The Kindle Chronicles

The Gaming Hall at South By Southwest On this last of my TKC updates from South By, I will tell you why I'm not going to sell my small stake in Bitcoin any time soon. Also, a tourist's view of the high-energy gaming track at SXSW.  Right-click here and then click "Save Link As..." to download the audio to your computer, phone, or MP3 player.  

Len on the main escalator at the Austin Convention Center Neil Pasricha , director of the Institute for Global Happiness Neil Pasricha's books at Amazon "Four Ways of Looking at South By Southwest" by Len Edgerly at Medium - March 14, 2019 The Texas Tribune John Hickenlooper and Pete Buttigieg websites CNN Town Hall with Pete Buttegieg: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qXD8uFU-xgM CNN Town Hall wit...

This is the view from the big escalator at the Austin Convention Center, where I am attending a session about the Hope and Hype of Blockchain. Also in this TKC Extra I share an unusual experience I had yesterday while visiting senior living communities with my cousin Peter, who is blind. Thanks for listening! Right-click here and then click "Save Link As..." to download the audio to your computer,...

I plan to upload brief segments each day this week from Austin, where I am attending South By Southwest through Sunday. So much to learn! Right-click here  and then click "Save Link As..." to download the audio to your computer, phone, or MP3 player.

Author of Winter World Interview starts at 17:30 and ends at 43:00 "My books almost always deal with an extinction-level event or the pushing of humanity to the brink at times." Comments Mark Isero's Kindle Classroom Project Kindle Direct Publishing eBook Quality Dashboard Interview with A G Riddle A G Riddle's books at Amazon.com My interview with A G Riddle in July, 2018 on TKC 520 News Amazon t...

Len teaching a creative writing class at Belmont Hill School Audio starts at 12:59 and ends at 54:39 News "Amazon Alexa and the Search for the One Perfect Answer" by James Vlahos at Wired - February 18, 2019 Tech Tip "How to hear (and delete) every conversation your Amazon Alexa has recorded" by Natt Garun at The Verge - February 28, 2019 Audio from my presentation at Belmont Hill School Blue Yeti...

Executive Director of Two Lions and Amazon Crossing Kids Interview starts at 23:18 and ends at 43:02 "We would really love to discover books from all over the globe, especially from diverse regions that may not be as well-known to a young English readership. We want the list to be dynamic and really showcase every possible language and culture that we're able to." News "How New York Lost Amazon" o...

Author of Early Riser: A Novel Interview starts at 11:47 and ends at 39:00 News Amazon to buy Eero  - in Wired and  Yahoo Finance Amazon drops plans for HQ2 in New York ( Washington Post ) Tech Tips VoiceBrew podcast on Alexa tips (via Bradley Metrock's This Week in Voice podcast) Interview with Jasper Fforde Early Riser: A Novel at Amazon.com Early Riser web site and "What's the book about?" Shad...

Author of Year of Wonder: Classical Music to Enjoy Every Day Interview starts at 18:16 and ends at 42:30 "I wanted to demystify the music itself, and I wanted to humanize the people who created it, because I think we often think about classical composers being these dead, white European guys invariably from Germany and Austria somewhere in the 18th century maybe with a frock coat, maybe with a pow...

Author of This is Marketing: You Can't Be Seen Until You Learn to See Interview starts at 13:06 and ends at 45:08 "I have a bunch of regrets about how Amazon is steering the boat these days. One of the things I think they dropped the ball on is they've had a hundred opportunities to make Kindle a social platform, and they have dropped it. And they shouldn't, because that is a really useful transfo...

Author of M essy: The Power of Disorder to Transform Our Lives Interview starts at 15:43 and ends at 43:50 "You can be super clever and have all your tricks, but fundamentally everything in your life is crowding out something else in your life. At some point you have to choose, and the choice should be thoughtful." News "The Prime Challenges for Amazon's New Delivery Robot" by Matt Simon and Ariel...

Project Manager for MobiScribe reader/writer by TeamUC Interview starts at 18:37 and ends at 41:06 "It's basically going to be like a Kindle that you can write on. If you've ever had your work documents on the Kindle it must be frustrating, because you feel like you can't write on your work documents even though you have it in a meeting. So now we have PDF annotation integrated into the device as...

Author of Typeset in the Future: Typography and Design in Science Fiction Movies Interview starts at 18:51and ends at 43:30 "So much of this stuff that, when we watch 2001 today, makes it feel fresh, makes it still feel futuristic was way ahead of its time at the time that the movie was created." News "The 'Future Book' is Here, But It's Not What We Expected" by Craig Mod at Wired - December 20, 2...

Chief Marketing Officer at Open Road Integrated Media Interview starts at 9:51 and ends at 38:35 "I do think we're unusual in that we consistently continue to market these books day in and day out for many years. I think that's the benefit we bring to our partners in the Open Road Ignition program, that we are taking those eBooks that they don't have time or resources to market in an ongoing way a...

Forbes contributor & co-founder of Omni Talk blog Interview starts at 7:33 and ends at 41:04 "2018 was a watershed year in terms of how things transpired. This to me was really the year you saw Amazon try to become a physical retailer." News Amazon holiday press release - December 26, 2018 Sphero Mini Blue : The App-Controlled Robot Ball Tech Tip Calibre Recomendo Fakespot Fakespot Chrome extensio...

Creator of Calibre Interview starts at 9:53 and ends at 43:03 "So the first and most important thing that is different between a Calibre library and your Kindle collection is that you actually own the books in your Calibre library, whereas you stream them from Amazon for your Kindle collection. " News Bradley Metrock on Barnes & Noble Will Amazon buy Target? Jefferson Graham's Talking Tech podcast...

TV news anchor and author of the Traveler series Interview starts at 10:21 and ends at 41:59 "Writing is a muscle, I think. If you don't use it you lose that. Because I write every day both creatively and for my job, I think that's part of what helps me to write as much as I do as quickly as I do. I write under deadline, so creating my own self-imposed deadlines is pretty easy. It's just instead o...

Author of We Miss All the Great Parties Interview starts at 2:12 and ends at 35:59 "I had this traditionalist view that I wanted to hold the paper book and feel the turning of the page. I was absolutely wrong in my assumptions. Reading on an eReader felt like reading. It was still this sort of cuddly, warm, meditative, reflective experience. I could sit and read for hours on it. It fit in my jacke...

Host of the Kindle Chronicles News "Amazon gets into the blockchain with Quantum Ledger Database & Managed Blockchain" by Sara Perez at TechCrunch - November 28, 2018 Bitcoin Price Plummets CoinBase (my app of choice for buying Bitcoin) "Apple Music to launchy on Amazon Echo speakers" by Tim Bradsha at The Financial Times - November 29, 2018 "Introducing medical language processing with Amazon Com...

Vice Principal and Principal Analyst at Forrester Research Interview starts at 2:28 and ends at 38:32 "Nobody can see the future, but what we can see from the past is that it unfolds according to certain properties. What [Virginia Postrel, author of The Future and Its Enemies ] wrote that was so compelling was that the best properties to help that unfold in the best way are properties of experimen...

Amazon Books Senior Editor Interview starts at 12:44 and ends at 39:11 "We often talk about accessibility. We start there. We talk about quality of writing. The story is important, obviously. Maybe the thing that gets you over the line is your visceral reaction to the book. How much are you willing to argue for it? You win some, and you lose some. Ultimately I think we come up with a great list. E...

Author of the Breakthrough series Interview starts at 9:36 and ends at 40:28 News Amazon to split HQ2 between two cities ( Wall Street Journal ) Amazon announces free shipping with no minimum purchase for the holidays My video of a dunk test for the all-new Kindle Paperwhite plus Darlene's comments Interview with Michael C. Grumley Breakthrough series by Michael C. Grumley: Breakthrough , Leap , C...

Vice President, Macmillan Podcasts & QDT Interview starts at 9:43 and ends at 40:01 "We can think of podcasting as an entry point to audiobooks. They are less of a commitment, they are free, they can actually give you great insights into book discovery. Podcasts can move at a more rapid pace." News Jeff Bezos in Cambridge! Black Friday deals Harlequin makes an eReader platform change 4-Star Amazon...

Site Reliability Engineering Lead at Shopify Interview starts at 10:07 and ends at 43:36 "If someone were to come around with some hardware that was even 50 percent worse than the Kindle but was opened up for easy highlight consumption, making it easier to see what highlights my friends have done, and all these sorts of things--I would switch in a heartbeat. " News "Amazon Kindle versus iPhone XS...

Joerg Tewes, Head of Kindle Product Management, and Kevin Keith, VP Amazon Devices New Paperwhite at Amazon.com Kevin Keith , VP-Amazon Devices Joerg Tewes , Head of Product Management for Kindle Press Release on new Paperwhite - October 16, 2018 Click here to check for software updates for your Kindle or Fire device Next Week's Guest Simon Hørup Eskildsen , author of "How I Read" Music for my pod...