07:22 PM by Alexander Turcic in E-Book General | News

The NYT has an interesting write up on how Kobo is losing its race against Amazon to dominate the Japanese e-reader market.

Amazon’s victory over Sony and Rakuten, which got into the e-reader business when it bought the Toronto-based Kobo in November 2011, began with aggressive pricing. Amazon sold the Kindle Paperwhite for 7,980 yen, or about $80. Not only was its price about $40 less than it was in the United States, it also matched that of Rakuten’s Kobo and Sony’s PRS-T2. [...]

But Amazon wasn’t winning just because of price. It also gave consumers another reason to prefer the Kindle. “The reason for the Kindle’s success in Japan is the same as it was in America,” said Munechika Nishida, author of “The Truth About the E-book Revolution” and a technology analyst. “The Amazon Web store is the easiest to use, the easiest to understand.”

The current market shares according to Tokyo-based MM Research Institute:

• Amazon: 38.3 percent
• Kobo/Rakuten: 33 percent
• Sony: 25.5 percent

Many of you have noticed that Kobo is currently revamping its online e-book store. Could this be the key for a successful fight against Amazon's market dominance?

[image: Haruhiko Okumura / Flickr]

05:37 PM by Alexander Turcic in E-Book General | News

John Scalzi has taken the best novel honors at this year's Hugo Awards for his work, Redshirts: A Novel with Three Codas. The Hugos are given every year by the World Science Fiction Society, since 1953.

Winners of this year's Hugo Awards:

• BEST NOVEL: Redshirts: A Novel with Three Codas, John Scalzi (Tor)
• BEST NOVELLA: The Emperor’s Soul, Brandon Sanderson (Tachyon Publications)
• BEST NOVELETTE: “The Girl-Thing Who Went Out for Sushi”, Pat Cadigan (Edge of Infinity, Solaris)
• BEST SHORT STORY: “Mono no Aware”, Ken Liu (The Future is Japanese, VIZ Media LLC)
• BEST RELATED WORK: Writing Excuses Season Seven, Brandon Sanderson, Dan Wells, Mary Robinette Kowal, Howard Tayler and Jordan Sanderson
• BEST GRAPHIC STORY: Saga, Volume One, written by Brian K. Vaughn, illustrated by Fiona Staples (Image Comics)
• BEST DRAMATIC PRESENTATION, LONG FORM: The Avengers, Screenplay & Directed by Joss Whedon (Marvel Studios, Disney, Paramount)
• BEST DRAMATIC PRESENTATION, SHORT FORM: Game of Thrones, “Blackwater”, Written by George R.R. Martin, Directed by Neil Marshall. Created by David Benioff and D.B. Weiss (HBO)
• BEST EDITOR, SHORT FORM: Stanley Schmidt
• BEST EDITOR, LONG FORM: Patrick Nielsen Hayden
• BEST PROFESSIONAL ARTIST: John Picacio
• BEST SEMIPROZINE: Clarkesworld, edited by Neil Clarke, Jason Heller, Sean Wallace and Kate Baker
• BEST FANZINE: SF Signal, edited by John DeNardo, JP Frantz, and Patrick Hester
• BEST FANCAST: SF Squeecast, Elizabeth Bear, Paul Cornell, Seanan McGuire, Lynne M. Thomas, Catherynne M. Valente (Presenters) and David McHone-Chase (Technical Producer)
• BEST FAN WRITER: Tansy Rayner Roberts
• BEST FAN ARTIST: Galen Dara

Link

Congrats to all the winners!

[via Pat's Fantasy Hotlist]

04:43 PM by Alexander Turcic in E-Book General | News

Roughly one day before the official Sony PRS-T3 unveiling, the guys at Librista managed to get their hands on a retail package of this new e-reader. We wish we had anything new to report other than what we've already mentioned in previous leaks, but we don't.

At least now we have some very nice hands-on photos to look at.

Update: And now we also have a video. Kudos again to Librista!

05:15 AM by pdurrant in E-Book General | Deals and Resources (No...

Just a reminder that if you want to buy Baen's October 2013 Bundle, six SF/Fantasy books for $18, you only have FOURTEEN days left to buy it. The bundle will come off sale sometime on the 15th September, and the full bundle can be downloaded by those who've bought it sometime from the 16th onwards.

The total cost of the individual books is about $52. So if you don't already have any of the books in the bundle, that's a saving of 65%!

The books in the October bundle are:

• 1636: The Devil's Opera by Eric Flint and David Carrico
• Treecat Wars by David Weber and Jane Lindskold
• Worlds of Edgar Rice Burroughs by Mike Resnick and Robert T. Garcia
• In Space No One Can Hear You Scream edited by Hank Davis
• Swords of Exodus by Larry Correia and Mike Kupari
• Phoenix Rising by Ryk Spoor

01:40 PM by doctorow in E-Book General | News

[Moderator Edit: If you bought eligible e-books between 2010 and 2012, you're likely to receive up to $3.06 per book. For detailed information how much you're likely to get in the settlement, see AnemicOak's post, and onward.]

Original post:

No refund for me. My inbox is empty and sad.

Publishers Weekly:

Representatives from Rust Consulting, the firm retained to administer the settlement fund, confirmed to PW that 23,073,840 customers of Amazon, Apple, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Google, and Sony have been directly notified via e-mail or by postcard that they are eligible to participate in the settlement. That figure represents consumer accounts, a Rust representative explained to PW, not the number of individual consumers, as some consumers have accounts with multiple retailers, or multiple accounts at a single retailer.

Who is eligible?

An eligible consumer is defined as anyone “who purchased e-books from an ‘Agency Five’ publisher from April 1, 2010 to May 21, 2012.” Anyone who received notice by e-mail or postcard purchased at least one qualifying e-book from one or more retailers. The figures do not include Minnesota, which has a separate settlement.

More details on the settlement Web site

01:23 PM by Alexander Turcic in E-Book General | Deals and Resources (No...

There are many ways to get content onto the Amazon Kindle, but if you also happen to wield an Android device, the Push to Kindle app offers one of the most elegant ways to do so. Once installed, it hooks into the Android's share menu, making sending articles to the Kindle quite easy.

Available at Google Play, at 50 percent off the regular price (till end of September).

10:16 AM by WillAdams in E-Book General | News

Heretofore, the Cintiq was a graphics tablet w/ integrated LCD --- Wacom has now squeezed in a full-fledged computer (your choice of Windows 8 or Android) and battery:

http://cintiqcompanion.wacom.com/en/

Looks like the dream device for someone wanting a larger screen (it's 13.3") --- no word on daylight viewability yet.

10:13 AM by Alexander Turcic in E-Book General | News

It's been a long time coming, but word hit the street (in German) that Gembird is going to launch their EnerGenie ePP2 e-reader at the IFA conference next week. Actually, e-reader is not the right term. Rather they call it an "e-paper printer", based on its capability to function as a printer. It works by connecting the reader, uh, printer, to a computer via USB, where it's then being recognized as a printer. When you print a document, it will be automatically stored onto the device.

Down to the details:

• Display: 9.7-inch E-Ink, 1600 x 1200 pixels
• CPU: 800 MHz
• RAM: 256 MB
• Storage: 4 GB, expandable to up to 32 GB (microSD)
• OS: Android Gingerbread (2.3.4)
• Battery: 2350 mAh
• Dimensions: 270 x 188 x 11.5 mm
• Weight: 600 g
• Price: rumored to be around EUR 399 and EUR 499

Below is a video showing the EnerGenie in action: