Barnes & Noble closing all ebook stores except US and UK

[EowynCarter]

Originally Posted by murg

Kobo at some point may make the decision to lock down either their devices or ebooks.

This is what B&N is currently doing. And see how well it's working for them.

I buy from kobo because they use ePub with adept.
The day they lock things, I'm not interested in doing business with them anymore.

[Calenorn]

Originally Posted by AnemicOak

...and
Interestingly I just noticed that B-A-M is selling old model Nooks now (Simple Touch for $40, HD+ tablet for $80).

Now that is VERY interesting! I wonder where they got those. Also wonder if they are new or refurbished. Very curious.

Very nice prices, too.

[Nate the great]

Originally Posted by Calenorn

Now that is VERY interesting! I wonder where they got those. Also wonder if they are new or refurbished. Very curious.

Very nice prices, too.

Probably from B&N in the refurb trade.

[Calenorn]

Originally Posted by Nate the great

Probably from B&N in the refurb trade.

I think so, too. That would imply a business relationship between B&B and BAM, at some level. Do you think BAM would want to acquire the NOOK store?

[Nate the great]

Originally Posted by Calenorn

I think so, too. That would imply a business relationship between B&B and BAM, at some level. Do you think BAM would want to acquire the NOOK store?

That would be the kiss of death for BAM. They're not very healthy either.

And BAM has long sold Nook hardware - since 2011, I think. It might be an off/on relationship but it has been around for a long time.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by Nate the great

And BAM has long sold Nook hardware - since 2011, I think. It might be an off/on relationship but it has been around for a long time.

They didn't have many options to keep a toe in digital waters; Amazon didn't start their B&M outreach until later and Kobo wasn't offering much.
White-labeling never did work, either.
Still hasn't.

[tomsem]

Originally Posted by Calenorn

Now that is VERY interesting! I wonder where they got those. Also wonder if they are new or refurbished. Very curious.

Very nice prices, too.

BAM has been selling Nooks for a long time. I've never understood why.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by tomsem

BAM has been selling Nooks for a long time. I've never understood why.

B&N was paying them.
Money is money, wherever it comes from.

[pbrown]

On the 7th August 2015, Barnes & Noble will close down all their ebook stores except for the USA and UK ones.[/QUOTE]

Hi All,
At the risk of sounding really stupid,............ what does the above statement mean- the e-book stores are closing?
I'm thinking an e-book store is nothing more than a website, therefore to shut down an e-book store (a website) in one country means the next customer has to type in a slightly different URL (not a big deal). Is it that big of a deal to type in "xyz.ca" instead of "xyz.co.uk" or "xyz.com"? It's not like the shipping is going to be more expensive- the e-books just get downloaded anyway regardless where the e-book store is located.
Am I missing something???

Thanks in advance,

[Nate the great]

Originally Posted by pbrown

Hi All,
At the risk of sounding really stupid,............ what does the above statement mean- the e-book stores are closing?
I'm thinking an e-book store is nothing more than a website, therefore to shut down an e-book store (a website) in one country means the next customer has to type in a slightly different URL (not a big deal). Is it that big of a deal to type in "xyz.ca" instead of "xyz.co.uk" or "xyz.com"? It's not like the shipping is going to be more expensive- the e-books just get downloaded anyway regardless where the e-book store is located.
Am I missing something???

Thanks in advance,

If you're outside the UK and US then B&N will no longer sell you ebooks. They may also disable the app remotely (if that is possible).

[SteveEisenberg]

Originally Posted by pbrown

Is it that big of a deal to type in "xyz.ca" instead of "xyz.co.uk" or "xyz.com"? It's not like the shipping is going to be more expensive- the e-books just get downloaded anyway regardless where the e-book store is located.

Am I missing something???

The British web sites do mostly try to stop me from buying their eBooks, and I honor that. This is because books are marketed separately in different countries.

I don't much like it. But I can suggest some more or less reasonable reasons. And I'll end with a totally unreasonable reason:

-- Some non-fiction books are held back from sale, typically for a few months, in a certain country, if a title on almost the same subject is doing well there.

-- eBook prices can be, and are, set higher where the locals can afford it (Australia) and lower where they can't (India).

-- Some countries (example: Germany) do not have a fair use doctrine, making it costly to publish nonfiction books quoting copyrighted materials.

-- Government censorship.

[dgatwood]

Originally Posted by AnemicOak

OmniLit
Weightless Books

I hadn't heard about those two. I'll have to check them out.

Originally Posted by AnemicOak

...and

eBooks.com

DRM-only. Ick.

Originally Posted by AnemicOak

Books A Million

If B&N is struggling, can they be far behind?

Also, as far as I can tell, they don't really distribute eBooks except for those coming from major publishers. The only ways I could find to get eBooks into their store involve either contracting with Lightning Source/Ingram to distribute the eBooks or paying for Books-A-Million's author services (where they produce the book). Either choice is very expensive for the limited benefit (forty or fifty bucks a book), which basically makes them noise as far as I'm concerned, at least with my author hat on.

Originally Posted by AnemicOak

Large publisher stores
Bookview Cafe

Those have all the problems of BAM, plus the added benefit of fragmenting the marketplace very badly.

So here's hoping the Nook and Kobo stores stick around for a long time to come....

[GeoffR]

Originally Posted by SteveEisenberg

The British web sites do mostly try to stop me from buying their eBooks, and I honor that. This is because books are marketed separately in different countries.

I don't much like it. But I can suggest some more or less reasonable reasons. And I'll end with a totally unreasonable reason:

-- Some non-fiction books are held back from sale, typically for a few months, in a certain country, if a title on almost the same subject is doing well there.

-- eBook prices can be, and are, set higher where the locals can afford it (Australia) and lower where they can't (India).

-- Some countries (example: Germany) do not have a fair use doctrine, making it costly to publish nonfiction books quoting copyrighted materials.

-- Government censorship.

But these conditions apply equally to paper books, and yet B&N are happy to sell me any paper book regardless of which publisher has the rights in my country (i.e. they will sell me the US Random House edition of a paper book even if HarperCollins has the New Zealand rights), but won't sell me the ebook version because I live outside US/UK.

[AnitainTN]

Originally Posted by tomsem

BAM has been selling Nooks for a long time.

Does anyone know which DRM BAM's ebooks use? Is it the same as BN, or does BAM use ADE?

[Apache]

Originally Posted by dgatwood

If B&N is struggling, can they be far behind?

Also, as far as I can tell, they don't really distribute eBooks except for those coming from major publishers. The only ways I could find to get eBooks into their store involve either contracting with Lightning Source/Ingram to distribute the eBooks or paying for Books-A-Million's author services (where they produce the book). Either choice is very expensive for the limited benefit (forty or fifty bucks a book), which basically makes them noise as far as I'm concerned, at least with my author hat on.

Far behind? I think they are in the lead.
Apache