For Amazon, October is independent author month (#PoweredByIndie and #PublicaConKindle). I am honored that Amazon decided to feature one of my audio/video multimedia books as part of its celebration. As a result —and by their own decision— Amazon temporarily lowered the price of this book to under US$1, under a €1 or an equivalent amount in your region; is featuring it on its celebration page, and you could win a color Kindle Fire tablet. My multimedia book which Amazon is featuring contains an HD video with a 3D timeline, plus several short audio clips. Ahead I’ll give you those details, plus an update on the current state of audio/video multimedia book distribution.

The exact title being featured by Amazon is my El encubrimiento de la Real Academia (shown above). That title is also available in English as The Royal Spanish Coverup (shown below),

although the English version is not included in the current Amazon special promotion (vergüenza ajena/third-party guilt and completely beyond my control). You could win a free color Kindle Fire tablet if you follow a few simple steps, as indicated on each linked page above. Spaniard singer, translator and voiceover talent María Esnoz also covered this in the most recent CapicúaFM episode (link and audio player at the end of this article).

Current state of audio/video multimedia book distribution and production

As indicated in my February 2016 article The making of a cross-platform audio/video multimedia ebook here in ProVideo Coalition magazine, even though non-multimedia Kindle books are completely cross-platform, that’s unfortunately not yet the case with the multimedia Kindle books. Even though the multimedia Kindle books can be downloaded onto iOS devices like iPads, iPhones and iPod Touches, and the text and photos display, unfortunately the audio and video elements are not currently playable on those iOS devices. Amazon has assured me that this will eventually be corrected in some future update of the Kindle app for iOS, without any change to the book itself. However, even after the latest Kindle app version 5.3 for iOS from September 29th, the audio/video elements are still not playable on iOS. (Thanks to Memo Sauceda for verifying that for me.) The audio/video elements from Kindle multimedia books do play properly on Android and more recent Kindle Fire tablets, which I have reviewed most recently here and here.

As a result, for an audio/video multimedia book to be cross platform, for the moment, it is necessary to do the extra work to create it both as a Kindle multimedia book (using Amazon’s free KTC app I reviewed here, illustrated below)…

and for Apple’s iBooks, using Apple’s free iBooks Author app (shown below, covered in The making of a cross-platform audio/video multimedia ebook).

From an optimistic point of view, this will change as soon as Amazon finally updates the Kindle app for iOS to include this capability, and/or if and when Apple offers the iBooks app for Android. If you think that is a crazy idea, please note that Apple already offers the Apple Music app for Android. If Apple already offers the Apple Music app for Android, why not the iBooks app too?

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FTC disclosure

No manufacturer is specifically paying Allan Tépper or TecnoTur LLC to write this article or the mentioned books. Some of the other manufacturers listed above have contracted Tépper and/or TecnoTur LLC to carry out consulting and/or translations/localizations/transcreations. Many of the manufacturers listed above have sent Allan Tépper review units. So far, none of the manufacturers listed above is/are sponsors of the TecnoTur programs, although they are welcome to do so, and some are, may be (or may have been) sponsors of ProVideo Coalition magazine. Some links to third parties listed in this article and/or on this web page may indirectly benefit TecnoTur LLC via affiliate programs.

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The articles contained in the TecnoTur channel in ProVideo Coalition magazine are copyright Allan Tépper/TecnoTur LLC, except where otherwise attributed. Unauthorized use is prohibited without prior approval, except for short quotes which link back to this page, which are encouraged!