News flash! Barnes & Noble buys Fictionwise for $15.7 million

[HarryT]

Gosh, you've right - I should have called it that!

[GeoffC]

except for the unfortunate addition of DRM ....

[pilotbob]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Gosh, you've right - I should have called it that!

BTW: Did jetbook put out an update that I missed to allow it to read mobipocket format?

BOb

[Alisa]

Originally Posted by zelda_pinwheel

i think for a lot of people going to a book shop has become about more than just finding new titles ; more and more bookshops seem to be adding cafés to their stores and people really enjoy browsing, getting their books, and then starting to read them right away while having a coffee.

for people without liseuses with some of wireless connection (remember, not everyone has or wants that) a kiosk or terminal would allow them to enjoy this sort of experience with ebooks.

I think this is more where book "stores" are heading. They'll be more like book-lovers reading cafes that will promote and sell books and other items that appeal to book people, hold events, and be a lovely place to hang out with other folks who love books. They might have some paper books to browse but if you want to buy them in paper, it'll be POD. They could carry a variety of lovely bindings, too. Personally, I'd prefer to get the few books I love in a binding I like then have the mishmash on my shelves now. If you get a deal on the POD if you bought the digital copy from them, that could help tie you into their store more, too. They won't be huge rooms full of multiple copies of books. That's just not necessary any more. I know it persists, but I think the days are numbered.

I think the kiosk thing is likely a needless expense. As a cafe, they'll have wifi and anyone who doesn't have connectivity on their reader can simply have an employee load their purchases. It could be integrated into the POS system easily. A few bucks for a USB cradle makes more sense than thousands for a custom kiosk. You could even have a single self-serve computer like they do for searching their stock already.

[zelda_pinwheel]

a standard format means a lot more than just being common. it means interoperability and continued developpement. it means a much stronger guarantee of future access to your files, particularly in the case of epub which is an open format based on xhtml and can therefore be read on any web browser even if you don't have a device of any kind.

mobipocket is admittedly relatively common for the moment, but that is already changing in europe, where very few new publishers are using it, the majority overwhelmingly are choosing to support epub.

that aside, the fact that it is a closed, proprietary format means that despite its current popularity it's not a very good archival format (i realise this is not important to you since you consider ebooks more or less expendable commodities, but not everyone feels that way), and it's not very futureproof.

in addition, even for novel-reading (which is the bulk of my library), the mobipocket format has some rather serious structural flaws and is inferior to the epub format in terms of formatting possibilities, meta-data possibilities, evolution possibilities, accessibility... and although it's a common format, it's not evolving at all ; mobipocket developpement has been at a standstill for years despite the many known bugs.

since epub can be converted to be read on any mobipocket device which doesn't support it natively, i can't see why anyone would prefer to *start* with that format.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by pilotbob

BTW: Did jetbook put out an update that I missed to allow it to read mobipocket format?

BOb

I thought that I'd read that JetBook now supported FBReader, which can read DRM-free Mobi? Apologies if I am mis-remembering that. Am I getting confused with FB2?

[mdibella]

Originally Posted by HarryT

We already have that situation with MobiPocket. It's not a "formal" standard, but every eInk device on the market except Sony supports it. Buy a Mobi book and you can read it on a Kindle, a CyBook, a BeBook, and iLiad, a Hanlin, a JetBook, etc etc., not to mention hand-held devices such as PDAs, mobile phones, etc, pretty much all of which can read the format.

Well, yes and no. Not every ebook in the Mobipocket store can be read on a Kindle, for example (which blows my mind, given that Amazon owns Mobipocket).

And Fictionwise sells DRM'd Mobipocket files but without removing the DRM, those can not be read on Kindle. Given the B&N purchase of FW, I doubt that's gonna change any time soon.

I really have a hard time understanding the marketing model here. EBook readers can't possibly be a super-high-profit item, since folks only buy one of them. It's the content, the books, that provide the profit! So booksellers should get as many readers as possible in people's hands, selling them at cost if necessary, and then compete for the book sales.

My gosh, I don't have to buy a new pair of eyes to read a book purchased at Border's versus B&N! Why should I need to buy a new reader???

[zelda_pinwheel]

Originally Posted by mdibella

Well, yes and no. Not every ebook in the Mobipocket store can be read on a Kindle, for example (which blows my mind, given that Amazon owns Mobipocket).

excellent point ! even within the supposed support for this format there are incompatibility problems. that seems pretty incoherent to me too.

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by mdibella

And Fictionwise sells DRM'd Mobipocket files but without removing the DRM, those can not be read on Kindle. Given the B&N purchase of FW, I doubt that's gonna change any time soon.

Hmm.. well, given the Kindle Serial number, you can derive a Mobipocket PID, and then buy DRMed Mobipocket for the Kindle.

I can't see that there's anything to stop (except possible support issues) Fictionwise accepting Kindle serial numbers and doing the conversion on their server, to make it transparent to the user.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by zelda_pinwheel

excellent point ! even within the supposed support for this format there are incompatibility problems. that seems pretty incoherent to me too.

One can say the same about pretty much any format. There are ePub books that the Sony Reader won't read. You have to distinguish between the format, and deficiencies in specific implementations of readers of that format.

[mjh215]

Wouldn't the "de facto standard" actually be PDF? I know since you are defining terms yourself to your own ends that you are skewing the meaning to relate specifically to mobile devices but the truth is that PDF is the most widely used format out there combined with the most platforms.

Even if Mobipocket is the "de facto standard", there is little reason to argue to support it as an archival standard. This reminds me of a recent conversation on VHS/Betamax, and quite frankly the argument for Mobipocket would be like those that argued for DIVX over DVD when it came out, and arguing for VHS would be akin to arguing for PDF...

I own a Sony and would NEVER argue for BBeB/LRF to be an archival standard. An archival standard needs to be open and (to reiterate Zelda) non-proprietary in order to be somewhat futureproof.

As for current buy-once formats, if epub is unavailable I would think LIT would be the best option.

-MJ

[pilotbob]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Am I getting confused with FB2?

Yes. However, I think they "said" there were working on mobi and epub support but I haven't seen any announcements that it is available yet.

BOb

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by mjh215

Even if Mobipocket is the "de facto standard", there is little reason to argue to support it as an archival standard.

Certainly not. I don't think anyone's ever made THAT claim for it. Mobi is a "terminal format", although it can fairly trivially be converted back to HTML + images. That's not a "lossless" conversion though - if you convert HTML to Mobi and then back again, you don't get back the same HTML that you started with.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by pilotbob

Yes. However, I think they "said" there were working on mobi and epub support but I haven't seen any announcements that it is available yet.

BOb

That must be it. Thanks for putting me right!

[GeoffC]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Certainly not. I don't think anyone's ever made THAT claim for it. Mobi is a "terminal format", although it can fairly trivially be converted back to HTML + images. That's not a "lossless" conversion though - if you convert HTML to Mobi and then back again, you don't get back the same HTML that you started with.

In what context do you mean 'terminal', Harry?