Barnes & Noble unveils largest ebookstore
Book retailer partners with Plastic Logic and Google to take on rival Amazon.
The world’s largest bookseller has taken the wraps off the world’s largest e-bookstore. Barnes & Noble (BN) announced yesterday the availability of more than 700,000 digital e-books, along with free e-reader software for the iPhone, BlackBerry, Mac and PC platforms. “It’s a unique every-device strategy,” said William Lynch, president of BN.com in a conference call.
The strategy is clearly aimed at Amazon.com (AMZN) and its popular Kindle e-reader, which I wrote about recently here, as well as the eReader from Sony (SNE). Like Amazon, BN is offering many new releases and best-sellers for $9.99. Unlike Amazon, Barnes & Noble will also allow users to download nearly a half-million public-domain books for free, courtesy of a partnership with Google (GOOG).
As part of the announcement, Barnes & Noble also revealed an exclusive agreement to provide ebooks for the widely anticipated Plastic Logic e-reader, an 8.5 x 11 device that’s scheduled for release early next year. (Plastic Logic uses technology developed by E Ink of Cambridge, Mass.) The deal started to come together in the spring after Barnes & Noble acquired e-book platform Fiction Wise, which had been working with Plastic Logic to develop an e-book store.
Plastic Logic vice president of business development Daren Benzi says his device is geared for business travelers, and as such will support the display of PDF files, Microsoft's (MSFT) MS Word, Powerpoint, and Excel, as well as newspapers and magazines. But ebooks are a big part of the game plan. “Will we carry every single one of those 700,000-plus titles? I don’t know. We’ll announce that as we get further along,” Benzi. “But we will have access to them all.”
Barnes & Noble first entered the e-book business in 2001, but as Barnes & Noble's Lynch and Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos both now acknowledge, nobody was buying. Lately, however consumer attitudes have changed, due in large part to bigger screens and increasingly mobile lifestyles. Wholesale ebook revenue exceeded $25 million in the first quarter of this year, compared to $7.5 million in Q1 2008, according to the International Digital Publishing Forum. “We see a number of [positive] indicators coming together,” says Benzi. “One of the factors is the Kindle; and Sony has experienced significant growth as well. But over and above that, the content providers are embracing new technology and new business models. Even some of the media companies are talking about investing in their own device. All the pieces are there to make this a vibrant and exciting market.”
The book industry seems to agree, and certainly welcomes a healthy competition among device makers. “I'm all in favor of seeing more e-books on more screens,” says Tim Sullivan, executive editor of Basic Books, a New York-based publisher. “And I'm pretty sure that an open format – which is what it sounds like Barnes & Noble is going to offer – will be disruptive to both Amazon and Sony,”
"All public domain books available electronically can be read, for free, on the Kindle. "
http://www.gutenberg.org/
They are 30,000 free books for anyone in multiple formats. I have mark twain, lewis carroll, jane austen, arthur conan doyle, lots of sci-fi, science, poetry , etc.
BTW Seniors and those with visual impairment find the iPhone much easier to use, they can easily increase the text size.
All public domain books available electronically can be read, for free, on the Kindle. Either e-mail it to your-user-id@free.kindle.com and transfer it, or use the free Mobipocket Creator to create a mobi formatted e-book and transfer that.
I dislike the large size of this device. I think the Kindle's ability to buy and download books and magazines nearly anywhere, with no regard for a hot spot, is going to keep it on top.
If the device shrinks to paperback size, offers superior file organization (perhaps if we could tag our books, or browse by genre), and has some kind of eye-popping new feature to get attention, then it has a shot. If it's a pale clone of the Kindle, it's not going to do so well.
I just wish we could get to device independence. I want to buy the ebook device I favor most (the Kindle for me; different users would have different preferences), then buy content wherever I like. The marriage of content to device is destructive to the industry.
Open format, public domain books, and navigation: ability to go directly to any page and to compare two pages simultaneously.
Finally, they are getting it right. Not only B&N Ereader, but also the Ereader from Ereader/Fictionwise will soon allow you to buy and download from B&N's ebook store (after next update). They have it covered, the prices are right, and the iPhone will lead them to win on this one if they stick with it (unlike the last time they tried this!). Excellent work on all parts!
I think the biggest part of this whole story is the "open format" piece. You just GOTTA know that Amazon and Sony would love to charge publishers to release in their proprietary format, if they don't already do that. Get an open format with a big name behind it, and publishers will flock in droves.
The MOMENT this happens, Amazon and Sony are in HUGE trouble if the don't follow suit almost instantly.
Ummm, you actually CAN download public domain books for free directly to your Kindle from a variety of sources, including Amazon's online store.
I tried to download some public domain books from B & N on my Mac. It was a pain! The documents didn't go the right folder on my system, couldn't open them, etc. If you're used to things just working (like iPhoto and iTunes), this makes you want to give up after 10 minutes of trying. I'll try again in a few months – maybe they'll work out the bugs.