This and that, in no particular order. Mostly stuff I forgot in the ePub post or didn’t know while I was writing it or changed as soon as I hit the “publish” button.
BOOKEEN CYBOOK. I briefly mentioned this in the ePub post, but forgot to say that this is one that’s caught my attention more than a few times. It’s just that it gets overshadowed by the Biggies and I forget about it. eInk (therefore, no backlight–but you knew that), supports PDFs (don’t know about reflow), plays mp3s. Also supports Mobipocket, HTML, TXT, and PalmDoc. It runs $379, which is a bit rich for my blood.
BEBOOK. There’s a new little kid in town. According to MobileRead forums, this puppy’s got 30k machines in circulation (which I have no idea what that really means). At $349, you can add it to the eInk contenders.
BOOKS ON BOARD and DIESEL EBOOKS. I know I talk about Fictionwise a lot, but more and more I find myself going to booksonboard.com and diesel-ebooks.com just because their formats are easier to follow and I can find stuff more easily. Fictionwise is a nightmare for my poor ADD. So, hey, Fictionwise. Do something about your web design, because you’re about to lose a customer.
ESPRESSO IN-STORE POD. Behold: 
Coming to an Australian bookstore near you. Am I the only one who can visualize this beast in the middle of Wal-Mart and Target, Sams Club and Costco? I mean, this isn’t new news; the concept has been around for a while, but the machines are expensive.
Still, I’d think Barnes & Noble and Borders would find this to be worthy of early adoption, if only to reduce their stores’ square footage and associated costs. Why are you still sitting in that small box? Your cheese moved.
[Okay, okay, to be fair, PersonaNonData reports that they’re steadily rolling out in the US.]
As ebookie as I am, I’m excited about this thing Time called an “ATM for books.” Paper is still my first love, to stroke and fondle, to smell and behold. Uhm, paper prØn?
STANZA. I’ve been hearing a lot lately about this ebook reading software which runs (built expressly for? I don’t know) the ePub format. After preliminary perusal, we at B10 find this pertinent to us in that it offers ways to convert text to the ePub format and an iPhone/iTouch app to read ebooks on those devices. According to the website, it is also:
…the first program that has a built-in export feature especially for the Amazon Kindle. Your PDFs, Word documents, and other eBooks can all be exported to the Kindle’s native format and copied over to the device using a USB cable.
However, before we get our hopes up, Apple may blackball Stanza the way it’s blackballed Podcaster. Still, Stanza 1.4 (newest version) is now up in the iApps store.
So along with Stanza, the current state of publishing, the slow (in my opinion) early adoption of the Espresso by outlets such as Barnes & Noble and Borders, please simply add in the requisite anti-DRM rant–
Just how long until commercial publishers start using Stanza to sell and distribute their wares as nonDRMed ePub? And how will the terms compare to those of Amazon and others? (From the Teleread article linked above.)
This is where you start wondering where the Greedy Bastards went. Ban? Ignore? Flee? No! Embrace! Embracement = mo’ money. Where’s Gordon Gekko when you need him?
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I think Espresso will make a big splash, but I see it more as an airport success — like how Penguin first moved mountains putting vending machines in train stations.
And a future version will manage the same miracle at a lower initial price (that is, price for the machine).
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Score! Didn’t think about that; I was thinking “mall kiosk” (showing my age), but around here, the mall is pretty much dead. (I wonder where teenagers go now?)
I believe I read somewhere they build them one at a time versus assembly line. That may be a chicken’n’egg problem that’ll get solved with demand.
Thanks, James and thanks for checking it out.
I saw your URL in my stats and wondered the same thing about you. 🙂
The teens are busy texting, x-boxing, and going to Sbux.
“Still, I’d think Barnes & Noble and Borders would find this to be worthy of early adoption, if only to reduce their stores’ square footage and associated costs. Why are you still sitting in that small box? Your cheese moved.”
bwahahahaha yeah, no kidding.
I love the ATM book machine idea! LOVE LOVE LOVE it!
It’ll happen. I predict either Wal-Mart or Target will do it first.
Because why would the publishing industry do anything, you know, innovative?
bwahahahahahahahaha
Rock on! I just blogged about this myself and had to hop on over to give you major kudos and a nod of my head.
They need to get this machine in stores like yesterday. The NY Library and the University of Michigan already has this as well as the Aussie book chains and it made an appearance at a recent SF con. Why the heck don’t we have this yet in bookstores? And make it compatible with ebooks while they’re at it.
I think as one author recently said, this is going to come about because of individuals and most likely individuals who are readers. It’ll probably show up in those niche stores who know how to make their customers happy (Poisoned Pen for one). Because the pub industry just doesn’t get it. :-/
Awesome blog you have here. I may have to drop by more often! 🙂
I’m actually glad that this little “black October” for publishing happened. It may force them to take a good long look at the consignment system.
There are way too many people wrapped up in consignment. If one CEO from one publisher (you know, one of the four or five that are making a profit) had the fortitude to say, “No, Borders, we AREN’T going to send you more books until you pay us and we AREN’T going to take back what you sent”–which he would have had to justify to his stockholders for the loss–
–it would have taken one quarter for him to take the hit, and then the rest of publishing would have followed suit and/or Borders would have ponied up the money.
It’s going to take someone with some seriously cast-iron balls to break this thing open.
Nope. Innovators, they ain’t.
–it would have taken one quarter for him to take the hit, and then the rest of publishing would have followed suit and/or Borders would have ponied up the money.
It’s going to take someone with some seriously cast-iron balls to break this thing opened.-
But then they’d get the title of Cast Iron Balls and *whew* that’s quite a title. =D
I had no idea about the printer thingie. And now I REALLY can’t fathom why they are setting these things up everywhere. More $ for them-more for the author, everyone’s happy CHAMPAGNE for all! Granted, like you said it’s take a quarter suck up, but then they’d get the blood sucking monster off their backs.
Well, one very practical reason is because the machines take a long time to manufacture. But there’s nothing saying they couldn’t put up a cardboard cutout and say, “Coming in Month/Year!” and totally market the hell out of it.
How long do they take to print a book? Would you have people in lines getting pissed? Maybe start with a smaller print run and then fill gaps with the machines at srategic places.
I don’t remember precisely, but it seems I remember something like 7 to 15 minutes, depending on the length of the book.
I was thinking one of these machines would work wonderfully in a coffee shop.
Order your book. Order your sandwich and coffee.
15 minutes later, hot coffee, sandwich, and hot book. Right off the press.
Like the Jetson’s go to the coffee shop.