The Google Books system is now available for United Kingdom residents after what feels like an eternity! The company is now offering direct access to its millions of free books and its strong list of mainly fiction and bestsellers with Google eBooks!
Starting today, customers who live in the UK have the ability to buy the latest books by publishing companies such as Hachette, Random House, and Penguin. When you purchase the books they are actually stored in the cloud, so you can sync them to any computer or mobile device with your Google account. This is a tremendous boon for people who use smartphones or tablets in order to access their books and media.
Not only do end users benefit from the service being launched today, but publishing companies can submit their books into the ecosystem. Google has high visibility and a solid royalty rate to make money. Indie authors can also directly submit their books and not only have them listed on the main Google eBooks site, but sell them on their own website too.
The foray of Google eBooks into the UK marks the first true international branching out by the new system. Canada, Australia, and New Zealand should see launches by the end of the year.
Michael Kozlowski is the editor-in-chief at Good e-Reader and has written about audiobooks and e-readers for the past fifteen years. Newspapers and websites such as the CBC, CNET, Engadget, Huffington Post and the New York Times have picked up his articles. He Lives in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
