Amazon.com 2011 Annual Report Download - page 3

publishing world and giving writers like me a shot at their dream, and for that I am forever grateful.” That’s
Blake Crouch, author of several thrillers, including the Kindle best seller Run.
“Amazon has made it possible for authors like me to get their work in front of readers and has changed my
life. In a little over a year, I have sold nearly 250,000 books through the Kindle and have traded in old dreams for
bigger and better ones. Four of my books have hit the Top 100 Kindle Best Sellers List. Also, I have been
approached by agents, foreign sales people, and two movie producers, and have received mentions in the
LA Times, Wall Street Journal, and PC Magazine, and was recently interviewed by USA Today. Mostly, I am
excited that all writers now have the opportunity to get their work in front of readers without jumping through
insurmountable hoops. Writers have more options and readers have more choices. The publishing world is
changing fast, and I plan to enjoy every minute of the ride.” Theresa Ragan is the KDP author of multiple Kindle
best sellers including Abducted.
“Past age 60 and in the midst of the recession, my wife and I found our income options severely limited.
KDP was my one shot at a lifelong dream – our only chance at financial salvation. Within months of publishing,
KDP has completely changed our lives, enabling this aging nonfiction writer to launch a brand-new career as a
best-selling novelist. I can’t say enough on behalf of Amazon and the many tools that they make available to
independent authors. Without reservation, I urge fellow writers to investigate and seize the opportunities that
KDP offers. As I’ve happily discovered, there is zero downside risk – and the potential is virtually unlimited.”
Robert Bidinotto is the author of the Kindle best seller Hunter: A Thriller.
“I leveraged KDP’s technology to blow through all the traditional gatekeepers. Can you imagine how that
feels, after struggling so hard, for so long, for every … single … reader? Now, inspirational fiction lovers I never
would have reached are enjoying Nobody and my other two novels from the Kindle Store at $2.99. I’ve always
wanted to write a Cinderella story. Now I have. And, thanks to Prince Charming (KDP), there will be more to
come…” Creston Mapes is the author of the Kindle best seller Nobody.
Invention comes in many forms and at many scales. The most radical and transformative of inventions are
often those that empower others to unleash their creativity – to pursue their dreams. That’s a big part of what’s
going on with Amazon Web Services, Fulfillment by Amazon, and Kindle Direct Publishing. With AWS, FBA,
and KDP, we are creating powerful self-service platforms that allow thousands of people to boldly experiment
and accomplish things that would otherwise be impossible or impractical. These innovative, large-scale platforms
are not zero-sum – they create win-win situations and create significant value for developers, entrepreneurs,
customers, authors, and readers.
Amazon Web Services has grown to have thirty different services and thousands of large and small
businesses and individual developers as customers. One of the first AWS offerings, the Simple Storage Service,
or S3, now holds over 900 billion data objects, with more than a billion new objects being added every day.
S3 routinely handles more than 500,000 transactions per second and has peaked at close to a million transactions
per second. All AWS services are pay-as-you-go and radically transform capital expense into a variable cost.
AWS is self-service: you don’t need to negotiate a contract or engage with a salesperson – you can just read the
online documentation and get started. AWS services are elastic – they easily scale up and easily scale down.
In just the last quarter of 2011, Fulfillment by Amazon shipped tens of millions of items on behalf of sellers.
When sellers use FBA, their items become eligible for Amazon Prime, for Super Saver Shipping, and for
Amazon returns processing and customer service. FBA is self-service and comes with an easy-to-use inventory
management console as part of Amazon Seller Central. For the more technically inclined, it also comes with a set
of APIs so that you can use our global fulfillment center network like a giant computer peripheral.
I am emphasizing the self-service nature of these platforms because it’s important for a reason I think is
somewhat non-obvious: even well-meaning gatekeepers slow innovation. When a platform is self-service, even
the improbable ideas can get tried, because there’s no expert gatekeeper ready to say “that will never work!” And
guess what – many of those improbable ideas do work, and society is the beneficiary of that diversity.