Amazon is Hosting Author Blogs

The problem is that the conversation is one-way.

This development was first brought to my attention by Cory Doctorow on Boing Boing.

According to a recent New York Times article, Jani Strand, a spokeswoman for Amazon said the blogs:

“[give] authors a way to develop more of a one-on-one relationship with readers.”

But how is this possible without the two-way conversational aspect of comments?

Already, some authors are trying to find a way to connect more directly. Anita Diamant, guides readers from her Amazon blog to her own Web site, where they can write to her directly and she [promises to answer all polite e-mails.

Also, author David Dodd responded with a post on his Amazon Blog to a critical comment left in the “Spotlight Review” for Dodd’s book, “The Complete Annotated Grateful Dead Lyrics.”

This is a good use of the tools by the author, but for the average person this “conversation” is pretty tough to follow.

For fun, I looked up Robert Scoble and Shel Israel’s “Naked Coversation” book listing at Amazon to see if they had a started an Amazon blog directing readers to the Naked Conversations
blog.

They didn’t have one up yet, though I would suggest they do this as soon as possible, it would be one more place to expand the reach of the book and the blog.