The e-book debacle: Debate over causes: Hardware vs. other factors

[Archived in Entry]

[TeleRead: Bring the E-Books Home] With e-books still in major trouble, people on the eBook Community list are looking for explanations. Some blame high prices and lack of availability of big-name titles. Others see hardware as the problem. I say it’s a mix of the DRM mess, the Tower of eBabel, other complexity, high prices, some big commercial titles’ being AWOL from e-bookdom, and less-than-perfect hardware. Luckily screens and other parts should get much better in time. Reminder: The industry is a fast-grower, but is still a major underperformer compared to preductions-with less than $50 million in global sales, compared to the tens of billions of p-book sales. And the possible troubles of eBookAd could be just one more example why the hype is so wrong...

Some slightly related from Technorati and Google.

TeleRead: Bring the E-Books Home: Which does Microsoft want? Napoleonic control of a pigmy-sized e-book market? Or more revenue--from more sales of OSes for the Smartphone and the Tablet PC, all of which would fare better if e-books took off? More than half a dozen years after Microsoft and friends unveiled the now-misleadingly named Open eBook Forum, while explicitly advocating open standards at the consumer level, it's time to return to the old-time religion espoused by Dick Brass and former Microsoft e-book director Steve Stone.

TeleRead: Bring the E-Books Home: J.D. also writes: "I'm not sure what John Dean's position is, but Howard Dean has said on Larry Lessig's blog that he's sensitive to the digital rights community on these issues." To go into the "last I knew" mode, I was underwhelmed when Dean said in the Lessig blog: "No matter what the issues are that we as individuals care most about--whether intellectual property, healthy care, the environment--I believe that the only way we are ever going to come to a real solution on any of these issues is if we all stand together against the special interests in Washington." Some might be happy with that as a display of sensitivity, but, especially in the context of the Lessig blog, I'd more seriously take something like: "I want to fight for the repeal or extensive modification of the DMCA. And here are the specifics." That would be a real display of guts. All politicians say they are against special interests--nothing exciting there.

TeleRead: Bring the E-Books Home: Palm's tiny hand-held organizers fill that need. [Lisa Charters, online sales VP for Random House, Canada, Ltd.] said they have emerged as the most popular tool for reading e-books because millions are in use around the world and it is easy to download an e-book into their memory ready for the downtown commute, the cottage weekend, the beach or just cuddling up in bed.So, dear readers, how long until OeB renames itself The Proprietary Format Promoters' Association? It's been said that the PeBF is "agnostic" about a standard consumer-level format for e-books. My own description would be a tad different, "aggressively apathetic." That could change, of course, and TeleRead intends to keep pressing for a Universal Consumer eBook Format, John Noring's phrase.

TeleRead: Bring the E-Books Home: Infants would get their first book at the hospitals where they are born, and parents would then have to register to receive age-appropriate books each month for kids through age 5. Families would choose books from a list compiled by educators and early-childhood experts for the Dollywood Foundation of Tennessee, which has targeted literacy, said gubernatorial spokeswoman Cheryle Jackson.Some librarians are upset that the money--the first-year budget would be $26 million--wouldn't be going instead to the children's collections of libraries. Actually, however, Blagojevich is on the right track. A big difference exists between just checking out a book and being able to return to it again and again, especially if you're a young child and are identifying the object with Mommy and Daddy, both of whom read it to you regularly.

TeleRead: Bring the E-Books Home: But who says e-bookdom is the only offender? In the Blind Chance blog today, I have a few observations on the Gannett-owned newspaper in David Faucheux's hometown of Lafayette, Louisiana. Several times now I've tried in vain to get the Daily Advertiser to write about the accomplishments of a blind blogger, who, as of this week, is even podcasting.

Reflected tags on Technorati: Blog, DRM, MP3 Player News

Posted at May 23, 2005 11:19 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)