Introducing Bookish-A New Website from Hachette, Penguin and Simon & Schuster

[goldilocks]

Received an email about an hour ago from Hachette Book Group

Here's the link if anyone wants to check it out:

http://www.bookish.com/home

Karen

[pidgeon92]

Here's an interesting blog post about the new site:

http://www.the-digital-reader.com/20...s-bookishs-tos

[jgaiser]

And of course no ebooks available - at least the books I looked at.

[AnemicOak]

Originally Posted by jgaiser

And of course no ebooks available - at least the books I looked at.

I only looked at 1222 by Anne Holt, but it had an eBook listed (or maybe you meant having the eBook for sale right on the BookIsh site). B&N's gotta love that the link to them under 'other stores' took me to Amazon though.


As I said on Nate's blog though the prices and formats on the right side of the screen are to big and in your face for me. A subtle link or button to click for more info on buying instead of making me feel like I just walked onto a used car lot with the prices written on the windshields would be better IMO.

[Elfwreck]

LotR costs more in ebook than in paperback. Always a delight to see such clever marketing decisions.

[avantman42]

They don't appear to have a mobile-friendly version of the site, or if they do, they don't redirect mobile browsers to it. It's all but impossible to use the site on my phone

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by avantman42

They don't appear to have a mobile-friendly version of the site, or if they do, they don't redirect mobile browsers to it. It's all but impossible to use the site on my phone

That seems to be silly oversight, considering the times...

[jgaiser]

Originally Posted by AnemicOak

I only looked at 1222 by Anne Holt, but it had an eBook listed (or maybe you meant having the eBook for sale right on the BookIsh site). B&N's gotta love that the link to them under 'other stores' took me to Amazon though.

Yeah.. I meant on the site. No indication that anything exists except hardback and paperback. And my Firefox doesn't like the site. It could be because of the adblock/ghostery plugins because chrome does work (no plugins in it). Not a site that will see much use from me.

[caleb72]

Originally Posted by avantman42

They don't appear to have a mobile-friendly version of the site, or if they do, they don't redirect mobile browsers to it. It's all but impossible to use the site on my phone

I'm shocked - publishers are usually at the cutting edge.

[Fbone]

Originally Posted by jgaiser

Yeah.. I meant on the site. No indication that anything exists except hardback and paperback. And my Firefox doesn't like the site. It could be because of the adblock/ghostery plugins because chrome does work (no plugins in it). Not a site that will see much use from me.

The site doesn't work fully for me either. Firefox with everything blocked including affiliate links.

[teh603]

Originally Posted by pidgeon92

Here's an interesting blog post about the new site:

http://www.the-digital-reader.com/20...s-bookishs-tos

Wow, so Penguin got Hachette and S&S in on the "let's not allow any negative reviews" bandwagon. What next, the whole Big Four deciding to go into the vanity self-pub business?

(intended as sarcasm, not prophesy)

[CWatkinsNash]

Originally Posted by teh603

(intended as sarcasm, not prophesy)

Probably wouldn't be the first time a statement about the BPHs turned out to be both.

I think the site is okay. Since I signed up for the beta thing, I got an email when it went live. Which is good, because I had totally forgotten about it. Some of the authors I follow are on imprints from those three, and it is kind of nice to have somewhere to find a list retail links that actually seem to work. It's attractive, has moderately interesting content. Haven't added any books to my list thingies so I don't know if the recommendation feature is worth anything yet.

They need to get more samples going. For any book with an ebook available, there's really no excuse for not having a sample available. I like that their samples open in an overlay window that fits on my laptop screen nicely and seems to work well, unlike sites that seem to have chosen completely arbitrary dimensions for their online preview. (I'm looking at you, Amazon, with your too-tall "look inside" feature.)

Within the next couple of days I will try their Android reader app on my tablet.

[avantman42]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

That seems to be silly oversight, considering the times...

Yes. I can't remember where I saw it, but I read a while ago that something like 20% of all internet traffic is mobile, and the figure is going up rapidly. I'd have thought that a site that sells ebooks would get more than the average amount of mobile traffic, as people look for things to read on their phones & ereaders.

I left feedback about it (not easy on a phone), and got a response this morning, which says:

Hello Russ,

Thank you for your feedback. We appreciate customer input regarding new features and changes to our web site.

This problem will be forwarded to our Bookish Team for investigation.

Best Regards,

ChristineSupport

Nothing really surprising or notable, but I do wonder why the name isn't just "Christine" or even "Christine (Support)". The use of CamelCase in this context looks odd to me.

[meeera]

Well, that's confusing. I thought this thread was going to be talking about major* Australian ebook site Booki.sh, which has been around for several years.


* unfortunately, as it's a technological clusterflop of a site.

ETA: So. They spent all that extra time vetting and re-vetting the TOS, supposedly, and yet they ended up with this?

"Your User Content may not include any negative comments that are connected to race, national origin, religion, gender, sexual orientation or physical handicap ".

[But mental illness and intellectual disability is fair game? Someone really didn't think this through.]

[tubemonkey]

Originally Posted by caleb72

I'm shocked - publishers are usually at the cutting edge.