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

[kazbates]

Originally Posted by zelda_pinwheel

i completely agree with that, but it shouldn't be too costly to simply add a basic terminal (any pc with an internet connection will, and i suspect most shops already have these for other uses) even if it means having to go through checkout. alternatively, even if they don't add kiosks, they could raise visibility of ebooks by simply indicating in the shelves "this title is available as an ebook on Fictionwise.com". this would at least have the benefit of raising awareness of ebooks.

what i'm hoping is that B&N will be able to get more content available digitally, since they must have a fairly long-standing relationship with a lot of publishing houses. in-store advertisising of ebook editions might be a nice incentive to publishers to encourage more ebooks since it's a nice form of free publicity for people who might prefer ebooks to paper books when possible.

One of the things I like about our local Borders are all the pc terminals around that let you search for a book. They give the location in the store where the book can be found or whether you can order the book directly from Borders. If B&N went that route, they could easily use them as use suggested, Zelda.

I like looking through the books I am thinking about purchasing to help me to decide if I really want it. If I do, I go home and buy it from Fictionwise in LIT format and convert it for use on my Sony. I don't mind plugging my reader into a computer to download (it gives me a chance to use Calibre for organizing), but I would love it if I didn't have to take the time to do all that converting.

[zelda_pinwheel]

Originally Posted by daffy4u

Maybe that's why Amazon chose Mobi, because it was already so popular. Was epub even around when they first started working on the Kindle?

that would make sense, particularly since they own mobipocket, *if* they hadn't modified the format so that it's not immediately compatible with other mobi devices, and so that drm-ed mobipockets are not immediately compatible with the kindle (user "workarounds" aside). i admit to being puzzled about their choice there. it doesn't make much sense to me in the long term.

[Moejoe]

Originally Posted by daffy4u

Maybe that's why Amazon chose Mobi, because it was already so popular. Was epub even around when they first started working on the Kindle?

Of course, the same parallell happened with music distribution to an extent. MP3 was the first on the block so it was adopted, then along came OGG and AAC. iTunes has some success with AAC, but it's by no means the most popular. OGG technically gives you more for less and is more flexible, even AAC is an open standard, but MP3 still survives despite it being a lesser format.

Fraeunheuffer (spelling?) must be jumping for joy at all the licensing

Amazon is not using the MobiPocket format. Currently awz-files happens to be the same as MobiPocket files but that can change anytime since Amazon has easy control over the upgrade of all readers for the format. I suspect we will soon see a change in Amazon books that makes it impossible for them to work on certain MobiPocket readers.

I used Mobi as shorthand because the files are so alike, and I'd hope that Amazon do move forward and adopt ePub, but I worry, that as with MP3, they have no incentive to do so. What they're using now seems to be working out okay for them, maybe they don't need anything more. What might happen is a continental divide, a kind of NTSC/PAL situation, where in Europe you have one standard, US another, Asia yet another format and so on.

We loose out of course, as always, with systems like this. Don't get me started on REGION ENCODING in DVD's

[cerement]

Originally Posted by mjh215

Wouldn't the "de facto standard" actually be PDF?

Unfortunately PDF is not an ebook format, it's a layout format

Originally Posted by mjh215

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.

ePub currently looks to be the best bet ...

But I still wonder why we had to create yet ANOTHER ebook format with all the existing ebook formats out there (everything from the current TEI Lite all the way back to grand-daddy standards of LaTeX (from TeX) and DocBook (from SGML) ...

[kazbates]

Originally Posted by AnemicOak

Probably a new generation eink eBookwise using epub with eReader DRM.

Although I've put it aside in favor of my PRS-700 that my family bought me for Christmas, I think my eBookwise 1150 was pretty close to my idea of a perfect reader. If it was a little lighter, used eink, and accepted more formats, I would definitely consider bugging the family for a new present!
Kaz

[daffy4u]

Originally Posted by zelda_pinwheel

that would make sense, particularly since they own mobipocket, *if* they hadn't modified the format so that it's not immediately compatible with other mobi devices, and so that drm-ed mobipockets are not immediately compatible with the kindle (user "workarounds" aside). i admit to being puzzled about their choice there. it doesn't make much sense to me in the long term.

The modification may have to do with the mysterious reason as to why MobiPocket still exists. Amazon could certainly have taken over and sold Mobi books as is. I still think there is some legal thing that keeps MobiPocket in play and Amazon with an tweaked version of mobi.

[zelda_pinwheel]

Originally Posted by kazbates

Although I've put it aside in favor of my PRS-700 that my family bought me for Christmas, I think my eBookwise 1150 was pretty close to my idea of a perfect reader. If it was a little lighter, used eink, and accepted more formats, I would definitely consider bugging the family for a new present!
Kaz

me too.

[tompe]

Originally Posted by daffy4u

The modification may have to do with the mysterious reason as to why MobiPocket still exists. Amazon could certainly have taken over and sold Mobi books as is. I still think there is some legal thing that keeps MobiPocket in play and Amazon with an tweaked version of mobi.

There are technical reasons. They do not want to have to be compatible with old devices. Now they can have books with large images. If the had used MobiPocket format then this they would have gotten a lot of complaints from people with Palm devices when the book did not work.

[AnemicOak]

Originally Posted by daffy4u

The modification may have to do with the mysterious reason as to why MobiPocket still exists. Amazon could certainly have taken over and sold Mobi books as is. I still think there is some legal thing that keeps MobiPocket in play and Amazon with an tweaked version of mobi.

Mobipocket as a distributor sells all books for full list price so that they aren't undercutting any of the sellers they distribute to. By making Kindle use azw instead of plain old Mobi they probably intended to avoid any problems that would have occurred had they had Kindle use regular Mobi and then been seen as undercutting everyone on price. Or something like that.

[Moejoe]

Originally Posted by cerement

Unfortunately PDF is not an ebook format, it's a layout format


ePub currently looks to be the best bet ...

But I still wonder why we had to create yet ANOTHER ebook format with all the existing ebook formats out there (everything from the current TEI Lite all the way back to grand-daddy standards of LaTeX (from TeX) and DocBook (from SGML) ...

I think it was desperately needed. There are too many formats, you're right, but what was needed was an agreed upon standard for ALL books, a ratified standard like they have with DVD/Blu-Ray etc. This standard is needed to prevent incompatibilities going forward. If you look at the specs for DVD or Blu-Ray it has suggestions for Codecs, max and minimum resolution, file structure withiin the actual disc itself. Without this there'd be no way to guarantee any ease of use.

Only 15.7 million for Fictionwize/eReader? Perhaps the company's eBook sales aren't as much as I thought.

BTW, I recently received a survey from Fictionwize questioning whether I was going to buy a dedicated reader soon and which one. Maybe, with B&N behind them, they can get their software on more readers.

[GeoffC]

Originally Posted by akira28

Only 15.7 million for Fictionwize/eReader? Perhaps the company's eBook sales aren't as much as I thought.

BTW, I recently received a survey from Fictionwize questioning whether I was going to buy a dedicated reader soon and which one. Maybe, with B&N behind them, they can get their software on more readers.

If my memory serves me correctly, there have been 3 (almost) identical FW surveys in the past 9 months (that have been emailed to me). The last one asked if I wanted formats for the iphone (I think)...

[GeoffC]

Originally Posted by akira28

Only 15.7 million for Fictionwize/eReader? Perhaps the company's eBook sales aren't as much as I thought.

Just an extra thought - perhaps FW are unwitting victims of the current financial turmoil?

[bill_mchale]

Originally Posted by Moejoe

The problem might be that Amazon's Mobi format might become the standard just by sheer volume of use. MP3 doesn't have the advantages of OGG or even AAC, but MP3 is the de-facto standard. I'd hate to see ePub ignored because Amazon got there first and made their Mobi format more popular.

I think there are significant differences between mp3's dominance of audio formats as compared to mobi's dominance of ebook formats. Part of the reason that mp3 became so popular was because of the easily available software that made it easy for people to convert their existing CD's into mp3 files. Pretty much by definition, nothing like that exists for books. Therefore, to a large extent, the Publishers still can have a major say in the actual format in which ebooks are distributed.

--
Bill

[kazbates]

Originally Posted by GeoffC

Just an extra thought - perhaps FW are unwitting victims of the current financial turmoil?

That was one of my first thoughts! What with the purchase of the ereader format and then the down swing in the economy, Fictionwise might have needed to be under the umbrella of a more financial secure company.

Of course, my husbands first thought was that B&N bought it to crush the ebook market and get all those book buyers back into the stores!
Kaz