Fairfax Media, one of Australia’s large media companies, has rejected the Kindle and decided to look elsewhere for e-delivery. Even worse for Amazon, this announcement comes on the heels of another Australian Media company’s public dissatisfaction with the Kindle. Rupert Murdoch has voiced his concern over Amazon’s business model, and it seems that News Corporation will simply skip the Kindle with its Australian holdings.
As the eReader market grows in Australia, it looks like electronic newspaper subscriptions will follow a more traditional model where subscribes subscribe from the newspaper itself. But since newspapers are only a fraction of the Kindle’s revenue, I can’t imagine that this news alone will stop the Kindle from breaking into the Australian market. First and foremost, the Kindle platform is an entertainment medium designed to work off of Amazon’s existing status as a leading book retailer. Being able to read newspapers and periodicals is a nice feature, but books remains the Kindle’s strong suit.
Even if some of the major papers bail on the Kindle, the device will have popularity with those who like to read. If other online publishers take off in a way that could hurt the Kindle, Amazon needs to merely allow their device to read other formats. They might not take a cut of the sales, but their are plenty of other revenue streams for Amazon.