This is NOT good…
Amazon has quietly added a new AI feature to its Kindle iOS app — a feature that “lets you ask questions about the book you’re reading and receive spoiler-free answers,” according to an Amazon announcement.
The company says the feature, which is called Ask this Book, serves as “your expert reading assistant, instantly answering questions about plot details, character relationships, and thematic elements without disrupting your reading flow.”
Publishing industry resource Publishers Lunch noticed Ask this Book earlier this week, and asked Amazon about it. Amazon spokesperson Ale Iraheta told PubLunch, “The feature uses technology, including AI, to provide instant, spoiler-free answers to customers’ questions about what they’re reading. Ask this Book provides short answers based on factual information about the book which are accessible only to readers who have purchased or borrowed the book and are non-shareable and non-copyable.”
As PubLunch summed up: “In other words, speaking plainly, it’s an in-book chatbot.” […] Perhaps most alarmingly, the Amazon spokesperson said, “To ensure a consistent reading experience, the feature is always on, and there is no option for authors or publishers to opt titles out.”
h/t SS
This frankly sucks, as there is no way to shut that crap off… Sigh…
fwiw-
Stick to cellulose.
It’s natural.
If it’s digital, it is fully corruptible.
An excellent start would be to purchase some of the
fine selections at this site, in fact.
Juan
I like to read books to use my own brain , I don’t need a road map. I once read one of my kid’s Harry Potter books , and later they got a good laugh because I mentioned the character “Hermee own” , not knowing the real pronunciation of “Hermione” . I read the whole book thinking this girl’s name was a word of my own making in my pea brain . Yeah I do dumb shit .
This in book chat bot with no opt out sounds like BS Sir .
Perhaps I’m doing it wrong, but I’m not finding this feature on my Kindle software. I have it on my Windows computer, and on my iPad and my iPhone.
Actually, from reading the press release, it looks like the feature (which I can’t find and therefore can’t verify) only comes alive if you call for it.
It MAY be only available if the book you are reading has the feature installed.
https://www.aboutamazon.com/news/books-and-authors/kindle-recaps-feature-ebook-series-refreshers
BTW: I looked for it while reading Cedar Begley (Sanderson) “Wonderland: Follow the White Rabbit to Murder” as well as in the Raconteur Press Anthology “Library Creatures (The Haunted Libraries Anthologies Book 3).” So, it might be present in other books.
As to what value the feature will offer, maybe something, maybe nothing; RAFO (Read Around and Find Out).
Don’t need it, didn’t ask for it, don’t want it.
Don’t forget the first rule of business, Amazon: Give your customers what they want (not just what you want, or you might find you don’t have very many customers left.)
X2
No. Just plain, No.
I wondered what that was…
This week I’ve seen it on some books but not others, so apparently it isn’t universal. My current book doesn’t have it, but my previous one did – both are books I’ve read before.
There are a bunch of ebooks I’d like to purchase in paper, but I haven’t found a way to yet.
STFU, book, I’m trying to read.
No opt out = me no buy.
Amazon: “We forced an unneeded, unwanted, unsolicited, mandatory feature onto our customers and they don’t like it. Our customers obviously don’t know what they want.”
In related news: “Trump support of cyberstuff blamed for paper shortage due to unexplained surge in sales of physical books.”
“…the feature is always on, and there is no option for authors or publishers to opt titles out.”
“Inflammable? Challenge accepted.” Michael Z Williamson
Welcome to the Six O’clock News. “In an industry-wide protest, Amazon-published authors have begun embedding hidden data in their stories which cause Amazon’s new Ask this Book app to respond to readers’ queries with a string of profane obscenities directed against Amazon. Film at eleven if the censors allow it. Next up, the shocking truth about the book “Why Johnny Can’t Read”, after this word from PuzzleMENt, the feminine hygiene product for Real Men.
All- Thanks, and it does ‘appear’ to only be on certain books (so far)… Pat, that might explain why you haven’t seen/encountered it yet.
I don’t use Kindle, nor anything by Apple, so I have no need to turn it off. I read books. They’re made of paper. Cool technology.
TB: But what about the childre…I mean, the trees?! You Luddite! 🙂
TB- That it is! And almost timeless!!!
Robert- LOL
You. Must. Have. AI. In. Everything.
Pretty soon there will be “smart” TP holders, with AI, networked to some mothership somewhere, offering you unwanted advice about personal moments while selling the data to perverts somewhere.