Archive for Commentary
The Real Battle with the Kindle Fire Is with the Nook Color
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At the most recent e-Reader Conference 2011 in San Francisco there was one prevailing sentiment among all others. Major news media outlets are trying to drum up a Kindle Fire VS. Apple iPad debate, which is not really important. The big news that everyone in the industry is talking about is how the Kindle Fire will affect the Barnes and Noble Nook Color.
Doug Klein, the VP of Product development in the Nook division, sees the Kindle Fire as the primarily competitor to the Nook Color and could cut into its profit margins.
Barnes and Noble saw 1.2 billion dollars this year so far in Nook Sales and is considered an unheralded success for the retail chain. Part of the reason why it does so well is thanks to the female demographic. Doug speculated that 70% of all Nook Color users are females and they use the device to access books, magazines, and other content such as NookKids. The Nook Color is priced at $249 and is within the price reach of most customers looking for a device that not only can read books but can access most media in full color.
Doug Klein mentioned that the Nook e-readers are the most successful Android products of all time and the scope of sales speaks for itself. The Nook Color Android experience is locked into a custom GUI and UI and is not like most stock tablets that rely on the Google App store or other markets to pump content into the device. The company recently opened its own App Store earlier in the year that allows customers to download apps and games certified by B&N. The Nook e-Readers also use Android as the main OS, while most others on the market use Linux.
So the strengths of the Nook Color entail Magazines, eBooks, Apps, NookStudy, NookKids, and a deep content distribution system. The biggest con is that the device and all of the content is primarily USA only. You must have a registered billing and shipping address in the United States and the company does not ship the device overseas. The only way to get it is via 3rd party companies such as our own sponsor Shop e-Readers.
The Kindle Fire is also a full color tablet and is priced well below the cost of the Nook Color at $199. It also uses a custom GUI that makes the tablet much like the Nook Color in the respects that it is locked down to be a media/book reading device and not a run of the mill android experience.
The new Kindle Fire tablet coming out in November is poised to be one of the most successful tablets of all time. It is priced very aggressively at $199 and may get more sales because it is within the price range of the average person. It is designed in the same way as the Nook Color, in the respect that it is a locked Android experience and promotes exclusively Amazon products and services. Amazon has said that it is not going to lock the bootloader and will allow customers to load in their own applications. This means if you want a more traditional Android experience you won’t have to wait very long until someone roots the device.
The Kindle Fire may not have the deep magazine experience the Nook Color has right now, but Amazon has made inroads in securing the top publishing companies to offer subscriptions and single issues. This puts the Fire in direct competition because it intends on offering magazines at more affordable costs.
The big draw on the new Kindle Fire is the ebook, audiobook, and the cloud based solutions. Amazon has one of the best ebook stores in the world and has everything from classic books to modern day best sellers. It is also a nexus in terms of authors self-publishing, so you can easily discover new up and coming authors. Amazon does business with Audiobooks with audible.com and beats out the Nook Color for people who love having books read to them as they are driving, walking the dog, or doing whatever else. Some people just have a preference to have books read to them rather than just reading text on a page for a number of reasons.
The new Kindle Fire Silk web browser is also designed very well and will automatically cache the most visited websites so they instant load. This is very cool and considering the Fire is WIFI only and lacks 3G or 4G, it could provide a boon for offline reading.
One of the main benefits that will ensure Amazon sees a massive amount of sales is because of the international availability of its content. The company markets its entire content library to Canada, USA, Europe, Australia, and many more. This allows people to buy books, magazines, and soon download apps internationally.
Amazon also has plans for even more content as the Fire launches. They are approaching various publishers on a Netflix style ebook subscription service. They are getting resistance on that front because Penguin told us in an exclusive email interview that it “devalues their books sold on other platforms.”
So the Amazon Fire will offer magazines, books, audio books, apps, textbook rentals, video on demand, Amazon Prime, and a slew of other services. The company really does offer a greater media experience with its device than the Nook Color does.
Doug Klein mentioned that he is not worried about the Kindle Fire eating into his companies market share of being the second highest grossing e-reader line in the USA. He sees the Kindle Fire has a multimedia device and the Nook Color as a pure reading experience. The big reason why the Nook Color should continue to sell well is because “Barnes and Noble Stores are discovery engines, they allow customers to discover new books, magazines, and gadgets.”
The primary battle for LCD Reading devices this holiday season will definitely be the Kindle Fire vs the Barnes and Noble Nook Color. For the first time B&N will have serious competition on all fronts from its biggest rival. Amazon controls over 70% of the entire e-reader market in the USA and could make strong gains with the release of the Fire tablet in November.
The Battle of e-Readers in the Russian School System
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There is a battle brewing in the e-ink technology sphere and it is not in the American market, where over 75% of global e-reader sales take place. Instead, the newest version of reading is happening in the Russian Educational system.
During our discussions with executives at e-Ink and Plastic Logic over the weekend at the first E-Readers Conference in San Francisco, we talked in detail on the war being waged. Away from prying eyes two major companies are vying for market position and trying to land lucrative contracts in Russia.
The Russian educational system is providing an old west style free for all, that is encouraging many tech companies to vie with important contracts. Recently a top level decision was made to digitize the Russian educational school system. This has promoted companies to vie for contracts to be one of the technologies used in thousands of schools. This obviously means it’s a very important race to be the one to garner over a hundred million in sales.
Right now in Russia many pilot programs are being launched with competing devices to find the right solution. Different tablets and e-readers who have firmware geared towards schools are jockeying for position.
The two most important companies who have the best chance in being selected have a tremendous amount of experience and a solid management team to make it happen. Both Plastic Logic and Ectaco are considered the front runners so far.
After 4 years of trials and tribulations, Plastic Logic cranked out their first official device that is aimed at the Russian educational school system. Plastic Logic CEO Indro Mukerjee officially debuted the electronic textbook at an event held at the Moscow Planetarium during a visit by British Trade Minister Lord Green. The event, organized by RUSNANO and UK Trade and Investment (UKTI), highlighted Plastic Logic as an example of the joint technology cooperation between the UK and Russia.
Plastic Logic had a major investment partner earlier on in the year from a Russian company looking to make a play at the educational market. Currently Plastic Logic has a Research and Development business in California, an office in Cambridge, a manufacturing plant in Dresdon Germany and an upcoming major factory in Russia. It is the plant in Russia that warranted the investment to create jobs, but more importantly to play an important role in why Plastic Logic should be selected. After all, it is an compelling case during negotiations that the device is made in Russia, for Russia.
The new Plastic Logic 100 is the new device they are testing right now and feels very polished. It uses a new technology that is neither LCD or eInk, it uses patented PlasticPaper. Because the base is not glass, the Plastic Logic 100 display is large, thin, lightweight and is uniquely shatterproof and rugged, which is especially important given constant use by students.
The new device sports a 10.7 inch shatter proof screen that reads like paper. The resolution is 1280×960 and has 150 PPI! It has a capacitive IR touchscreen interface that makes interacting with it easier then most touchscreen e-ink devices. This is the same tech found in the new Kobo Touch Reader. It has a 800 MHZ processor and 4 GB of internal storage. Battery life will last about a week of constant use, which is fairly solid.
The operating system and firmware is designed to be a students guide. It has all of the features of note taking, highlights, book reading and study guides to assist in this. The firmware is obviously evolving due to the constant feedback from the trial programs and is being polished.
Ectaco has been making e-readers for a number of years normally aimed at the end user. Due to the competition in the retail sphere the company is changing their business model to be more education based. This has prompted the company to launch their own Jetbook K12 e-reader that is aimed specifically at the education market. It is meant to be used by students from Grade 1 to 12 and has a myriad of options to make it student friendly. It has many books and firmware to maximize the effectiveness of a device made for schools. They have also purchased the rights to the Hanvon Color e-ink reader to distribute it in Russia. This is the new breed of e-ink Triton which mimics paper and gives thousands of colors and offers high resolution for books and images.
Ectaco is making a play with a color and non-color device aimed at various levels of the educational system. The K12 is for highschool and middle school while the Jetbook Color is aimed at higher learning environments.
I have had the pleasure of having hands on time with both of these devices and Ectaco has a more refined operating system and firmware enhancements directed at students. In retrospect, I see Plastic Logic as having better quality technology and their devices feel more polished and hightech.
What about the international market such as the USA, Canada, and the UK? Where do they fall into the plans to get their hands on Color e-ink technology? Both Plastic Logic and Ectaco stress that Russia is the critical market and will determine whether they have enough resources to penetrate markets that have more money to spend but are harder to break into.
Daren Benzi, an Executive Director at Plastic Logic, mentioned that the reason why they are focusing on Russia and not other markets is because of the “Top Down” approach. Russia on the highest level of government mandated that they want to digitize the school system with tablets or e-readers to conserve on money in the longer term. This means there is lots of money, set in stone, to be allocated to the companies who win the bids. When you look at the American educational market it is not “top down.” You have specific schools wanting to make the change, and maybe specific districts, but never entire states or the country wanting to update.
A few months ago, Mercy Pilkington interviewed Governor Rick Scott of Florida about his proposition to implement e-readers and tablets in all of the classsrooms in Florida. “The decision on what devices to use will be left to school districts, with advice and technical assistance from the Florida Department of Education,” says Press Secretary Lane Wright. “The law allows districts to decide how they’re going to use the money required for digital learning materials, starting in 2015-2016. Districts will decide on which subjects and grade levels. Initially, school districts will only be required to begin buying digital instructional materials using 50% of the funds allocated by the state for instructional materials in the 2015-2016 fiscal year.”
Although specific states in the USA might be making moves to gravitate towards a digital experience, it is not a sure bet. If Rick Scott does not make it into another term in office, this bill can be shot dead. Until digital readers are decided upon, on a Federal level, most companies will focus on markets that already have these things decided from the higher reaches of government.
If Color e-ink by way of Ectaco and new tech from Plastic Logic are not in the cards anytime soon, where does that leave the market that wants color in their e-reading experience? When we met with executives from Liquavista and Mirasol over the last few days, they told me that we will see devices by the end of the year using their technology. Although both use different types of technology that is not e-ink, remember e-ink Holdings is a company offering screen technology found in the Kindle, Kobo, and Sony e-readers of the world. It is popular, of course, but there are other avenues available that been in development for quite some time and could eat away at e-Ink’s market share if marketed correctly.
Samsung recently acquired Liquavista earlier this year and this is why we have not seen their new Electrowetting technology in any products to date. I was told that “anytime you are acquired there is a always a long delay in manufacturing and management changes.” Obviously Samsung has perhaps one of the strongest companies in the world in terms of “the total package.” They make their own screens and components, and sell their items under their own banner. We could prospectively see some mighty new products from Liquavista that give us better resolution than e-ink and draw even less power, giving us longer battery life.
Mirasol based technology is another alternative that is coming soon and is developed in conjunction with Qualcomm. You might have heard a while back that Mirasol and Freescale had teamed up for an e-reader which was all over the news. When we spoke with Cheryl Goodman, who is in charge of Publisher Relations at Mirasol, she said that the e-reader was just proof of a concept to test the new chipset in their designs. It was never meant to be marketed.
The specialty of the Mirasol display technology is that the display does not depend on backlight, but instead uses the ambient lighting for it to show text on screen. In this respect, the Mirasol display can be considered similar to e-ink screens, though that’s where the similarity ends. While e-ink screens have the advantage of low power requirements, they suffer from the disadvantage of being unable to render color displays or support moving pictures. This is not so with the Mirasol screens, which can handle both.
The e-Reader space is too competitive for Plastic Logic and Ectaco to make a play for the Western European and North American Markets. So many companies have tried and failed to make an impress on a fickle market that is obsessed with Nooks, Kindles, and iPads. Many people wonder why color e-ink or color displays on e-readers are not a reality here at home. Hopefully this article has shared some insight on why the two companies are not ready to bring it over here yet on a commercial level.
Has Amazon’s Public Notes Gone Too Public?
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Earlier this year, Amazon.com launched its own social interactive reading platform, Public Notes. As the name readily implies, users can choose to follow other Public Notes users and see their highlighted passages and notes in the virtual margins for any book that users choose to make, well, public. The entire premise of social reading was conceived as a great worldwide web book club in which users who follow each other can comment on specific passages in the books they read and people can easily search for other users with similar literary tastes.
But as with all things social media, more connectivity was decided to equal more users relying on Public Notes for their social reading experience, a bigger-is-better approach. Once users linked their Twitter or Facebook accounts to their Public Notes accounts, their entire following or friend lists automatically became connected to their Public Notes friends. That wouldn’t really seem like a bad thing, to most users. However, the connectivity move was apparently made without prior information to those users who were currently signed up with Public Notes. Moreover, there is no automatic setting to enable users to not see someone’s notes.
Essentially, if two users are connected on Facebook, they are now connected on Public Notes unless they take steps to prevent it, without regard to their tastes in literature or their ability to string eight words together to make a coherent sentence, let alone to critique a book.
Admittedly, before Amazon forced the link between Facebook, Twitter, and Public Notes, it was difficult to weed through the plethora of Public Notes users to find likeminded readers with whom to connect. At the same time, how many different social networking sites can companies reasonably expect users to keep updating with the same names that have been in their Facebook friends’ lists for quite some time? Rather than cause readers to establish yet another social media fan base, Public Notes incorporated its users other accounts, like it or not. Apparently this was a little too Big Brother-ish for Barnes & Noble, who went to great lengths to stress to its customers that Nook Friends will not shanghai anyone’s friend list or followers.
The real issue of concern here may be privacy. On the surface, the gut reaction to this news might be, “Big deal, so the entire internet found out you read a book.” However, it would seem logical that there are books out there that readers don’t necessarily want their entire connected universe knowing they bought, read, and commented on, such as titles outside the mainstream in politics, religion, or sexuality, just to suggest a few. At this time Public Notes users have the option of not sharing their connections in their Twitter and Facebook accounts with Amazon, but users will need to correct the default setting of public sharing in order to keep their personal libraries hidden from the view of their contacts lists.
How My Buying Habits Have Changed with the Advent of e-Readers
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There is little doubt that e-readers have grown tremendously in popular and many avid book collectors are making the switch. Many people who own e-readers constantly email us saying the book is not dead and they continue to buy real books. This got me to wondering what types of books people are downloading or buying in stores.
In my current flat there are over five bookshelves that are brimming with dusty old tomes and first editions. Amidst all of my proper reads is a growing wellspring of throwaway books. These are books that are unimportant and take up valuable real estate from proper literature. In order to make every book count and to look good on my shelf, I have undergone a paradigm shift on what I buy in the store and what is purchased online.
Before I had ever heard of an e-reader, many times a month their was a used bookstore or a Chapters in my weekly routine. I tend to buy lots of hardcover books by my favorite authors or take a chance on a new business, geopolitics, or other non-fiction type of reads. I tend to balance out my most serious reading with some guilty pleasures. These are the mindless pulp novels that are slowly taking over my entire apartment. There is an invasion underway with zombies, wizards, and spaceships. OH MY!
Even though I love tangible books and will never stop buying them, there is an e-reader in my life because of the dwindling storage space for books. During the last year there was a noticeable difference in my buying patterns. I started to phase out the purchasing of my pulp or mindless zombie reads and instead buy them online. I tend to read these kind of books very fast and over the course of a few days easily finish them and quickly forget what they were even about. It just makes sense to buy these in electronic form and then delete them when I am done. Otherwise my shelf space would reach critical mass and there would be no room for proper reads. So my e-reader is normally equated with the throwaway style of book.
I started to look at my buying patterns and noticed that I now exclusively purchase pulp reads on my e-reader and more essential type reads in hardcover form. Purely for aesthetic reasons, hardcover books look proper on the bookshelf and paperback novels look cheap. I tend to proudly display my elevated taste in mostly non-fiction subject matter and take great pride in researching a good book before I take it home with me. There is also a fair number of friends in my life that have the same taste in literature and there is a fair bit of lending and trading going on. These are the types of books that I feel are very profound and are normally on my top list of books every year. Zombie and fantasy books? Not so much.
Even though I am addicted to my e-reader, I still make regular pilgrimages to the local bookstores. Something about a full store of people seeking to expand their literary horizons is intoxicating. I could spend hours just perusing the wide selection of books that are available and make mental notes to either buy this on Amazon and purchase this one today! Bookstores will always have a place in my life because they make reading the selection of essential reads a social event. Reading, by its very nature, is generally a very anti-social type of thing and I tend to balance it by surrounding myself with people who love to read in a retail type setting.
So in essence I am very selective in the type of book that I purchase in the store and tend to buy more trashy books online. I could never bring myself to throw away a real book, but it is very easy to straight up delete a book on my reader, once I am done.
I’d like to encourage all of our loyal readers here at Good e-Reader to share your situation on what you buy digitally and what you purchase in the stores.
Danger Puts The Role of Bookstores in Perspective
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An odd news item crossed our paths last week. Throughout the course of the rioting taking place in London, detailed news reports of the violence, the looting, and the police action have overtaken news outlets. Some have compared the rioting to that which took place in Los Angeles following the verdict of the officers who assaulted Rodney King. Others noted the similarities between the young people involved in the London melee with the protesters throughout the Middle East earlier this year.
One report that repeatedly snuck in quietly but actually speaks volumes is the news that extra police units were dispatched to protect the bookstores. First, it would be wonderful to envision uniformed men standing guard in front of the plate glass display windows of a local bookseller, protecting the wise old proprietor’s livelihood of meaningful tomes. It would also be a striking statement about the value of bookstores to the public, despite digital publishing trends and a flailing print book industry.
Instead, two major chain bookstores were guarded by police men who could have possibly been better used elsewhere. Were there ever any serious concerns that looters would stop reaching for the 42” plasma televisions and go after the hardback editions of Mark Twain’s long-awaited autobiography? Wouldn’t this be an ideal opportunity for hardcore ebook devotees to proclaim that such a show of force wouldn’t be necessary if everyone owned and embraced an ereader?
Rather than take a jaded view of the situation, it is far better to assume that the bookstores would have been damaged by looters just for the thrill of it and the police were standing blockade because books—in any form—are a vital part of society. Countless editions have been lost through the ages to wars and destruction, and in the case of the London riots, this would not be one of those times. Even though the books being protected were merely copies of current originals—not priceless, by any stretch of the imagination—the message was still clear: books are meaningful and treasured.
The symbolism of standing guard to prevent senseless damage to books is not lost on those of us who are reminded almost daily that our right to read is being threatened, either intentionally or not, by an abundance of entertaining electronic media, funding cuts to libraries and schools, even moronic, extremist book banning in our public education institutions by those who wield arbitrary power over curricula. As the world looks on while the rest of the city is trying not to succumb to violence and inferno, the books are safe.
Bookstores: Survival of the Fittest
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From the mega-chains to storefront hometown locations, bookstores as a whole are floundering. Some sites are even keeping a running death knell, announcing the demise of more bookstores almost every day. Borders is out, Barnes and Noble is still in negotiations with Liberty Media that are rumored to be stalled over a lack of reliable financing, and indie book stores struggle to keep up with Amazon and the digital revolution.
Some brick-and-mortar stores, however, are still thriving by adapting to the demands of a new market. Book Nook in Sylacauga, Alabama, so-named before the e-reader device of the same name, has maintained its hometown business by specializing in older collectible books, while Vroman’s, Southern California’s oldest independent bookstore, continues to attract customers coming with several author appearances a week, education classes, art exhibits, and more.
One of the best models of literary adaptation may have to be Canada’s Indigo Books, who has managed to maintain sales in the digital book age. From the start, Indigo worked with e-reader force Kobo, helping the digital leader increase sales from just over $800,000 in its first year to well over $60 million up to April of this year. Rather than fight against the trend towards e-books, Indigo embraced it, despite its origin as a print bookstore. They’ve also shifted some of the focus to encompass not just books, but toys, games, and soon, home décor.
At this year’s BookExpo America, Barnes and Noble’s Theresa Horner, VP of Digital Content, detailed how the leading brick-and-mortar book selling chain has incorporated ebooks into its in-store model. Nook owners receive special discount offers and incentives when they enter a Barnes and Noble location with their devices. In addition, Nook users can read any ebook in the entire catalog for free, as long as they are in the store; this model has taught Nook consumers that they still need the old fashioned bookstore, while translating into increased sales for B&N in products besides books.
As publishing industry executives continue to promise that print and digital will prosper side-by-side, this evolution of what consumers expect from a bookstore will continue to adapt in order to stave off extinction.
Nook Color Beating iPad in Key Subscriptions
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Apple made a few headlines this year with the anxiety over its app subscription model. Consumers were more than a little displeased to find out that their favorite magazines were costing upwards of $250 a year, the same as the newsstand price, to read them on their iPads. At the same time, big-name retailers had a battle of sorts with the tablet giant over the ability to send customers to their purchasing portals. But that’s not the real news behind why certain magazines are outselling iPad editions on the Nook Color. It comes down to simple marketing.
“The Nook Color has surprised publishers of women’s magazines like O, The Oprah Magazine, Cosmopolitan and Women’s Health by igniting strong sales that rival — and in some cases surpass — sales on the iPad,” says Jeremy W. Peters in an article in the New York Times.
While the iPad has been marketed as a combination do-it-all machine and grown man’s toy, if you will, Barnes and Noble took the quiet road with its target audience, literally. Commercials for the device, which has been on the market for less than a year, show women lounging on beaches or reclining for a few stolen quiet moments overlooking the backyard where their children play. The last thing Nook’s key demographic wants is an expensive device that lets you multi-task on fifteen different mini-screens at once.
And that price may have played a huge part in the higher sales to women. For a consumer group that has a notorious stereotypical reputation for not spending money on itself, the Nook Color was at a far-less guilt-inducing price point than the iPad, while still affording women the convenience of portable subscription-based reading and downloadable apps.
While Barnes and Noble will not reveal specific sales numbers for the Nook other than to say it is in the strong millions, several magazine publishers have now come forward with the information about how their sales are faring on the Nook Color versus the iPad. Magazine publishing families Meredith and Hearst are outselling women’s magazines on the Nook by an average of two-to-one over iPad numbers, allowing for the fact that some of the women’s magazines they publish are still not available by subscription on the iPad. Publishing mainstay Rodale, which publishes Runners’ World, Women’s Health, and Prevention, just to name a few, now reports that it sells five times as many subscriptions on the Nook Color as it does on the iPad.
L. A. Banks – Mourning the Loss of a Great Writer
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The writing community lost a dear friend yesterday when author Leslie Esdaile Banks passed away after fighting late-stage cancer. Ms. Banks wrote under several pseudonyms, including L.A. Banks, Leslie Esdaile Banks, Leslie E. Banks, Leslie Banks and Leslie Esdaile, simultaneously with five major publishers: St. Martin’s Press (NYC), Simon and Schuster (NYC), Kensington Publishing (NYC), BET/Arabesque (NYC), and Genesis Press (MS.). This post was published on the Tor website yesterday:
“Several authors have reported today that Paranormal Fantasy author L.A. Banks has just passed away. Banks had been fighting a battle with cancer for some time, one that she tragically lost today. Banks was known to the science fiction and fantasy community primarily for her Crimson Moon werewolf series as well as The Vampire Huntress Legend series. Under a variety of pen names, L.A. Banks also wrote in several other genres including crime, thriller, and romance.
L.A. Banks was a witty, upbeat author who brought energetic and strong sensibilities to her work. The fields of SFF and her fans will miss her deeply.”
Banks may have been best known for her paranormal fiction, notably the Vampire Huntress series and the Crimson Moon series, but also had several major titles in print in her graphic novel series of the same name. The author gained respectful renown for featuring a variety of races and ethnicities in her strong leading characters.
The writing community and publishing industry have turned out their support for Banks’ family and fans at this difficult time. Sites have been established where those who are interested can donate to help ease some of Banks’ medical bills, which was the only hopeful news behind her passing yesterday. Writers, editors, agents, and publishers spent much of yesterday on the various social networking sites linking to the fund that has been established.
Controversy in the Publishing Industry Over Digital
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GoodEReader.com has recently covered the ambitious and forward-thinking agendas of literary agencies and traditional publishing imprints that are exploring more options in the realm of digital publishing. Some major publishing houses are experimenting with no-advance ebook-only imprints, and several noted literary agencies are offering more digital options to their clients in order to establish strong numbers of books sales.
However, as we’ve reported in the past, self-publishing and digital publishing still carry the burden of a weighty stigma, especially in the eyes of traditional publishing purists. The negative perception towards indie publishing does rightfully stem from the unscrupulous vanity press models of the past, but even as more bestselling authors look to indie publishing that attitude has yet to disappear altogether.
“People often confuse an agency helping its clients publish their titles to ebooks with the agency becoming a publisher themselves,” says Deidre Knight, president of the Knight Agency, who has recently been the target of some harsh criticism in the debate over the acceptable role of a literary agency in terms of digital publishing. “We’re not a publisher, because there’s a big distinction between publishers and agents who promote digital editions of their clients’ books.”
The key difference? Rights acquisition. As literary agents, even ones who assist their clients in distribution of ebooks, agents cannot acquire the rights to the book and still claim they are not the publisher. One New York Times bestselling author and long-time client of the Knight Agency, Cecil Murphey, has eleven out-of-print backlist titles from over twenty years ago that his agent is now working on bringing to ebook. As Murphey retained the rights to all of his own out-of-print titles, the agency now has an outlet for publication that does not depend on seeking out a print-contract on worthwhile, albeit older, titles.
The other main difference boils down to the money. “We make the same percentage if we help an author digitally publish a work or if we sell it to one of the Big Six,” continues Knight. “This is just another service agents can provide for their clients in order to sell books and ensure the longevity of the writers’ careers. Agents who choose to explore this option are still making their fifteen percent commission on their clients’ work, but in order to justify that cost we absorb a lot of the upfront costs that would ordinarily fall on the indie author, such as purchasing ISBN numbers, hiring cover designers, and paying our staff of marketing people to promote the title.”
So why does it feel like a witch hunt is taking place in the industry? A lot of it may be the result of the divide that still separates the traditionally published author (often referred to politely as a “real author”) from the indie author. When publishers and agents choose to blur the lines between the two sides of the industry, opponents begin grasping at straws to discredit the professionals who are working to put more books into the hands of the readers and to further the careers of the authors.
Racing to Release the Big News
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By watching competitors play their marketing strategy games, consumers can make a lot of headway when it comes to discovering what devices will best suit their future needs. Sometimes these announcements are full-on press releases from major competing retailers, and occasionally they come in the form of a quiet stock market report. Either way, watching the major players in any technology battle can be akin to the head-turning antics of a heated tennis match.
GoodEReader.com released the news of the world’s first touch-screen e-ink device, distributed by Kobo, at this year’s BookExpo and IDPF Digital Conference in May. The next day, Barnes and Noble introduced its own touch-screen e-ink device and guess what? Ours has a better battery life. Within an hour of Barnes and Noble’s press conference, Kobo countered with an announcement that their new device is the first e-reader ever to support foreign language content in six languages.
Google made a huge announcement last week that it had partnered with South Korean e-reader manufacturer iriver to release the first-ever e-reader that would download content directly from Google’s nearly three million title collection, eliminating the need to download digital books and manually transfer them via cable to current e-readers. Not to be outdone in the breaking news department, Amazon upstaged Google by confirming a lot of the rumors that it would be releasing a tablet this fall. Google countered this eagerly anticipated buzz-worthy news story with the breaking developments that it had been selected by Pottermore Publishing as the third-party payment platform for all its online content, and that Google would enable account users to store the long-awaited Harry Potter ebooks, available for purchase only through Pottermore.com, in its cloud-based Google Books library accounts.
Much of the news coming from large companies, whether in the form of public press releases or side comments during unrelated conversations, is meticulously planned to coincide with what the other guys have up their sleeves. It is these rumors and releases that drive the technology companies to be constantly on the cutting edge, and provide interesting speculation on the parts of the digital consumers.
Amazon Publishing Keeping Its Distance from Indie Publishing
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Amazon has made some of the largest strides in ushering in a new publishing model, larger than possibly any other major name, adopting models for self-publishing print books through its adoption of CreateSpace. Amazon has three distinctly separate publishing models under its wing, with CreateSpace for print-on-demand hard copy books, a digital self-publishing model for ebooks through Kindle Direct Publishing, and in 2009 it took on the role of a full-scale traditional publisher, recently hiring widely respected former CEO of Time Warner and literary agent Larry Kirshbaum to head up Amazon Publishing in May of this year.
For all that Amazon has a reputation of embracing all things indie and digital publishing, today’s announcement regarding the hiring of Julia Cheiffetz, a former senior editor at HarperCollins, to lead as the editorial director for Amazon Publishing made it clear in no uncertain terms that this branch of the Amazon family is all business when stepping out as a traditional publishing model.
When Amazon announce the hiring of Kirshbaum on May 31st, many publishing industry insiders may have felt it was yet another nail in the coffin for publishing. Some felt it was going to quickly become impossible to compete against the finances and clout of Amazon, especially with the Kindle e-reader access.
However, in today’s statement that was emailed to a number of agents regarding the hiring of Cheiffetz, Kirshbaum made it very clear that Amazon Publishing is not just another avenue for independent authors to squeak past the gatekeepers of the publishing industry with their renegade manuscripts:
“Julia’s sharp editorial sensibility and devotion to her authors, combined with her passion for new technology, makes her the perfect choice. She offers a unique blend of an entrepreneurial mind-set built upon a strong belief in the bedrock values of traditional literary and commercial publishing,” read Kirshbaum’s announcement, giving much-deserved obvious praise of Cheiffetz in her capacity as an editor.”
Communiqués like this one may not seem threatening on the surface, but what are these “bedrock values of traditional literary and commercial publishing” that Kirshbaum openly referred to? Could he be referring to keeping out the riffraff, unlike Kindle Direct and CreateSpace, who both let anyone enter? While hopefully Kirshbaum’s statement was nothing more than a well-deserved praise for someone who did a stellar job turning out bestsellers at HarperCollins, it reads almost like an intentional separation in everyone’s minds from Amazon’s two other cousins to the publishing industry.
Why eBooks Need to Be Given Away with the Purchase of the Paperback Version
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Recently we wrote a news item on the fact that Algonquin Publishing is ushering in a trail program that would give people discounts on the ebook version of the paperback or hardcover. They plan on continuing the adventure by giving away the ebook for free with the purchase of the tangible copies. The success of these ventures is critical to the overall market growth of the ebook segment and could very well be the deciding factors for ebooks and e-readers sales to reach critical mass.
If you regularly keep up to date with ebook news you will know that Amazon, Barnes and Noble and most other companies that sell more ebooks then real ones. They publicly issue press releases on these milestones and it has stimulated the accelerated proliferation of e-readers to read the books on.
It is no secret that e-readers are quickly emerging from being relegated from fringe gadget to catching on a broader audience. Hardly anyone heard of the Amazon Kindle when it was first was released in 2007 and only a small demographic knew what they did. Fast forward to 2011 and you see commercials from Amazon and B&N, hyping the virtues of their latest and greatest ebook reader. Many major news companies have also recognized the technology and are seeing massive interest. The New York Times no small publication recently added eBooks – Fiction and Non-Fiction to their publication. I know for a fact from reading many different reports from think tanks that e-readers have caught on and are rising in popularity. Most people though, have absolutely no clue about the do and what they are.
In order for eBooks to really catch on with the public consciousness and in effect stimulate record e-reader sales is for the ebooks to be given away with the purchase of a new hardcopy. Book stores are the mainstay of entertainment and people love to read! Most people do not know what ebooks are and they will reach such a crazy level of exposure if ebooks were given away for free. Here are the virtues I see happening if more publishers follow suite from what Algonquin Publishing is doing.
Bookstores will survive – Retail chains like Borders, Angus and Robertson and many others would see new life.
E-Readers would get more popular – The more popular a device is, the more people want to buy them, the less it costs for the company to manufacture them, price comes down.
These are but two of the major benefits I see happening if the publishing venture comes true and more publishers are willing to give their ebooks away with the purchase of a real one. People would end up spending more money to have the hardcopy and the e-copy. This does not just directly benefit the bookstore segment but also the entire pipeline of making, printing, distributing said books.
Personally I buy as many real books as I do ebooks. I tend to buy elevated reading and very interesting books from the physical stores. I have lots of bookshelves and they are brimming with cool reads that I don’t mind lending to my friends. I tend to buy trashy ebooks that are quickly forgotten when I read them. Fantasy, SCI-FI and other genres tend to be the cheaper ebook version and are easily deleted after I have my way with them. I would be more inspired to have the electronic version of the book when I spend $40 on the latest hardcopy and then lend it to a friend and they lose it. Constantly one of the pitfalls of being an avid reader is that you end up lending books to friends or people who might be friends. Many times the book is wrecked, lost, incinerated, used for cat litter or what have you. It would be a consolidation if I could fall back on the electronic copy.
Can the Kobo Vox Succeed in a Market Saturated with Tablets?
Posted by: Michael Kozlowski | Comments (5)The Kobo Vox is the first tablet offering from Canadian based Kobo. They recently won FCC certification for their new device and the full specs have been prematurely leaked by Futureshop. Kobo is well known for their line of e-readers, but how will their tablet stack up against the competition?
The Kobo Vox will feature a 7 inch display and run the Android operating system. The resolution is fairly solid with 1024 x 600 pixels, which will give a vibrant experience. The tablet comes integrated with 512 MB RAM, 8 GB of internal memory, and 802.11b/g/n WiFi but no 3G. There also is a microSD card slot in case you need more storage power, while the built-in speaker will let you have a richer multimedia experience (as much as a single speaker is able to). There is a USB port and a headphone jack as well, though no microphone slot.
The price mentioned was $250 CAD which translates to $242 and would be hitting streets on the 17th of October, at least within Canadian shores. The tablet weighs a quite convenient 400 gms while battery life mentioned is about 6 hours. Needless to say, the latter aspect could have been better. File formats mentioned that the tablet will be compliant with include Adobe DRM, EPUB, and PDF.
The Kobo Vox is really nothing too special in terms of straight up hardware and puts it on a even playing field with the Kindle Fire or the Nook Color. The huge difference is the ecosystems.
Kobo has its work cut out for itself in the USA market where the tablet arena is firmly saturated and you don’t have to go far to buy an e-reader or tablet. 2011 has seen the retail sphere explode with every major store carrying a wide array of offerings. Best Buy, Walmart, Radio Shack, and Target all have a huge selection of e-readers.
Kobo had an agreement with Borders to exclusively sell its devices in their retail locations. Since the collapse of the company Kobo has really been without a home in the retail sphere. They really need to iron out a new agreement when their contract officially expires in 2012 in order to secure more stores to peddle their wares.
The Canadian e-reader company and bookstore normally does fairly well outside of the USA market where it is less competitive. Kobo has a strong retail presence in Canada where they are sold at Futureshop, Best Buy, Chapters/Indigo and many other locations. This was a good call because the selection of e-readers in Canada is very lackluster and normally each store may have Pandigital, Aluratek, and Kobo e-readers in stock.
Internationally, Kobo has been doing a good job at getting their brand out there. They secured deals with Swindon books in Hong Hong, Nigel R Khan in Trinidad in the last few months, and have expanded into Europe. Recently they launched ebook stores in Germany and in the last few days France via FNAC and will be selling their e-readers in a retail setting.
Kobo does a great job at the international accessibility of their e-readers and ebookstore. Its main competition, Barnes and Noble, only targets the USA where it is the number 2 ranked device in the e-reader product category. They see much success with the Nook Simple Touch and Nook Color but you can only purchase them in the USA and ditto with ebooks. Amazon has a bit better presence outside of the USA but they suffer from a limited selection in Canada and Europe, due to publisher restrictions. They have also done a good job at expanding their ebook store into Germany, France, and the UK this year. The Amazon Kindle Fire is going to be the largest competition the Vox faces for the next few months, although you can only pre-order the device if you live in the USA. There is zero international availability for the first tablet offering from Amazon. The Vox therefore has the advantage over both of these companies because of how easily it is available.
I foresee the Kobo Vox selling well because of their retail and distribution channels in many international markets. Many of their immediate rivals have failed to penetrate properly. Their entire book catalog is normally maintained and you are not limited to books purchased like their competition. They have a huge selection of books in English in all of their international stores with 2.3 million. Their new stores in France and Germany also offer almost 100,000 books in French and German.
The greatest strength Kobo has, in my opinion, is their social media approach to reading. Many companies offer Facebook and Twitter integration that allow you to share passages and update your status with the books you are reading. Kobo really takes it in another direction with their Reading Life and Kobo Pulse projects. Reading Life allows you to collect awards and achievements for reading and sharing them with your friends. Pulse is a very new product announced last month and gives you the ability to chat with other people reading the same book in real time via Facebook. They are leading the charge with their social media approach and many other companies could take a lesson from them.
Finally, Kobo has a ton of apps on many different platforms. Android, iOS, Windows Mobile, Blackberry, and others allow you to buy and read books on the go. This ensures you do not really need an e-reader to read books under their ecosystem.
Kobo is a distinctive company and plays the roll of the underdog in the e-reader arena. Their main advantage is their ecosystem and wide range of devices. Many of their competitors like Pandigital and Aluratek only sell the hardware. They do not sell ebooks or give you a personalized experience. They rely on pre-installing various Android or other book stores to give you the ability to buy books.
In order for the Kobo Vox to sell well they have to focus on the international approach. It is really impossible to compete against Apple, Amazon, and B&N in terms of hardware and ecosystem in the USA. Their products have too much durability online and in the retail setting. Normally the success in the USA makes or breaks a company, but Kobo does well at marketing their products everywhere else.
Stay tuned to Good e-Reader in the coming weeks when we get our hands on the Kobo Vox and do our standard written reviews and video reviews! We will also provide tutorials on library borrowing, ebook loading, and advanced features. If you want to ensure you get this in time for the holidays, you can reserve yours today on http://www.shopereaders.com