The Digital Reader

Random House met with ALA leaders this week in NYC, and there’s good news and bad news. The good news is that RH isn’t pulling their ebooks from library distributors (like Penguin), or restricting checkouts (like HarperCollins), but the bad news is that they are also going to be raising prices.

This news comes amid reports that the ALA is meeting with other publishers over ebook lending. There’s no word yet on how those talks went, but if we use today’s news as a yardstick, my guess is not well.

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This week (and possibly at secret locations), top officers and officials from ALA meet with publishing companies Simon & Schuster, Macmillan, Penguin, and Random House publishers  in New York City. The announcement of these meetings has moved me to a place of cautious cynicism. As much as I had previously hoped for publishers to meet with the library community, I’m sketchy as to the possible results and benefits from these gatherings. [Read more →]

When I’ve written about piracy in the past, I’ve generally taken a moderate position because like many I do not think piracy is  terrible evil. Instead I look for the harm it does and I try to weigh the negative value of piracy based on its damaging effects.

I’m glad that I waited for evidence because it looks like there isn’t any. Today I learned that piracy isn’t nearly as harmful to the entertainment industries as some claim.

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Three articles have sparked my thinking on this post. The are:

• The Charlie Stross piece entitled Cutting their own throats,
• Joseph Esposito’s insightful post on How B&N Can Take a Bite Out of Amazon, and
• The New York Times article, The Bookstore’s Last Stand

Stross talks about how the publishing industry has allowed Amazon to use DRM as a tool against itself. Esposito suggests “B&N needs an MCI solution” while the Times piece encourages B&N to have a sense of urgency in avoiding the same fate as Borders.

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As readers of my columns know, Amazon is not my favorite bookseller. It is not because Amazon doesn’t offer value or quality service; it is because I fear Amazon’s attempts to monopolize the book marketplace vertically, that is, everything from acquiring and publishing to selling exclusively. Right now consumers, especially ebookers, are happy with everything Amazon because the prices are lower, the selection is existentially broader, and the customer service is great (especially as Amazon is more interested in market share than profit from the book division). But will all that change should Barnes & Noble follow Borders into the “I remember when” category: I remember when there was competition and prices were low and customer service was great — before Barnes & Noble went out of business!

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A rumor broke the week before CES that the WiiU was going to get an app and possibly a content store.  The rumor was rather thin but there was a mention of Nintendo possibly selling and giving away gaming guides as well as having an ebookstore.

Naturally I was deeply interested in the rumor and I made time to meet with Nintendo and get a look at the WiiU. CES is a few weeks gone now, but my impressions of the WiiU controller are as fresh now as they were then.

The controller is not an ereader nor is it a tablet. But I can foresee that if you own one you will do at least some reading on it.

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Did you catch the story on Consumerist today about someone’s Kindle that was stolen during shipment? I hope you didn’t take it too seriously, because at least half of the story is fiction. The tale told on Consumerist doesn’t match with what my experiences with Amazon.

I’m going to clip a couple parts of the story and then I will explain why I don’t believe them. BTW, I don’t much like Amazon, but I hate it when people make things up just to attack a company.

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