04:23 PM by Nate the great in E-Book General | News

You probably remember the letter sent by Random House charmain Markus Dohle on Friday. He informed agents that the existing contracts with RH granted ebook rights by default even where digital rights are not mentioned.

The Author's Guild has posted a response to Mr. Dohle's letter. They take the position that he is 100% wrong, and the evidence weighs heavily in their favor.

The misunderstandings reside entirely with Random House. Random House quite famously changed its standard contract to include e-book rights in 1994. (We remember it well -- Random House tried to secure these rights for royalties of 5% of net proceeds, a pittance. We called it a "Land Grab on the Electronic Frontier" in our press release headline.) Random House felt the need to change its contract, quite plainly, because its authors did not grant those rights to it under Random House's standard contracts prior to 1994.

A fundamental principle of book contracts is that the grant of rights is limited. Publishers acquire only the rights that they bargain for; authors retain rights they have not expressly granted to publishers. E-book rights, under older book contracts, were retained by the authors.

There's no need to take our word for this, however. A federal court in 2001 examined this precise matter in Random House v. Rosetta Books. Judge Stein of the Southern District of New York was unequivocal in his 10-page decision: authors did not grant publishers the e-book rights in the old book contracts at issue. Judge Stein specifically dismissed notions, raised by Mr. Dohle in his letter to agents, that the non-compete clauses of these old contracts in some manner acted to grant Random House electronic rights to the works, saying that this "reasoning turns the analysis on its head." The court pointed out that the license of rights comes solely from the contract's grant language, not from the non-compete clause, and that non-competition clauses, to be enforceable, have to be narrowly construed. Using the non-compete clause to secure future rights is unsustainable. An appellate court affirmed Judge Stein's decision.

from:
http://authorsguild.org/advocacy/art...ve-rights.html

03:39 PM by Nate the great in E-Book General | News

A sharp eyed MR member noticed that Shortcovers has changed its name this morning. It's now known as Kobo Books. They also updated their iPhone app with the new name.

I was a little surprised when I looked over the new site. I hadn't realized that Shortcovers supported Adobe DE DRM, or that it had reader apps for Palm Pre, iPhone, and Android. Kobo also just added 1.8 million books from the Internet Archive to its store.

continued here

11:38 AM by Nate the great in E-Book General | News

A friend just sent me this press release:

Scribd, the world's largest social publishing company with more than 50 million readers each month, has entered an agreement with top global publisher John Wiley and Sons, Inc. to market and sell thousands of popular eBooks through the Scribd Store, Scribd's e-commerce marketplace. Wiley titles will include the For Dummies series, Frommer's travel guides and CliffsNotes study guides.

Scribd also recently signed agreements with Sterling Publishing, Chronicle Books and University of Chicago Press. They join the more than 150 professional publishers that are now selling in the Scribd Store. Sterling Publishing is a leading publisher of non-fiction books and a subsidiary of Barnes & Noble. Its multiple imprints include Hearst Books, which publishes popular brands Cosmopolitan, Esquire and Vogue.

from here
(Bookseller beat me to it)
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I looked through the Scribd Store, and the several books I checked all have Adobe DE DRM. No big surprise there.

11:03 AM by Nate the great in E-Book General | News

SEATTLE, Dec 14, 2009 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN) today announced that Kindle for iPhone App for iPhone and iPod touch is now available from the Apple App Store in more than 60 additional countries. The Kindle for iPhone App features Amazon's Whispersync technology that saves and synchronizes a customer's bookmarks across their Kindle devices and Kindle cross-platform applications, which include Kindle for iPhone and iPod touch, Kindle for PC, and in the coming months, Kindle for Mac and Kindle for Blackberry. Kindle customers can read a few pages on their Kindle, a few more pages on their Kindle-compatible device such as an iPhone and never lose their place.

from:
http://phx.corporate-ir.net/phoenix....306&highlight=
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You're probably wondering what took Amazon so long. After all, the Kindle PC Reader and the international Kindle both came out in October. But it's not Amazon's fault. The problem is with Apple, and how Apple allows apps to be made and distributed for the iPhone. With most any other OS (Windows, Linux, Maemo, Symbian, Android, Windows Mobile, DOS*), the reader software would be available everywhere you could download the day it's released. Not so with Apple.

The funny part about this announcement is that the app has been accessible since forever. All you needed to do to get it was set up an App Store account with a US address.

* There is something seriously wrong when a system doesn't compare well with DOS.

09:00 AM by Jellby in E-Book General | News

According to El País, the Spanish government has approved a reduced VAT of 4% for ebooks, the same as for paper books (compared to the standard 16%). This should reduce a bit the price of ebooks in Spain, but the real problem is the lack of ebooks at all. Maybe this will encourage publishers to release ebooks, though.

The article also says that the reduced VAT obeys to a EU recommendation, and announces the launch of the Enclave project of the Biblioteca Digital Hispánica (Hispanic Digital Library), which will supposedly be a portal for publishers to sell ebooks... Well, we'll see.

08:54 AM by anurag in E-Book General | News

This is bad news for S&S and publishers in general, because others big name authors are very likely to follow Covey in taking ebook rights away from traditional publishers and granting them to Amazon (and perhaps Google, B&N and Sony if they set up similar arrangements)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/15/te...amazon.html?hp

Ever since electronic books emerged as a major growth market, New York’s largest publishing houses have worried that big-name authors might sign deals directly with e-book retailers or other new ventures, bypassing traditional publishers entirely.

Now, one well-known author is doing just that.

Stephen R. Covey, one of the most successful business authors of the last two decades, has moved e-book rights to two of his best-selling books from his print publisher, Simon & Schuster, a division of the CBS Corporation, to Amazon.com for one year.

Amazon, maker of the popular Kindle e-reader and one of the biggest book retailers in the country, will have the exclusive rights to sell electronic editions of “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People,” and a later work, “Principle-Centered Leadership.” Mr. Covey also plans to gradually make other e-books available exclusively to Amazon, which will promote them on its Web site.

...

04:56 PM by Nate the great in Miscellaneous | Announcements

It is my pleasure to announce that members of MobileRead have now uploaded a total of 14,000 ebooks.

We shall celebrate in the manner of my people. Bring forth the finest cheese puffs and potato chips in the land. From my special reserve, I give you my best barrel of root beer. Eat, drink, and be merry! Let the games commence! A prize to the first to slay the grue!

A few key dates to put things in perspective :

• March 3, 2009: 10,000 uploads
• December 10, 2008: 7,000 uploads
• May 16, 2008: 5,000 uploads
• Feb 19, 2008: 4,000 uploads
• Jan 08, 2008: 3,000 uploads
• Nov 02, 2007: 2,000 uploads
• Sep 04, 2007: 1,000 uploads
• Mar 27, 2007: First upload

06:53 PM by Nate the great in E-Book General | News

There is an interesting article on Wired.com:

OLED displays are not just for consumer electronics. With a dash of creativity, they can be modeled into a nice dress. English fashion designer Gareth Pugh put together an outfit made of flexible OLED (Organic Light Emitting Diode) displays. OLEDs are gaining popularity because they are more energy efficient than traditional LED screens.

U.K. based company PolyPhotonix made the OLED display used in the dress that was shown earlier this week at a conference to promote plastic electronics. Plastic electronics technology allows circuits to be printed onto any surface and over large areas and is seen as a a low-cost alternative to conventional silicon-based electronics.

from:
Wired via Teleread

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I can't wait for this to be practical technology. "No, ma'am, I wasn't staring at your cleavage. I was reading your dress."