kindle.
[+] its_so_on|13 years ago|reply
Free with purchase of Kindle
[+] jlgreco|13 years ago|reply
Huh? The kindle application for iOS/Android are both free, as are the PC/OSX applications and the cloud viewer.
[+] cux|13 years ago|reply
Free if you have a computer or a smartphone.