04:31 PM by Alexander Turcic in E-Book General | General Discussions

Do you find reading e-books to be "psychologically or physically habit-forming... to such an extent that its cessation causes severe trauma" (Dictionary.com)? Well, perhaps you're an e-book addict. In fact, The Independent depicts a case where someone's e-book habit had gotten so excessive that it became a very real, damaging addiction.

Page after page, chapter after chapter, when Lucy started reading she simply couldn't stop. She wouldn't sleep, eat or speak to anyone until she had completed the story. Then, she'd begin another one. Lucy was addicted to ebooks. At her worst, the 23-year-old student would spend 30 hours at a time alone in her bedroom, reading online novels on her laptop. Her head would hurt, her eyes would ache and the hunger would be painful, but she was unable to tear herself away from the screen.

A doctor quoted in the article blames the rise in consumer electronics as the culprit for this new kind of addiction.

"Whether it's ebooks, porn or gaming, a lot of these things are technology based," Dr Smith says. "This is about devices being in the home and being used in different ways while becoming integral in our lives as well. There's a huge difference between a BBC Micro in the 1980s and a computer with a mouse or a touch-screen. These things are much more pleasing to us and much more attention-grabbing. They offer a greater degree of escapism."

[image by Lily Monster via Flickr]

02:13 PM by fjtorres in E-Book General | General Discussions

From The Shatzkin files:

[T]he disruption, so far, has been confined to English-language publishing. In no other market are publishers and booksellers so obviously questioning the basics of their business models or speculating so openly about whether the publishing business we have known for a century can survive in its present form for another decade.

We keep scanning the horizon looking for the first market that will be disrupted in a similar way. We think we’ve found it. That market is Germany.

Amazon is growing like a weed and is the dominant online bookseller, despite their inability to use price as a club in the competition. One observer told us that Amazon is about 2/3 of the online book sales marketplace [in Germany]. That’s not as much as they have in the US and UK, but let’s remember they’re playing without their pricing weapon.

(Bold mine.)
Yup, Amazon can do just fine without discounting.

And a fact we’ve learned that made us gasp is that many estimate the sales of print online to now constitute 25% of the total German market. This was also hinted at in a Borsenverein report, but it didn’t seem to strike many of the local players we talked to with the same impact with which it hit us.

Just as overall digital sales are 2-3% but they peak at 5 or 10 times that for some titles, the 25% online purchase of print is also unevenly distributed. So it is likely that there are a lot of titles in the German market now for which half or more of the sales are taking place outside of the shops.

Not sure how accurate his read of the market is or how things look on the ground but I suspect he isn't totally wrong.

One thing he doesn't go into, that may factor in the disruption, is that German-language books, like English-language books, have strong markets *outside* Germany. While he is looking at Germany alone, I expect that German ebooks from the trad-pubbers and emerging indie publishers won't be restricted to the borders of Germany. Those cross-border sales should be an extra incentive for authors looking to go indie.

Again, I don't know how much difference it'll make but the numbers he cites suggest ebooks in Germany may soon be breaking from hobbyist/enthusiast territory into the mainstream, and every little bit should help accelerate the transition.

Does his analysis hold water?

[image by Pen Waggener via Flickr]

01:03 PM by Alexander Turcic in E-Book General | News

Just received word that the Sony Reader PRS-T2 is on sale for $99 on Sony's online store. Free ground shipping.

Perhaps it's just a random sale. Or perhaps, Sony's clearing inventories for the introduction of the much anticipated PRS-T3.

06:00 AM by Alexander Turcic in Miscellaneous | Week in Review

In case you've missed any MobileRead news from this week, here is our usual roundup:

E-Book General - News

• Barnes & Noble between Scylla and Charybdis
• Amazon's love-hate for Kindle porn
• Overstock to Amazon: "If they go to 10 cents, I'll go to 9 cents"
• Australian Parliament recommends consumers be educated on circumventing geoblocking
• Rumor: Next-gen Kindle Fire HD tables - specs are in!

E-Book General - General Discussions

• Reader poll: Preorders
• So, did companies give up on two page devices?
• PDF is not an ebook format!
• Taking e-books to the beach - share your tips
• Back to school? Guide to the right e-reader
• How Copyright Made Mid-Century Books Vanish
• Your local library and e-books
• DOJ: Let's force Apple to allow in-app links to bookstores

E-Book Readers - Android Devices

• Moon+ Reader Pro 50% off (Android)

E-Book Readers - Apple Devices

• Kindle for iOS 3.9 released

E-Book Readers - Kobo Reader

• Kobo expands footprint in Down Under

E-Book Software - Calibre

• calibre V0.9.41 released, includes new database backend for testing
• calibre V0.9.42 released

Miscellaneous - Announcements

• OpenInkpot section moved into the Archive

12:03 PM by Alexander Turcic in E-Book General | General Discussions

Remember back in 2011 when Apple bought the hammer down on iOS e-reader apps? Companies, including Amazon, Barnes & Nobles, and Kobo, were no longer allowed to link to their respective online bookstore, but rather exclusively use Apple's in-app subscription system (which, conveniently, promised the latter a 30% cut on generated sales). Well, perhaps Apple will have to revise its business plan in the upcoming days.

If it's up to the DOJ, e-book app vendors should be allowed to link to their stores again for the next two years:

To reset competition to the conditions that existed before the conspiracy, Apple must also for two years allow other e-book retailers like Amazon and Barnes & Noble to provide links from their e-book apps to their e-bookstores, allowing consumers who purchase and read e-books on their iPads and iPhones easily to compare Apple’s prices with those of its competitors.

In addition, the DOJ is suggesting that Apple should end its existing agreements with the five publishers it's accused of conspiring with and refrain from entering new e-book distribution contracts for five years.

[via TechCrunch]

[related: Apple eBook price fixing case going to court]

07:10 AM by Alexander Turcic in E-Book Software | Calibre

MobileReader Kovid just released calibre V0.9.42. It includes bug-fixes related to the new improved database backend (still in testing, following the link for more information), along with the following other fixes and changes:

New Features

• When downloading metadata from Amazon, convert the amazon categories into tags. You can turn this off by going to Preferences->Metadata download and configuring the Amazon source.
• Kobo driver: Add an option to modify the styling in books being sent to the device, based on a template on the device.
• Get Books: Add support for two more Polish ebook stores: cdp.pl and ebooki.allegro.pl
• calibredb: Add a new clone command to create clones of libraries with the same custom columns, virtual libraries, etc. as the current library.

Bug Fixes

• MOBI metadata: Do not fail to set metadata in MOBI files if they have EXTH fields with NULL pointers to a cover or thumbnail.
• Fix editing of book metadata failing when its timestamp is out of range for the system.
• Fix renaming a user category to the same name it already has erases the user category.
• Fix drag 'n drop of cover onto conversion dialog not working
• Device drivers: Explicitly fsync() all files when writing to devices, to reduce chances of file corruption if the device is disconnected while jobs are running
• Fix calibre not appearing in Ubuntu's 'Open with..' menu

Improved news sources

• PC World

03:18 AM by forumshrew in E-Book General | General Discussions

Just curious as to what your local library offers in the way of borrowing ebooks.

My hometown of Greenhills, Ohio library system allows up to 20 ebooks at a time through Overdrive, as well as downloads from Freading using a token system (12 tokens a week, left over tokens rollover for a month and then expire if not used). On Freading books are assigned a token value of 4, 2, or 1 tokens depending on various factors.

[image: Flickr]

05:52 AM by Alexander Turcic in E-Book Readers | Android Devices

There's a whole plethora of e-book software available for Android devices, but Moon+ Reader Pro may just be one of the better ones we've tested. In celebration of its 3rd anniversary, the software is currently on sale for 50% off. If you're still evaluating your options to read e-books on your Android device, you should definitely check this one out.