Engine Punk

The internet is still buzzing with anti-Amazon sentiments following alleged strong arm tactics to coerce print-on-demand publishers to use Amazon's in house pod printer BookSurge. The penalty for not using them would be the loss of the "Buy" button on the Amazon site. When all this blew up, The Horsepower Whisperer was not available from Amazon in the US. Its status in the UK remained unchanged - it was available and qualified for free delivery if the order was over £15. As of today, The Horsepower Whisperer is shown as available through both branches of Amazon on either side of the pond. I know this because I checked. What prompted me to check was an e-mail from Amazon as a valued customer, recommending Dan Poynter's self-publishing manual. So on Amazon my book is represented better than it was. But many small presses and self-publishers do not want to kiss and make up with Amazon. On balance I reckon Amazon is a good thing. It encourages customers to search out simi...

Binky and Ginger contemplate Bishop's Wood before nailing it and going BOBO - Ball's Out, Brain Off I have a great deal of affection for this machine as this is what Team Robert campaigned in the 2005 and 2006 Land's End Trials. It belonged until recently to my mate Rob Robinson-Collins. That's him driving and that's me poised to do some rapid gymnastics to stop us crashing. The photo above was taken by Charlie Wooding (the official MCC photographer) on the 2005 event in Bishop's Wood near Wadebridge moments just before our finest five minutes. This remains one of my highs in a sporadic competition career. Career? I didn't get any money from it - I paid to do it. We just careered everywhere and it felt great, me, Rob and the Cox Triumph all doing our own thing and somehow going in roughly the same direction. On this section, we had to cross a steep forestry track at an angle and then blast up a sunken lane between the trees. We went BOBO - "...

Regular followers of this blog might remember that a friend of mine ordered The Horsepower Whisperer from Waterstones in Andover, Hampshire. Well, to cut a long story short after five and half weeks it still hadn't turned up so Professor Yarlett (that's what I decided to call him to preserve his anonymity) cancelled the order and got a refund. The assistant said that as the order was in the system The Horsepower Whisperer should turn up soon and that she would hold it for him. That was on 16th March. Prof Y underwent some surgery after that and after having to sit at home with his legs at right angles to his body for 15 days (!) he was able to struggle into town and enquire after The Horsepower Whisperer. You have to hand it to him - he's keen. That was on the 15th April and it still wasn't there. The assistant checked her computer and said she didn't know when it would be in. "These sort of books sometimes don't turn up," she said. I have now supplied...

Good Charlotte rocked the Carling Academy in Bristol on Wednesday night. I first became aware of GC when I joined a gym and “Girls like cars and money” was one of the few decent songs playing on MTV at that time. A subsequent recommendation from my mate Gary – he doesn’t do this often – and I got a couple of albums. I’m not the only person to misunderstand Good Charlotte’s image but it’s the music I like and that’s what matters. They look like they might break into rap at any moment but I'm happy to say that they don’t. They’d lose me if they did. On the inlay card to their first album they made a great deal of their Christian beliefs and this surprised me. I don’t associate religion with punk rock. When the prospect of seeing them in Bristol came up I took it although I wasn’t sure what to expect. Support band was Rooney, a Californian five piece some of us thought we’d heard of. I think they were on the sound track of Herbie Re-loaded, which (funnily enough) is one of the f...

This ex-Army Armstrong MT500 belongs to my mate Pete Low and is an excellent example of a “back to basics” motorcycle. These bikes have established something of a cult following. They were never available in the shops but were the British Army's despatch bike of choice for many years. As they've been sold off as military surplus, a number of people have realised what great bikes they are. “I bought mine in late '05,” says Pete, “partly with the idea of doing MCC trials on it. I liked the ruggedness, no chrome or shiny paint etc. but discovered the less desirable points that most MT500 owners will not admit to. “It was difficult to start from cold, and had a tendency to cut out at low revs, especially, it seems, at traffic lights. Both these problems are increased by the awkwardly placed left hand kickstart, but can be improved upon by junking the standard Mk2 Amal concentric carb and fitting either a 32mm Mikuni or 34 mm Dellorto. This also helps a bit, but not muc...

More has emerged from the Amazon pod publishing spat that kicked off last week. Many small publishers in the US have indeed lost their buy now buttons for their titles on Amazon. They are still available from third party sellers but presumably at a greater discount i.e. less income for the author/publisher. Meanwhile, in the UK, Amazon has expressed its fury in an article in The Times about competition from Waterstones and Borders since these high street chains are under cutting Amazon's prices AND stepping up their internet marketing campaigns. Penguin and Bloomsbury are also undercutting Amazon's prices. Amazon may retaliate by regarding a publisher’s online price as the recommended retail price and applying its trading terms to that. So it's not just with the little people that Amazon is crossing swords. The Horsepower Whisperer is still listed on Amazon as in stock. Buy it now while you still can! In the US, it is out of stock. It should be shown as in stock thanks to ...

Don't worry it's nothing weird, just a Fiesta that's been got at by Ed Holloway After all the shock horror stories in the publishing world this week (see my Anarchadia book blog on the right if you're interested) let's have another Vintage Thing. This is another device from that affable automotive anarchist Ed Holloway. I was already familiar with his work having seen the Weeny Leaper in action - see VT 11 - when the Tryagain Trycycle hove into view while I was spectating on the Land's End Trial a few years ago. (I'm sorry - I can't find relevant programme in the Boogie Wundaland archives. Er, that's where I live. Maybe someone out there can advise me?) Of course, it had to be Ed. The Tryagain Trycycle cleared the section but provoked a round of tut-tutting and disapproving remarks from the marshals and spectators. It seems that this such sort of thing shouldn't be allowed and could bring the sport of trialling into disrepute although n...

Lightning Source went out to its customers today with an open letter saying "be calm" as a means to re-assure publishers who feel threatened by Amazon's insistence that pod books are printed by BookSurge. Here's the contents of the e-mail I got today:- Lightning Source announcement regarding Amazon/Booksurge Dear Customer, Lightning Source has been following the recent press coverage and discussions about Amazon.com and BookSurge. We are aware of the concern this is causing the publishing community. The issue centers around Amazon.com tying the availability of your books and terms of sale at Amazon.com to the production of books at the Amazon.com subsidiary BookSurge, specifically requiring you to use BookSurge in order to sell on Amazon. Like you, we are very concerned about any conduct that would serve to limit a publishers choice in supply chain partners and to negatively impact the cost of your products to consumers. We believe that choice and selection of best...

Over the weekend, there was a tremendous amount of traffic on the self-publishing and Yahoo groups to which I belong. At first, due to my playground sense of humour (I do have others by the way), I suspected this might be an elaborate April Fool's joke. But now it would appear to be true. Amazon contacted a number of US small presses and self-publishers to say that if they didn't use Amazon's in house print on demand wing called BookSurge then the "Buy" buttons on the Amazon page for their books will be removed. They could then only sell their books on Amazon through a third party. Word quickly spread among the small presses and self-publishers who had been approached with this “offer they couldn’t refuse.” Approaches seemed to have been made by phone call with nothing in writing. It was all very mysterious and I couldn’t help feel that somebody was (successfully) winding an awful lot of people up. For many, BookSurge is not the first choice of printer for print ...