Looking for alternatives to Audible for (mainly German) audiobooks

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Montmorency
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Looking for alternatives to Audible for (mainly German) audiobooks

Postby Montmorency » Sat Jun 18, 2016 6:27 pm

Without going into the pros and cons of Audible, I've been wondering about alternative (legal of course) sources of commercial audiobooks in German. (I have several good sources for Norwegian; fortunately, that's not a problem).

I came across these people today:

(This happens to be the English language version of the site, but I'd previously looked at the German version, and they have the kind of books I'd be interested in for an ok price):

http://audioteka.com/en/buyers-guide

I'm not interested in the "reading from the cloud" aspect, but what I do like is:
Download audiobooks and listen anywhere

After your payment has been processed your audiobook (with its individual watermark) is ready for download.
You can download it completely or by sections as mp3 files.
Your purchased audiobook is your property and can be download an unlimited number of times.


Which sounds good to me (and I hope and trust it applies to the German site as well).

However, never having heard of them before, I thought it might be good to get some experiences if anyone has used them, or alternative sellers. Thanks in advance.
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reineke
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Re: Looking for alternatives to Audible for (mainly German) audiobooks

Postby reineke » Sat Jun 18, 2016 7:28 pm

It's a Polish company. I've never bought anything from them.
buecher.de and thalia.de deliver to your location. There's also https://www.vorleser.net/
Last edited by reineke on Sat Jun 18, 2016 8:28 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Montmorency
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Re: Looking for alternatives to Audible for (mainly German) audiobooks

Postby Montmorency » Sat Jun 18, 2016 8:05 pm

reineke wrote:It's a Polish company.


OK. That's interesting to know.
buecher.de and thalia.de deliver to your location.


Thanks for those.

There's also vorleser.de


I don't know what it was like last time you tried it, but it seems kind of broken when I try it.
Is that the correct URL?
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Re: Looking for alternatives to Audible for (mainly German) audiobooks

Postby reineke » Sat Jun 18, 2016 8:27 pm

Last edited by reineke on Sat Jun 18, 2016 8:44 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Looking for alternatives to Audible for (mainly German) audiobooks

Postby reineke » Sat Jun 18, 2016 8:44 pm

Montmorency wrote:
reineke wrote:It's a Polish company.


OK. That's interesting to know.


It's a good thing to know as that's about as far as I would be willing to send my money without serious guarantees.

It's a small company (Eur 17 mln) but it looks legit
5 mln users, 500 publishing houses in collaboration, run by 60 employees in 4 offices.

Reviews for the Google Play app:

https://sensortower.com/android/es/audioteka-s-a/app/audioteka-audiolibros-espanol/pl.k2.droidoaudioteka/#review-history
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Re: Looking for alternatives to Audible for (mainly German) audiobooks

Postby aokoye » Sat Jun 18, 2016 9:17 pm

While I don't tend to listen to audiobooks a whole lot, I would recommend the Goethe Institute's online library called Onleihe. You can see their selection of audiobooks here. You have to sign up through your local (national) Goethe Institute and the info for people in the UK is here. I'm not sure how much a year it is for people in the UK but I know my subscription from the US was $10 a year. From what I understand it's free if you're a paying member of the Goethe Institute. You also get access to all of their ebooks which is what I use it for.
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Montmorency
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Re: Looking for alternatives to Audible for (mainly German) audiobooks

Postby Montmorency » Sat Jun 18, 2016 10:30 pm

aokoye wrote:While I don't tend to listen to audiobooks a whole lot, I would recommend the Goethe Institute's online library called Onleihe. You can see their selection of audiobooks here. You have to sign up through your local (national) Goethe Institute and the info for people in the UK is here. I'm not sure how much a year it is for people in the UK but I know my subscription from the US was $10 a year. From what I understand it's free if you're a paying member of the Goethe Institute. You also get access to all of their ebooks which is what I use it for.


Thank you. I used to be a member of the UK Goethe Institut, and they would send videos (and probably books as well).
I had half-forgotten about them, so thanks for the reminder.

Thank you also @Reineke.
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Montmorency
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Re: Looking for alternatives to Audible for (mainly German) audiobooks

Postby Montmorency » Tue Jun 21, 2016 5:00 pm

reineke wrote:It's a Polish company. I've never bought anything from them.
buecher.de and thalia.de deliver to your location.


I read somewhere that those two only deliver* to Germany and Austria. It was not clear (to me) from their websites, but I wrote to Buecher to ask, and they have indeed confirmed that this is the case. :-( ( "aus rechtlichen Gründen..." ). (Or to be more precise, you have to have a German or Austrian billing address, or they won't accept your order).

A bit like the overseas Amazon situation.

And it's not even clear whether the Polish company will be any good either. If I switch to the English shop front, I can no longer find German audiobooks. I emailed to ask, and am now awaiting a reply.

*Edit: By "deliver" here, I'm talking about download of e-books or audiobooks after order/purchase
Last edited by Montmorency on Tue Jun 21, 2016 5:40 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Looking for alternatives to Audible for (mainly German) audiobooks

Postby reineke » Tue Jun 21, 2016 5:21 pm

Montmorency wrote:
reineke wrote:buecher.de and thalia.de deliver to your location.


I read somewhere that those two only deliver to Germany and Austria. It was not clear (to me) from their websites, but I wrote to Buecher to ask, and they have indeed confirmed that this is the case. :-( ( "aus rechtlichen Gründen..." ). (Or to be more precise, you have to have a German or Austrian billing address, or they won't accept your order).

A bit like the overseas Amazon situation.

And it's not even clear whether the Polish company will be any good either. If I switch to the English shop front, I can no longer find German audiobooks. I emailed to ask, and am now awaiting a reply.


Thanks for the information. I just wanted to let you know I didn't pull it out of my arse. I actually checked:

"In welche Länder liefert bücher.de?
Wir liefern in folgende Länder: Belgien, Bulgarien, Dänemark, Deutschland, Estland, Frankreich, Finnland, Großbritannien, Griechenland, Italien, Irland, Luxemburg, Lettland, Litauen, Malta, Niederlande, Österreich, Polen, Portugal, Rumänien, Schweden, Slowakei, Slowenien, Spanien, Tschechien, Ungarn und Zypern.

Bei Lieferungen ins Ausland ist die Bezahlung nur per Kreditkarte, Paypal oder ggf. Vorauskasse möglich.
Für alle Lieferungen nach Österreich berechnen wir eine Versandkostenpauschale von EUR 3,95.
Für alle anderen von uns belieferten Länder fällt eine Versandkostenpauschale von EUR 6,95 an. "

I guess you can order a pen or something. Can you order a CD version?
Last edited by reineke on Mon Nov 13, 2017 3:00 am, edited 2 times in total.
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Montmorency
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Re: Looking for alternatives to Audible for (mainly German) audiobooks

Postby Montmorency » Tue Jun 21, 2016 5:36 pm

reineke wrote:Thanks for the information. I just wanted to let you know I didn't pull it out of my arse. I actually checked:

"In welche Länder liefert bücher.de?
Wir liefern in folgende Länder: Belgien, Bulgarien, Dänemark, Deutschland, Estland, Frankreich, Finnland, Großbritannien, Griechenland, Italien, Irland, Luxemburg, Lettland, Litauen, Malta, Niederlande, Österreich, Polen, Portugal, Rumänien, Schweden, Slowakei, Slowenien, Spanien, Tschechien, Ungarn und Zypern.

Bei Lieferungen ins Ausland ist die Bezahlung nur per Kreditkarte, Paypal oder ggf. Vorauskasse möglich.
Für alle Lieferungen nach Österreich berechnen wir eine Versandkostenpauschale von EUR 3,95.
Für alle anderen von uns belieferten Länder fällt eine Versandkostenpauschale von EUR 6,95 an. "

I guess you can order a pen or something.


No, fair enough. I wasn't sure when you said "deliver" if you meant literal delivery of physical product, or electronic delivery of e-book/audiobooks. In any case, it was not obvious from the website what the position was on e-books/audiobooks, but they did point me to some "small-print" (although I think it may have only become visible if I'd gone through the order process.

[Edit: by the way, the reply I received was only applicable to downloadable items, which was what I had asked about]

I haven't checked, but I'll bet it's the same for Thalia. (But they don't have as many books, apparently).

Can you order a CD version?


I think that may be possible for some books. Seems kind of crazy in this day and age though, doesn't it?
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