One of the biggest problems with the current ebook market is how difficult it is to find good stuff. So much self-published material is available that it becomes hard to separate the wheat from the chaff. Even the “commercial” ebooks section has become a problem. One of the main advantages of an old-fashioned bookstore is that you can browse a book, look at the cover, talk to someone, and try to get a handle on what to buy.
Flipboard is trying to address that problem. It has opened a 25 section category called “Books” that contains selections from the iBookstore. According to the Flipboard blog, each “article” will contain a quick link to download books from the iTunes store. I wonder if they get a cut from Apple or if they are just doing it to increase traffic.
To me, the most important feature is mentioned in the last paragraph of the blog, “Flipboard’s new Books category, with all the iBooks sections, are available in the local Flipboard Content Guides, including the U.S., U.K., Canada, Australia, France, Italy, Spain, Germany, The Netherlands, and Brazil, only on iOS devices. Tap the red ribbon and scroll down to the country selector in ‘This Week’ to explore books popular in any of these countries.”
Paul Biba is a retired corporate international lawyer who has worked in 53 countries. Since he is a very fast reader he came to ebooks out of self-defense in order to avoid carrying a suitcase of books on his travels around the world. An early ebook adopter, he has read on Palms, Pocket PCs and practically every device that has been out there. After being a frequent contributor to TeleRead.com, the oldest ebook/epublishing blog on the net, Paul became TeleRead's Editor-in-Chief, a position he recently resigned. Send Paul an email to paulkbiba@gmail.com
