My love/hate relationship with Audible

[Ed Hansberry]

<a href="http://www.audible.com">http://www.audible.com</a><br /><br />Warning! This is a full blown rant. I absolutely love Audible content. I have been a customer of theirs since 1999 purchasing annual subscriptions to The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times and the occasional book or two. Great content - I would recommend it to anyone.<br /><br /><img src="http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/images/hansberry/2002/20020715-audible.gif" /><br /><br />I absolutely hate Audible software and support. They have a lousy desktop interface that behaves like no other Windows software I've ever seen. They have a flaky Pocket PC player that insists on launching when Audible Manager on the desktop launches. They have the worlds second worst Digital Rights Management. Microsoft Reader's DRM5 is the worlds worst. Their 888 number is often busy, and even when you get through, you can be on hold for 2 hrs and never talk to anyone. They do not seem to read your emails. They look for key words and often cut and paste a "uninstall and reinstall" response, regardless of the problem, even if you have told them in the email you already tried that. This email ping-pong with their support department is slow, taking 24-48 hours between replies. &lt;!><br /><br />To cut down on my frustration, I use MS Reader to listen to Audible. It is more reliable and friendly, even if it is missing some of the features of the Audible Player, which by the way, often don't work as advertised. Well, I used MS Reader until today. <img src="http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/forums/images/smiles/icon_evil.gif" /> Over the weekend I got a new laptop and set it up. As always I start with the XP Pro setup disk and repartition the drive. All was fine until I got to Audible.<br /><br />Oh the horror. I had version 3.1.2 on my old laptop and it worked OK. 3.1.2 is no longer available though. Now it is 3.5. Before I go on you must understand something. The higher Audible gets with its version numbers, the worse the software gets. In 1999 I had Audible Manager (AM) 2.0 on the desktop and Audible Player (AP) 1.0 on my Philips Nino 500. Worked wonderfully. It has steadily gone downhill ever since. AM 2.5 was a mess, and AP 2.0 was a joke of the worst kind. I actually went back to AM 2.0 and AP 1.0 until I got my iPAQ. I had to upgrade to AM 2.5 for that to even work. At the time, MS Reader on the iPAQ had a horrible skip when playing content (fixed in a Jan/Feb 2001 ROM) that was worse than what AP 2.0 inflicted, so I endured, swearing every 3-4 weeks I was going to cancel my subscriptions.<br /><br />Well, I could go on for days. Suffice it to say, I had found a calm place with AM 3.1.2 and MS Reader 2.0 on Pocket PC 2002 devices. Well, I am now forced to use AM 3.5 and it does not play well at all unless you have AP installed on your machine. It keeps trying to "upgrade" my iPAQ and inexplicably says it can't. My iPAQ is "busy." Busy fending off what it sees as a Denial of Service attack no doubt. So, in Audible Manager's frustration, it launches UpgradeCENotifier.exe and CENotifierPatch.exe in rapid succession. I guess it figures if it launches them fast enough, it will force this "upgrade" on my iPAQ. In the mean time though, AM is essentially moving about as fast the lady in front of you at Wal-Mart counts out <i>exact</i> change.<br /><br />The fix? I was forced to install AP 3.5. Keep in mind, during all of this I had to activate and deactivate my device about 30 times. Now, I can't just let AP 3.5 be. I passionately dislike it. The bug where it hung if MS Reader was launched <i>appears</i> to be fixed, but the last thing I want to do is be on the interstate doing 70 and it locks up again. Soft resetting an iPAQ at speed is no fun, for me or my fellow commuters. And finding where you left off? Fuggetaboutit. Yet AM insists on popping up that ad, I mean Audible Player, every time I dock my device.<br /><br />So, when I get more time tonight, I am going to try uninstalling it and seeing of the "upgrade" Gatlin gun comes back. Of course, that is another deactivation/reactivation. I have a feeling for the next three days I'll be listening to CD's rather than Audible as my activations run out and I have to send smoke signals to Wayne, NJ to get more activations added to my account.<br /><br />I once recommended Audible to everyone I knew that showed interested when I talked about news I had heard on my morning commute and how I had heard it. I stopped doing that about 18 months ago, and given the experience I have had this past weekend, I see no reason to reverse that stance, which is frustrating because the content is soooooooooo good!

[Charles Pickrell]

Ed,

It is my opinion that we should not support companies that have poor quality software. There are too many companies today shoveling out cr*p to customers. Take Thunderhawk for example. I installed the 1.0 program and it couldn't register me after 2 hours of fiddling with the registration process. I ended up debugging the problem myslef (usernames cannot accept spaces). The fact that I had to even fight the poorly written registration process turned me off to the application completely and I've not been back. If we continue to put up with this stuff the problems will not go away. If we vote with our dollars perhaps things will change. Stop using Audible and switch to Mazingo and listen to your content there instead.

[Ed Hansberry]

switch to Mazingo and listen to your content there instead.
Why do you think I uninstalled Mazingo? :|

Unfortunately, Audible has a lock on some content. Just like PeanutPress does. Fortunately, Peanut Press has great software and support.

[heyday]

I really like audible. My only complaint is that they don't have enough unabridged books.... but they are getting more. In the past unabridged books were just a nightmare becaue of too many tapes or CDs.... now that you can put it in one file more publishers are doing it....

heyday

[keduprey]

Ed,

I have similar complaints with the audible software, however, since my latest home system wipe/reinstall, I have come up with a stable working configuration for my Jornada 560 series. I have the AP 3.0.1 version on my Jornada, which works reasonably well (no hangs, but an occasional lost bookmark). When I reinstalled the latest version of the manager software on my home computer, and then went to activate my Jornada, it gave me the too many activated devices error, and I briefly contemplated sending smoke signals to Audible. The one thing that kept me from going there was the fact that AP still worked on my Jornada with the files that were currently on my CF card, and were activated for the same account settings. This got me to thinking about whether I even needed the AM for transfering the files to my device, so I experimented with transferring the audible files from my home computer to the device via Activesync or a network file share with Netrunner. It worked flawlessly. I then uninstalled AM and reinstalled it selecting the no portable device option. It downloads audio programs from their website to my home computer, and that's it. No attempts to find my device, and sync, or any of the other AM headaches. I use AM ONLY to download the programs to my home computer, and then use other methodologies to transfer the programs to my device. Perhaps this could solve some of your problems with AM. Good luck.

I still find Audible to be the best solution for listening to audio programs on my daily 1 hour commute to work. I have to admit though, that Mazingo is catching-up fast.

[sundown]

Breaking from ranks here to say I love Audible's latest release 3.1.2 which also allows me to transfer mp3's and wma's (although this feature seems hidden until you have certain drivers installed). I have to admit I don't have my Jornada installed as an added device. We use Audible exlusively on our mp3 players (we have 3 now) and it works flawlessly. For that matter, so did the previous version. Perhaps their Pocket PC market is much smaller than their mp3 market?

Overall I love Audible because they have a bunch of weekly programs I like to catch on my own time. Although I usually agree we shouldn't support companies that have poor software and customer service (which, although a little slow, was always quite helpful to me), I don't want Audible to go away so I will continue to support them.

[MobiliT]

I recently had two Audible.com issues that were both promptly resolved. One dealt with running out of activations. (One of my PDAs crashed, so I couldn't deactivate it.) Within a half hour of being on hold on the phone, the Audible technician simply reset all of my activations. This effectively started me from scratch.

Secondly, I had an issue with my Player software recognizing my CD player but not being able to write to it. I shot an e-mail before retiring the night and I had an attachment patch in my inbox the next morning that fixed it. I am pleased about the CD features they have incorporated in the Audible software.

On the flip side, I have had to resort to harrassing Microsoft for an activation. I mean at least Audible has a way of deactivating your hardware. With Microsoft, every time I reformat a PC or purchase a new PDA, I am at their mercy. No matter how much money you have invested in eBooks, they are not really yours in a sense. I have sent M$ weekly e-mails and never received a response. Finally, I gave up and just found which files the Reader program needed and copied them from another hardware source. It works! As long as I know which files to copy, and I actually have them, looks like I can bypass the online activation wizard. But, Audible.com should be recognized for giving the user more control.

[Ravenswing]

I don't have much trouble with Audible. Then again, I don't use it much.

I try to keep up with the latest software, and that usually works.

They did go through a phase (I think with AP3) where the player would start and come to the front on every power-on or CF card insertion. Now that was irritating beyond the power to express, but they seem to have fixed it.

I just wish they'd get the rest of Terry Pratchett's books online 8)

[lawnman]

Leave it to Ed to stir things up :P I agree mostly with his rant though.

[rlitchfield]

So far things are going well for me and Audible.com, though I'm a new user. I have a 35 min train ride each morning to work and back again and audible sure helps pass the time.

Robert

[danmanmayer]

After all of that and the stuff you go through what would anyone recoomd for someone that would like to have some audio books on his pocket PC. I mean audiable doesn't sound to great. What about peanut press. What has better full books (i don't want abridged). Are there any really good solutions for desktops? I would preffer on my pocket pc but i could honestly use my desktop for this much of the time.
8O 8O 8O

[BevHoward]

FWIW, I think the best place to start for Audible help is on the MS pocketpc newsgroup rather than through them...

I have gotten (and given) much more help there that has ever transpired through the official Audible routes.

In addition to the common startup problems, there is a good likelyhood that advanced problems have already been addressed by other ppc users.

[b3trio]

Why do you think I uninstalled Mazingo?

Ed, it can't be because their support is as bad as Audible's. Whenever I have had a problem with Mazingo the response to an e-mail has been prompt and curtious.

Mazingo does have it's bugs, however, they are constantly working to improve their product with the frequent release of updates.

I for one am a very happy Mazingo customer. :D

[l0o5er]

I sympathise with you experience having been pissed around so much with Audible software in the past. They really have (/do?) had such crappy software developers/QA/management.

But pleased to say that I haven't had any significant problems in the past year & Audible Player 3.5 works "as advertised" on my Ipaq 3870. I love my Light Listener sub which gives me 2 books a month & enjoy more than ever my commutes in & out of the city.

[Ed Hansberry]

I mean audiable doesn't sound to great. What about peanut press.
• Level 1 Audible sounds OK. 2, pretty good. 3 actually sounds just fine. I've never seen the need to go to 4.
• Can't do non-audio ebooks when driving.

[bbarker]

I really like audible. My only complaint is that they don't have enough unabridged books.... but they are getting more. In the past unabridged books were just a nightmare becaue of too many tapes or CDs.... now that you can put it in one file more publishers are doing it....
I've always loved listening to unabridged books I pick up free at the library. Our libraries have hundreds and hundreds of them.

Normally I listen on tape because it's the most convenient for me. But sometimes the library orders new books first on CD. I checked out The Summons by John Grisham on CD and used Windows Media Player to RIP the CDs so I could copy them to my Jornada and listen from there. But the process was just too time-consuming for me. I've found Audible's download and copy-to-PPC process tedious as well.

I prefer tapes. And I prefer them free, from the library.

[sundown]

BTW, talk about poor management and poor software, what about Microsoft? But we haven't much choice there, do we?

[Ed Hansberry]

AAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Uninstall Audible Player on the Pocket PC and Audible Manager detect is and starts sending out is UPDATE tendrils again.

$10 to someone that writes an app for me that runs on my Pocket PC in the background and kills Audible Player when it launches. :evil:

[hhollick]

Can anyone tell me if Audible fixed the bookmark/progress mark problem on the 2002 version of the Pocket PC Audible player? Is there even a 2002 version?

I am using an IPAQ 3600 with the original PocketPC OS. Aubible Player 3.5 on this OS overwrites the Prefs file each time you download new content. This means that all of my bookmarks and progress marks are lost each time I add new content. If I am in the middle of a long file I have to remember to write down how far I am and then manually fast forward to that location when I add new programs. Has this been fixed in the 2002 version?

I describe myself as a painfully loyal Audible customer. I have been with them for years and enjoy my daily dose of MarketPlace and Fresh Air as well as my weekly fix of Car Talk. But this particular bug has been with them since version 1.0. It took them several revs to fix the bug that caused the program to jump forward randomly when you hit the rewind button.

I have written so many emails that they have me filtered. I wish it wasn't so hard to enjoy their content.

[Ed Hansberry]

I wish it wasn't so hard to enjoy their content.
HA! That should be their slogan. :lol:

[Marcel_Proust]

:cry:
Although the software is buggy and awkward to use, I've never had major problems with it.

However, customer support once overcharged me a quite significant amount on one of my visits. It took more than 3 weeks and a number of emails to even elicit a response from customer support. The first responses were cursory and completely unhelpful. I'm not sure if they were intentionally refusing to look at the matter, or if the reps were simpletons. I had to cause quite an escalation to get my account reviewed and refunded. I think it took more than 3 months to settle the matter.

Counting software, hardware, electronics, music, movies, books, I've probably bought over $30k over the web in the past 5 years, and Audible has given me my worst and most memorable experience. Although I loved their content, I can't see handing my Visa number to them ever again.

[Bob S]

My big gripe with Audible is the proprietary desktop client which must be used to download their content. I love the concept, but in order to get a decent quality sound, you need a type 3 file which is quite large. Try that with a slow dial up connection.

I cant install the desktop client at work. If I could download directly to the device via passthrough at work, I would buy much more content and audible would get more profits.

too slow to wait for large content over dialup

[mgd]

I have been an Audible customer for years, but have recently let my subscription lag because I've been coming across more and more non-exportable content.

I don't mind that they aren't exportable--that's up to publisher--so much as not being able to tell the non-exportable from the exportable without first going through the whole purchasing process and the purchase being rejected. Their solution to the problem is a long alphabetical list of exportable books to peruse which kind of negates the whole ClickOut process. I don't choose my books that way. I usually choose by categories. Why not just place a "non-exportable" icon next to the titles--they've got icons for just about everything else.

I also hate Audible Player and the way it has taken posession of my PDA. I prefer using MS Reader with all of its drawbacks.

[Ed Hansberry]

My big gripe with Audible is the proprietary desktop client which must be used to download their content. I love the concept, but in order to get a decent quality sound, you need a type 3 file which is quite large. Try that with a slow dial up connection.
It is worse than that. Why not include a Pocket PC client for downloading? We have high speed connections now - have for several years since CF ethernet adapters were available. Nothing is more frustrating than to be on the road and not be able to get new content. I can buy ebooks online, I can get music. Why not Audible books?

Right now I have a bit of a hack using a Citrix Server and a VPN connection, but it is a pain and totally unavailable to most users. :x

[Snogpitch]

I have been a member of Audible since I got my Nino 301. I didn't really get into purchasing content for it until 1999. The only problems I seemed to have over the years was my activations. A variety of computers made me hit that wall more than a few times, but a phone call to the customer service allowed activation to be permitted on my newest machine at the time.

I'm now running version 3.5 on a Jornada 545 that I've had for two years. I subscribe to Audible only content that I mostly listen on my desktop computer at home. However, transferring items to Compact Media allows me to have hours of listening to take with me on trips. Since I don't use bookmarks, and usually listen to content straight thru from begining to end, I guess I have sidestepped issues that others mention.

Microsoft Reader on my version only allows playing type 1 Audible content, so I don't use that option for type 3. I have to admit, I did perfer using Microsoft Reader in those early days. Since option 3 became available, I haven't gone back to the smaller filetypes, and continue to use the Audible Player for the Pocket PC.

[thenikjones]

I used Audible with my old 545 - OK but the software was a pain. When I upgraded to a 568 I joined the frequent listener plan (2 books per month, ~$18). I want to cancel as I don't listen to them fast enough, and many books I want aren't available for UK subscribers. So I email them to let them know. They email back saying I need to call a number. I email to say I'm in the UK, do I really need to? Yes, they say, otherwise no cancellation :( . If I just phone my bank to cancel the payment, I feel they may hold my bought-but-not-downloaded-yet books to ransom - I live rurally so my modem rarely gets above 19kbps on my shared line. :roll:

Bottom line - I call the US number, on hold for ages, have yet to cancel and had to pay another months subscription. I am unhappy.
:evil:

[Ed Hansberry]

over 48 hrs later and I still have no reply. Wasn't expecting one really - that would imply they had customer service.

:devilboy: