Quote:
Originally Posted by sabredog
The Kobo in Australia certainly pushed the ereader concept along at a rapid pace in a market that had stagnated.
Prior to Kobo, almost all ereaders were limited to online purchase and cost three times as much as elsewhere. The exception was the Kindle, which still needed to be ordered online.
The Kobo appeared in a brick and mortar store, providing interested and casual customers alike the ability to gain a hands on look.
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Sabredog; I am woefully ignorant about the land down under. Amazon is obviously ubitquitous (with re: the kindle) and you can't throw a rock here in Texas without hitting a Barnes and Noble. Sony's a major force but always placed their readers from "slightly" to "outrageously" beyond the price point that most people would consider buying one.
However, Borders (aside from their web presence) never seemed to have the storefront weight that Barnes and Noble does...I grew up in Houston and can think of only 1 Borders off the top of my head (I'm sure there are more)...and live in Austin and can't think of any (once again, sure there is at least one somewhere).
Does Borders have a greater B&M marketshare down there? I'd tend to agree with you that even a scaled down ereader at $99.99 is a threat to Amazon and B&N worth their attention; but I think it would only cause them to shave a $10-$20 off their baseline readers...and then harp on the bedrock nature of the ginormous content they can always offer (interestingly, Amazon really didn't latch on to the second prong of attack since they have continuously thumbed their nose at epub).