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Well, I don't think any online store has in any way "cracked it" as far as creating a decent shopping/browsing experience.
There's a rather large amount of online bookstores out there, and very little to distinguish them. Cost is directly comparible, there's no delivery fees so there's little to separate shops. Geographic location makes no difference either, my native language is English, but I don't complain too much about American English books. As well as that the urge to pay for books I would expect, along with MP3s isn't strong, so to beat piracy then like MP3s the retailer has to make it easier and more pleasant to buy books for a painless price than "steal" them.
As to how you could distinguish yourself... I guess the only thing I can think of is some kind of flash application where you can "see" a bookshelf, and see the spines of the books (at a readable resolution). It would have to be mostly preloaded or at least loading the next shelves in the background so that it's fast. Use the mouse to "grab" a book out and see the cover, and the back cover for the standard blurb about it, and price.
I dunno if that'd be possible, or if it'd work, but frankly browsing online bookstores is crap compared to wandering around in a real shop.
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