NY Times is completely clueless

[markbot]

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/06/te...rssnyt&emc=rss

This writer reminds me of Malcolm Gladwell. Say some controversial things upfront....have some crappy supporting arguments that only people who already are biased toward your argument would swallow....then pussy out and equivocate and totally destroy your original argument......in essence saying absolutely nothing but taking up my time.

[lilac_jive]

I didn't see really anything wrong with it.

[doreenjoy]

I think the author made a bogus comparison between Barnes & Noble and Amazon. B&N isn't in 2nd or even 3rd place when it comes to E-books.

[Sonist]

Originally Posted by lilac_jive

I didn't see really anything wrong with it.

+1

The article is fine. B&N has the potential to be a big ebook player, but are late to the game, and are not doing it right.

So, IMO, they deserve the flack.

[Sporadic]

Originally Posted by markbot

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/06/te...rssnyt&emc=rss

This writer reminds me of Malcolm Gladwell. Say some controversial things upfront....have some crappy supporting arguments that only people who already are biased toward your argument would swallow....then pussy out and equivocate and totally destroy your original argument......in essence saying absolutely nothing but taking up my time.

Originally Posted by lilac_jive

I didn't see really anything wrong with it.

[Ervserver]

the New York Times got it right

.....And remember, you can never lend, resell or pass on an A or B e-book. You’re buying into proprietary, copy-protected formats.....

[markbot]

Originally Posted by Ervserver

the New York Times got it right

That doesn' matter. if you've bought an ereader and downloaded books you know that and have self selected yourself into the customer base such that you are probably well off and/or don't buy/resell books....and/or the many benefits of ebooks offsets this limitation.

also, I should mention that you can actually resell ebooks on the Kindle, although indirectly,....that is if you sell the entire device, the ebooks will still be there and you can build them into the price of selling the kindle.

[krisk]

Originally Posted by markbot

That doesn' matter. if you've bought an ereader and downloaded books you know that and have self selected yourself into the customer base such that you are probably well off and/or don't buy/resell books....and/or the many benefits of ebooks offsets this limitation.

also, I should mention that you can actually resell ebooks on the Kindle, although indirectly,....that is if you sell the entire device, the ebooks will still be there and you can build them into the price of selling the kindle.

your entire scenario is completely idiotic thus invalidating the argument

[shallowgal]

That new buyer better read those books in a hurry, like before they re-register their 2nd hand Kindle.
Have to be a real fiend of sorts. A book fiend.

[markbot]

Originally Posted by shallowgal

That new buyer better read those books in a hurry, like before they re-register their 2nd hand Kindle.
Have to be a real fiend of sorts. A book fiend.

According to very reliable sources, the kindle books on the device aren't deleted when u reregister. thus, I am correct and u are wrong.

[doreenjoy]

You can resell a Sony with the books loaded on it, too. I'm not sure what that has to do with this discussion...

[shallowgal]

Originally Posted by markbot

According to very reliable sources, the kindle books on the device aren't deleted when u reregister. thus, I am correct and u are wrong.

I'll have to read the other thread here, since this seems to be off topic here.

But, hey, I can admit when I am wrong. Not a problem, most of the time.

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Mostly the article seems to make clear how little the author thinks of e-books from any company, not to mention approaching the subject as if A and B&N are the only e-book choices out there. Though it does point out differences between the two services, it says little of substance about them, or your real alternatives. To me, it comes off as kind of vacuous and pointless.

[pwjone1]

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

Mostly the article seems to make clear how little the author thinks of e-books from any company, not to mention approaching the subject as if A and B&N are the only e-book choices out there. Though it does point out differences between the two services, it says little of substance about them, or your real alternatives. To me, it comes off as kind of vacuous and pointless.

Mr. Pogue can at times tend to oversimplify things, and he does in this case lead with some of the controversial bits, but then isn't that typical of what's expected of a well written news article? If you're writing for a newspaper, you have to grab the reader, they frequently only read a paragraph or two, and then move on. I myself can go on too long in posts, and they can be bland, so topical brevity is something I tend to admire.

Mr. Pogue also doubtless understands that there is more to eBooks than Company A and B, he's written or contributed to other articles in the area. But I think he grasps the basics well enough here. We have one company, Amazon, that's dominating the eBook field at the moment, if not totally so in sales, certainly in interest levels and visibility. With apologies to Sony, in the U.S. it's just not very visible. No big screen variant, no cell phone connections, kind of yesterday's tech. And Kindle is very obviously a bigger part of what Amazon is up to than Sony's eBook readers are to that company. So anything new that comes along, is going to be compared to Amazon. They're the trendsetter, they have the mind-share.

The Barnes announcement, while NYT correctly points out is "not exactly" at the moment, stands out as being significant to me on several levels. Barnes clearly gets that it cannot sit out eBooks indefinitely. Time to start building the infrastructure and market presence. Borders of course stocked Sony readers, so in the Bricks and Mortar space, the Barnes announcement positions it to go after mind-share, and directly compete. Second, the Plastic Logic connection, while that's turned to the Waiting-for-Godot device, gives what looks like a very good hardware device a very-good backend bookstore to partner with. This pairing is of benefit to both. Think iRex (albeit with better firmware), for the prime example of what happens to good hardware without a good backend. Granted BN went the Sony route of artificially inflating its book count, but that's just marketing, harmless enough, presumably they'll fix that as time elapses. And third, the article touches on this but somewhat in another context (the BN Mac software is obviously not-ready-for-prime-time), BN got something very definitely right that Amazon still has wrong, the need to be able to read an eBook on a PC. eBooks need to be readable, anywhere, which means at least 4 platforms (arranged, more or less, in order of screen-size/portability):

1. Phones (iPhone, Blackberry, 3-5" screens,etc.) - Uber portability/convergence, but not the place to read War and Piece (unless you like giving business to your optometrist)
2. Dedicated eBook readers (ala Kindle, 5-13" screens) - long battery life with wireless download
3. Netbooks (with apologies to Microsoft, but 9-12" screen PCs, Apple's upcoming appliance)
4. PCs (Laptop and Desktop, 15-30" screens)

It is the last two where BN seems to have found a chink in Amazon's armor. Kind of surprising, given Amazon's obvious thoroughness in developing/buying eBook capabilities, and stated intention to go multiplatform.

I kind of look at the BN announcement as just their foot in the door, for now, but more significant in that what's a very big Bookstore presence has concluded they cannot let Amazon dominate the eBook field any further. This is a significant milestone. If there were any questions remaining, eBooks have arrived. BN will make Amazon (and Sony) better, the competition has been joined.

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

pwjone1, you know what?

You should've written the article. I got more out of your comments than Pogue's.