Quote:
|
Originally Posted by NatCh
I don't think I'm following you -- I see the appliances as more like the PSP -- it only does one thing, play games, while the platforms, like PCs can do lots of things. The Sony Reader is mostly an appliance in that it mostly just reads texts, but it's also partly both because its Linux OS potentially allows it to do other stuff as well -- play mp3 and AAC podcast files, for starters, and maybe other reader software makers will release versions for the Sony Reader, as they seem to be contemplating doing with the iLiad. Then there are the applications that will spring up that we can't predict, but will love and wonder how we lived without ... which is where the hacking community comes in, actually ... and potentially increases demand, but now I'm repeating myself.  |
Well, when I say "platform", what I mean is that the company develops a piece of hardware not for the sake of the hardware itself, but rather to make money selling content for it. The old "razor/blade" model, where the razor is the platform and the blades are the content. If someone's making money selling razors, then they can make any blade fit in - in fact, the more blades that fit, the more useful their product is, and the more they'll sell. But the more common model these days is selling the razor very cheaply - for little profit or even a loss! Then you make money selling the user razor blades. Since users only buy one razor, but buy many blades, you make more money that way. But it also means that your razor had better only fit your blades, or else you might lose their business to a competitor.
Sony makes money on the PSP not by selling people PSPs (in fact, I think they lost money on them at first) but by selling them games. Or actually, by licensing the ability to write games for the platform to other people, who make games. But only Sony-approved PSP software can be run on the PSP... And Sony tries very hard to keep it that way. If you buy a PSP and no games, Sony loses money. On the other hand, when you buy a PC to play games on, you pay all the money up front, and then you can do whatever you want - buy the games, download free games, or even write your own.
The Librie was undoubtably the same as the PSP - the only content that was available was Sony-approved, and it probably subsidized the hardware to an extent. They weren't making an ebook reader, they were trying to sell you books. The early Sony digital music players were the same way; they didn't play MP3s, they only played ATRAC3 files that you could, conveniently, buy from Sony Connect.
The new Sony philosophy (speaking just as an industry observer, not as an employee... no one tells me anything about business decisions ;-)) is that content is king. That's why they bought the music and movie studios, and are working on expanding that. And all the other divisions work towards supporting the movie and music business.
Now, Sony doesn't have a book publishing business, and allowing txt, pdf, and rtf formats seems to indicate that they're open to other people's content being on there. But I'd feel more comfortable if the Connect store didn't exist. I'd rather my hardware provider and content provider be separate entities; that way I know they're not screwing me over for their own benefit.