• Welcome to BookAndReader!

    We LOVE books and hope you'll join us in sharing your favorites and experiences along with your love of reading with our community. Registering for our site is free and easy, just CLICK HERE!

    Already a member and forgot your password? Click here.

Google: We will bring books back to life

I fear the future of reading will be the tiny screen of a handheld device. The industry will likely feel pressure to go there (cut printing and distribution costs by oodles). Look at music, an industry that really hasn't cut its costs despite having its overhead slashed by who knows what exponential extent with downloading. For anywhere from $10 - $15, instead of receiving a jewel case, cover art, a booklet and a physical disk, you get a bundle of binary bits with a JPEG.

Big Money: 1
Consumers: -2
 
That's quite shocking. Given how often it was bandied about that Google was 'preserving libraries for generations' etc. Yes, how lovely it will be for those folks in 2300 who refer back to a digital archive to read "Murd n he rient press by gath hrist " no doubt they'll all be hooked into the Matrix and what not whilst nibbling on their soylent green but still, the data is only as good as the source.
 
beer good said:
For those in the US, the Google ebook store is now open for business. Any takers?
Click to expand...

Well, that sure is impresssive! And in multiple formats!

Looks like my average online ads from B&N and Borders, and the broad coverage is entirely unexpected. Much broader than I had ever realized.

I've started edging closer to a Kindle and am now starting to check each time whether the hard-copy books I buy online also have kindle versions, for the day when I might etc etc . . .

This makes it so much easier to check -- and feel wanted :innocent:

A huge step in the right direction.

Thanks for the post BG.
 
Of course, Kindle is likely to be the one eReader that cannot read books from Google's shop, since Amazon have their own format and DRM system.
 
beer good said:
Of course, Kindle is likely to be the one eReader that cannot read books from Google's shop, since Amazon have their own format and DRM system.
Click to expand...

Yes, correct; but in my enthusiastic optimism, just for the moment I saw the face of the future right there. And it was good.:)
 
I did see an article, yesterday I think, that spoke of Amazon/Kindle not being amenable to google's new venture. But if google does well, don't you think it likely that they'll eventually accommodate each other?

It would be the practical thing to do.
 
I tend to agree. One way or another, I have difficulty wrapping my mind around the concept of an "Amazon" book. I suppose I have lived too long with the idea of being able to walk into any bookshop and buy any book I want, irrespective of who the publisher is. When e-books get that way, we will have arrived, I think.
 
Peder said:
I tend to agree. One way or another, I have difficulty wrapping my mind around the concept of an "Amazon" book. I suppose I have lived too long with the idea of being able to walk into any bookshop and buy any book I want, irrespective of who the publisher is. When e-books get that way, we will have arrived, I think.
Click to expand...

Good point Peder.
 
pontalba said:
I did see an article, yesterday I think, that spoke of Amazon/Kindle not being amenable to google's new venture. But if google does well, don't you think it likely that they'll eventually accommodate each other?

It would be the practical thing to do.
Click to expand...

Practical for the readers, sure. Of course, Amazon's goal is to make money, which is why their devices only work with books bought from Amazon, and books bought from Amazon only work on their devices. So far their model has worked pretty well; they're by far the biggest e-book seller on the world market. Barnes & Noble wasn't much of a threat, iBooks wasn't much of a threat... Google might just do it. It'll be interesting to see what happens.
 
Not sure how to feel about the Google thing. I guess that author's group that OK'd this doesn't represent all authors.
 
As I understand it, the big problem is the fact that Google would essentially monopolize the market.
Chin wrote, Google's current pact would "simply go too far". It would "give Google a significant advantage over competitors, rewarding it for engaging in wholesale copying of copyrighted works without permission,"
Click to expand...
Google's standard reply to that is that they started in a garage and if anyone else wants to start in a garage and build a similar company they're free to do so.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top