Upset that they had not reached their quota for billable hours for 2013, four different law firms (so far) have issued press releases and announced plans to investigate Barnes & Noble. All 4 firms are piling on to the investigation which the SEC is conducting into possible financial irregularities.

That SEC investigation was revealed last week, but has yet to actually uncover any wrongdoing. But now that the SEC is going to be assisted by these 4 firms I am sure that any wrongdoing will be uncovered (assuming B&N actually did anything wrong, which I still doubt).

At this point I have no information beyond what B&N shared in the 10-Q report they filed last week:

On October 16, 2013, the SEC’s New York Regional office notified the Company that it had commenced an investigation into: (1) the Company’s restatement of earnings announced on July 29, 2013, and (2) a separate matter related to a former non-executive employee’s allegation that the Company improperly allocated certain Information Technology expenses between its NOOK and Retail segments for purposes of segment reporting. The Company is cooperating with the SEC, including responding to requests for documents.

Nevertheless, the law firms of Bronstein, Gewirtz, & Grossman, LLC; Levi & Korsinsky; Johnson & Weaver, LLP; and Pomerantz, Grossman, Hufford, Dahlstrom, & Gross are all investigating claims on behalf of investors of Barnes & Noble, Inc. They are seeking B&N shareholders who might be interested in signing on with the investigations and share in the settlement shakedown should any wrongdoing be uncovered.

Should the law firms join forces I understand that their efforts will be lead by Dewey, Cheatem, and Howe.

Feedly is known as the leading replacement for the now deceased Google Reader but they are also beginning to get a reputation for making absolutely bone-headed decisions.

Last month Feedly had the bright idea of forcing all their users to have a Google+ account in order to use Feedly, and today Feedly has found a way to piss off bloggers everywhere.

I have just discovered that Feedly has rolled out an unannounced update that changes how users share links.

Instead of sharing a link which leads to a publisher’s website, Feedly users are now sharing links that lead to the same content, only now it is hosted on Feedly’s website.

This change happened sometime around midnight Friday night. Any link shared from Feedly before midnight links to the original source, but any link shared after about 10am links to Feedly.

Update: As of midnight Saturday, Feedly has suspended the hijacking of links. All links (including the one below) now lead where they should.

For example, the following link leads to a copy of one of my blog posts which Feedly is hosting and distributing:

http://feedly.com/e/dCAnCBil

It looks like this:

Just to be clear, I don’t know of any other service that pulls this kind of stunt. This is very much not okay with me and I would bet that I am not the only one.

This bothers me both as a publisher and as a reader. And just to add insult to injury the "open site" button at the top of the screen won’t actually take you to my blog. It takes you deeper into Feedly.

I’m not sure how many of my readers remember but a similar problem occurred last year when the save-for-later service Readability was criticized for having users share links that led to the Readability website and not the source publisher’s website (AppAdvice).

Readability was roundly criticized and quickly changed how their sharing option worked, but before that happened ReadWrite spelled out exactly why one is always supposed to share a link to the source:

I’m not moaning about page views here. That’s not my point. I’m a blogger, but I don’t care about blogging nearly as much as I care about reading and sharing.

The problem with this is that it breaks sharing. It forces mobile users to use Readability instead of their link-saving app of choice, which might be Instapaper, a service that does treat publishers with more distance and respect. It might be Pinboard or another bookmarking service. A shared link should always, always, always be the original URL, so that users can do with it as they please.

Instead, Readability skipped ads for publishers and showed ads for itself instead. Even on the desktop, though it loads the original page below, it puts the linked story in a Readability.com frame, so the URL still isn’t right.

And that’s not the only reason why one should be allowed to share a link to the original source.

I have contacted Feedly and confirmed that this is a new feature they are testing (and not a bug). Instead, they think it will boost engagement:

This is a tool we are building to help publishers increase the engaged readership in feedly. This also helps mobile users consume content a lot faster. This is still experimental but I will be happy to completely opt you out.

I really have to wonder about Feedly; it’s almost as if they don’t realize that publishers want to engage with readers directly and not have Feedly engage with readers at our expense.It’s kinda the reason I have a website rather than posting everything on (for example) Facebook. Furthermore, what if said reader wants to engage via email, Twitter, Facebook, or in the comments section?

Feedly can’t help in those areas, and in fact by changing the way their links work Feedly has actually hurt my ability to engage with readers.

Why they would think this was a good idea escapes me, but I have high hopes that Feedly will drop this publisher hostile policy.

Pocketbook’s 13.3″ ebook reader might not have a price or release date yet but it does have its first commercial.

As you can see in the video below, Pocketbook is targeting the ?AD Reader at small builders who might find a 13.3″ Android tablet with an E-ink screen appealing. Like many tablets, the CAD Reader offers AutoCad integration and Wifi/3G connectivity, making it a useful tool for displaying digital blueprints.

The PocketBook CAD Reader, which debuted last week at the Autodesk University trade show in Las Vegas, NV, is going to be the speediest ereader on the market when it ships. It runs Android 4.0.4 on a dual-core 1 GHz CPU with 2 GB RAM, 16 GB Flash storage, and an 8Ah battery.

It has 2 touchscreens (Wacom and capacitive), not one. Sony’s writing slate is similarly equipped with dual touchscreens.

This ereader/tablet’s claim to fame is its one of a kind screen. The CAD Reader is the first device to use E-ink’s new Fina screen tech, which is both lighter and thinner than Pearl or Carta E-ink screens. Of course, the 13.3″ with its resolution of 1600 x 1200 also packs in fewer pixels per inch (150ppi vs 265ppi on the Kobo Aura HD), but you can’t have everything.

There’s still no info on price or release date, but I am hoping to have those details soon.

The-eBook.org

It’s been about a month since Google last opened a new branch of Google Play Books and you know what that means: it’s time for another expansion.

Google Play Books is now live in an additional 5 countries in South America. Readers in Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Peru, And Venezuela can now join Brazilians in buying ebooks from Google and reading them on their iDevice, Android, or ereader (except the Kindle).

In keeping with Google’s past low key announcements, the Google Play team tweeted the news, which was confirmed by Google Play’s help pages. This brings the total number of countries supported by Google Play Books to 44, including a broad swath of Europe, southeast Asia, Australia,most of North America, and now most of South America.

Google Play Books is now available in more countries than any other type of content which Google is selling, and at this point Google is far in the lead in terms of local ebookstores, with over twice as many local sites as the Kindle Store but still fewer supported countries than the 51 supported by Apple. What’s more, Google’s pace appears to be accelerating. The intervals between launches is getting shorter, having shrunk from several months down to 5 or 6 weeks and now under a month. At this rate Google will launch local ebookstores in most of the world by the end of 2014.

Android Police

Flush with the early success of their Day One literary magazine, Amazon  announced today that they are expanding their efforts with the launch of a new publishing imprint which will focus on short fiction.

StoryFront is going to publish a variety of works, including new previously unpublished titles and translated works as well as stories originally published in Day One for purchase a la carte. This imprint is launching today with 43 stories, including:

• Sheila by Rebecca Adams Wright, the first story published in Day One
• A Bite of Strawberry by William Lashner, featuring the long-awaited return of defense attorney Victor Carl
• Museum of Literary Souls by John Connolly, a page-turner that blurs the lines between fact and fiction
• Farmer One by Christian Cantrell, a dystopian adventure set in a future gone utterly awry

“Based on the continued success of short fiction on Kindle as well as the enthusiastic response to Day One—we received thousands of subscriptions in the first week—we know readers are hungry for short stories and excited about exploring new genres,” said Daphne Durham, Publisher of Adult Trade and Children’s Group. “With StoryFront, we’re feeding that enthusiasm by offering a wide range of stories curated by a team of editors who are committed to the craft.”

As I see it, StoryFront is going to be taking over from Amazon’s Kindle Singles imprint, which had been publishing short stories since it launched. While Kindle Singles is best known for longform essays and other works that are too long for a magazine article but too short for a book, a significant number of the titles in the Kindle Single section were actually fiction.

In a way Amazon has been publishing short fiction for quite some time, it just occurred under most people’s radar.

StoryFront joins sister imprints Jet City Comics, Kindle Worlds, Lake Union, 47North, AmazonCrossing, AmazonEncore, Amazon Publishing, Grand Harbor, Little A, Montlake Romance, Skyscape, Thomas & Mercer, and Two Lions in the Amazon Publishing family.

StoryFront

A belated press release has crossed my desk today with the news that E-ink is ready to manufacture a new and thinner screen.

The Fina screen module, which is being used in the recently announced Pocketbook CAD Reader, features a lighter and thinner glass backplane. This screen replaces the glass TFT backplane used in many E-ink screens with a very thin glass substrate that promises to deliver screens that are much lighter and thinner than in standard LCD screens. It is now available to be built into E-ink screens of all sizes from 5″, to the 13.3″ screen used in the Pocketbook CAD Reader. According to the press release, a Fina screen weighs less than half as much as an E-ink screen which uses an existing backplane, and it is less than half as thick.

As a result the Fina screen in the Pocketbook CAD Reader weighs only 60 grams. This device, which was only announced a few hours ago, runs Android 4.0 on a dual-core 1GHz CPU. It runs software designed to display blueprints  from AutoDesk as well as other construction documents.

"Fina adds to E Ink’s portfolio of innovative display products which enable unique consumer and engineering products," said Giovanni Mancini, director of product management for E Ink Holdings. "The extremely low power requirements, thinness, lightweight and readability under all lighting conditions truly enable design engineers to display information where they never thought possible before."

That’s great and all but it’s not like there was any technical reason preventing larger screens from going on the market; the roadblock is that there isn’t much of a market for larger screens due to development and manufacturing costs.

And given the relatively low density/sharpness resolution of the Fina screen (150ppi, compared to 265 PPI on the Kobo Aura HD or 212 ppi on 6″ Pearl HD E-ink screens) I don’t expect to see very many small devices use it either.

But once you filter out the hype this is still a fascinating technical achievement (confirming once again that I am a nerd.).

Did you catch the article in The Telegraph today?

The well-known British horticulturist and author, David Hessayon, is retiring at the age of 85. While this would not normally rate a post, I was intrigued by one of the quotes.

Dr Hessayon laments that the internet is having a negative effect on the market for non-fiction titles:

“My The Bedding Plant Expert was in the top 10 of all non-fiction books but that won’t happen again. People don’t have time for books when they’re always on Google, Twitter or Facebook.

“The garden reference book market has declined because of the internet. In the future I’ll offer people gardening advice but I won’t write any more. If you have a problem you go on the internet. I pity anyone new coming into writing. Five years ago, all the bestselling gardening books were how-to-do-it books. Now it’s look at my garden or look at other people’s gardens.

“The how-to-do-it book has lost its absolute supremacy. To write a bestseller now you need to choose something that you can’t look up on Google.”

I’m not sure how much weight I would put a critique of the publishing industry from someone whose 40 plus books aren’t available digitally (with a single exception), but it is an interesting premise is it not?

It’s an idea that I have not heard mentioned very often but it has been rattling around publishing circles since at least 2000, when a prescient literary agent wrote:

I’ve done a lot of work lately researching the impact the Internet is having on writing and publishing. And, in doing so, I see a trend that could hurt the nonfiction writer’s income. I don’t have a lot of hard data to back up what I’m going to say here, but I think for many authors it may have the sting of recognition.

The free availability of information on the Internet may dilute the earning potential of nonfiction books. The Internet itself has become a competitor.

A similar criticism was expressed in Andrew Keen’s 2007 book, The Cult of the Amateur. Working from a viewpoint that had much in common with Robert Levine’s Free Ride,  Keen argued that web companies didn’t actually create anything but instead were decimating the culture businesses (to use Levine’s phrasing) :

“What you may not realize is that what is free is actually costing us a fortune,” Mr. Keen writes. “The new winners — Google, YouTube, MySpace, Craigslist, and the hundreds of start-ups hungry for a piece of the Web 2.0 pie — are unlikely to fill the shoes of the industries they are helping to undermine, in terms of products produced, jobs created, revenue generated or benefits conferred. By stealing away our eyeballs, the blogs and wikis are decimating the publishing, music and news-gathering industries that created the original content those Web sites ‘aggregate.’ Our culture is essentially cannibalizing its young, destroying the very sources of the content they crave.”

Sidenote: If you’re not familiar with either author, let me add that I have yet to read Keen’s book but I was struck by how the quote (copied from an NY Times review) shared Levine’s viewpoint that culture is created not by people but by companies. Naturally I disagree.

Getting back to the main topic, I have come across yet another version of this lament on a blog post by Alan Canton dating to 2010:

Publishing was so, so, so much easier in the 80s and 90s before the internet killed off so much of non-fiction publishing. Back then if you wanted to fix your bicycle or plant a garden you bought a book on bike repair or gardening. Not anymore. Today you go to a website where you will find a video on how to take apart your exact bike or a website with an interactive fill-in-the-form program on how to design and plant a garden in the exact amount of space you have.

Everyone is sitting on the edge of their chair hoping and praying that ebooks will be their salvation. I too am hopeful, but not as optimistic as others.

Four different industry insiders have made the same argument over the past 13 years; is there any truth to it?

Yes and no – but mostly no.

Yes, the internet has made it easier and cheaper to find new info on a wide range of topics. While this has been to the detriment of some publishing entities, it has also enabled experts of all stripes to share what they know.

The technical expert with the Youtube channel, the hobbyist with a website, and the community of enthusiasts are all examples of expertise that the publishing industry used monopolize but cannot any more. (They also stand as examples of Levine and Keen being wrong when they argue that businesses create content, but that’s not strictly relevant here.) Many of these folks would never have made it through the old gatekeepers. Some don’t have time to write a book, while others don’t have the skills. But that doesn’t mean they’re not experts.

So yes, the internet has broken up the distribution monopoly, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing nor does it mean that existing publishing entities can’t survive or thrive in the new publishing industry.

Please note the distinction I made in the above paragraph; like indie authors those unpaid experts who are sharing their knowledge via Youtube, websites, or Wikipedia are arguably just as much a part of the new publishing industry as existing publishing entities.

And that’s why there are startups (and even legacy publishers) which are already looking for bloggers who are technical experts and might, with enough support, write a book. Hyperink is one such startup, and I’m sure there’s more. (For more details on how to go about it, check out Laura Matthews' post on Joel Friedlander’s The Book Designer blog.)

Since I have wandered far afield, let me restate the original question:

Is the internet harming nonfiction publishing?

In some ways, yes, but in other ways it can help. A web presence can compliment book sales both as a promotional channel and a new revenue channel (and not just from sales or distribution). Some in publishing, including Seth Godin, have already figured that out.

Take F+W Media, for example. This thriving non-fiction publisher is divided into multiple business units, each of which focuses on a single topic or interest. All (most?) of the units include an online presence (blog and/or community) which compliments the content which is being sold to readers and to advertisers. They don’t show any sign of being harmed by competing sources of free information.

In conclusion, I really have trouble accepting the argument that the internet is ruining publishing. It is changing publishing, yes, but I predict that the long term effect will be closer to the what we see happening in the music industry.

All those experts I mentioned above are like the musicians who no longer have to go through a record label to reach an audience. While that is detrimental to the recording industry, the music industry as a whole has benefited.

Similarly, in the long run the experts will be able to make more from working around the legacy gatekeepers than they could by working with them. We are already seeing that happen with some indie authors and I expect the trend to strengthen.

And that’s why I think publishing will also gain more than it loses. Or at least that’s my 2 cents; what do you think?

P.S. I’d like to extend my appreciation to Mike Shatzkin and Brian O’Leary for helping gel my thoughts on this topic. Thanks, guys!

images by Penn Provenance Project,

Seattle Municipal Archives,

Jamison_Judd,

Politics and Prose Bookstore

One of the better ways to get a customer is to catch them young. this is why Amazon has a Amazon Student membership deal, and it could be why Amazon has started a pilot program to test affiliate partnerships with college bookstores.

There’s been no announcement from Amazon, and the program doesn’t even have a name yet, but for earlier this Fall Amazon started a year long pilot with the University of California – Davis bookstore.

Update: Amazon formally announced the pilot in late January 2014.

UC Davis Stores has a dedicated portal page on Amazon.com (davis.amazon.com). The portal launched in mid-September and offers a selection of Amazon’s stock similar to what the bookstore would stock (in other words what a student is inclined to buy). This portal is functionally a part of Amazon (and not UC Davis Stores’s servers or stock system), and any order placed there is filled by Amazon via their network of warehouses and partners.

The school collects an affiliate fee (2%, in fact) on any sales made via the portal page, and they also get an affiliate fee on any purchases made by students that sign up for the Amazon Student membership program and list UC-Davis as their school. On an unrelated note, college students can sign up for a free 6 month trial of Amazon Student; benefits include free 2-day shipping and Prime Instant Video.

According to Amazon, UC-Davis is the only school participating in the pilot, which is planned to last a year and will also include the installation of Amazon Lockers in a couple locations on the UC-Davis campus.

There are no plans for this pilot to integrate Amazon Source, the recently launched program which encourages indie retailers to sell the Kindle in their stores in exchange for a small commission on hardware and ebook sales. That program has proved exceptionally unpopular among a number of exceedingly vocal pundits, booksellers, and the "Death to Amazon" crowd at Melville House books, but I don’t think college bookstores will feel the same way. There’s a chance they will look at their market position rationally and acknowledge the fact that cash-strapped students are going to do their best to avoid the higher prices in the college bookstore anyway.

Jason Lorgan, the director of UC Davis Stores, is in favor of the pilot program because he realized that the bookstore was not going to take away any of Amazon’s market share, so he might as well profit from it.

According to the NACS Campus Marketplace newsletter, Lorgan said: "We have all kinds of marketing programs to drive people into the store, but the truth is most college stores have about 50% market share today. Do I want to get a small piece of that 50% I don’t have, or do I just want to give it up? Consumers have a lot of choices and all retailers have to adapt to the fact that they are just one of many options."

And Lorgan is not the only one to note that students are avoiding the college bookstore; earlier this year ed tech startup Akedemos commissioned a poll of college and university CFOs. 89% of the respondents in that survey believed that students are increasingly turning away from campus-based bookstores in favor of third-party providers. Cost was cited as being the primary reason for students to bypass the college bookstore (78%).

College bookstores don’t have the same position that they held 20 years ago, and thanks to laws like the Higher Education Opportunity Act, passed by Congress in 2008, they’re probably never going to regain it.

So if college bookstore management are smart they will welcome it with open arms.

Well, Follett and B&N College won’t; these 2 companies operate around 1500 college bookstores under contract (Follett is larger, with 800 odd stores). But the several thousand stores that run either independently or under the management of the university should consider the deal Amazon has with UC Davis Stores (assuming the pilot works out).

And it would be a smart move for Amazon; in the long run it will probably reap dividends as the students graduate and continue to shop with Amazon. A similar ploy certainly worked with me; I got my start at Amazon via the Amazon Student program (a long time a go, back before it included streaming video).

images by LeafLanguages, rfduck

With 6 billion monthly page views Flipboard is still the leading aggregator app, but with the appearance of a new challenger that might one day change. Bangalore-based NewsHunt has recently reached a new milestone; they’re now boasting that their users are clocking in a billion page views per month.

This 4 year old service reached 10 billion page views in June 2013, making it one of the larger aggregators anywhere,  and today they expanded into ebooks.

They’re offering a catalog of paid and free ebooks from over 50 regional publishers in a number of Indian languages, including Malayalam, Marathi, Hindi, Tamil, and English. The ebooks can currently be read on NewsHunt’s Android app, with support coming to their iPhone and Windows Phone apps in the near future.

Newshunt also offers access to over 100 Indian newspapers in 11 languages, including offering localized news feeds for over 600 districts and towns in India. The Newshunt apps are free (but ad-supported), but the ebooks are sold with payment processing handled by using either credit/ debit cards or using mobile balance using iPayy, a carrier billing solution.

Newshunt is moving into a very different market from the one they know, and they’re facing tight competition. In addition to local competitors like Flipkart and Infibeam, Kobo, Amazon, and Google have opened ebookstores in the subcontinent.

NextBigWhat

Barnes & Noble shared more bad news today in the form of a new quarterly report. In the 3 months ending 26 October, B&N grossed a total revenue of $1.73 billion, or about 8% less than the same period last year.

On the plus side, B&N reported that EBITA (operating profit) increased from $66.5 million to $75.7 million. They also reported net earnings of $13.2 million, or 15 cents a share, up from $501,000 a year ago. On a per-share basis, the company posted a loss of seven cents a year earlier.

But in spite of the 2 bright spots revenues were still down. Retail revenue fell nearly 8%, to $921 million. College bookstore revenue fell 4.6% to $737.5 million, and that was during the back to school period when B&N should have shown an increase.

And to top things off,  Nook revenue dropped 32%, to $108.7 million. Device and accessory sales reached $51 million for the quarter, a decrease of 41.3% from the same period last year. Even though B&N was selling their hardware at drop dead prices they still couldn’t equal last year’s sales.

Digital content sales also dropped for the quarter. They totaled $57 million, a decline of 21.2% compared to a year ago.

Just to put that in perspective, the AAP reported last week that August 2013 digital revenues (ebook plus audiobook) totaled $144 million.  That’s one of the 3 months included in B&N’s latest quarterly report and does not include the entire market, but it does offer an indication that B&N has lost ebook market share.

At one point B&N claimed to have 27% of the ebook market, and now it is clear that their market share has shrunk. I’m sure this comes as no surprise to anyone.

Barnes & Noble is going into the holiday season in a reasonably strong albeit minimally profitable position. Their current financial report shows hints of a turnaround in terms of profitability, and if B&N can keep that trend going while still boosting sales during the most important sales quarter of the year then they should come out even stronger than before.

Remember that new Nook Android tablet that my sources said would be launched in October but B&N said would not be launched this year? B&N might not be planning to ship the tablet this year, but they do have it under development and it just showed up on a benchmark website.

According to GFX Bench the new Nook device, which I am calling the Nook X, will have the model number BNTV800 and run Android 4.2.2 on an Nvidia Tegra 4 chip.

There’s very little other information available, but I can tell you that the CPU speed registered at 1.8GHz. I also know that the screen resolution is 1620 x 1080, but I can’t tell you about the screen size.

That’s not a standard resolution, so there’s really no way tell how big B&N’s new tablet really is. While it is possible that B&N might have a tablet with a nominal screen size of 1620 x 1200 and decided to reserve the missing 192 pixels for onscreen buttons, I would not bet on it.

And I wouldn’t bother trying to guess the screen size from the model number; one has nothing to do with the other. The new Nook Glow, for example, has a model number of BNVR500-A, even though it has a 6″ screen. in fact, the only relevant detail I can deduce from the model number is that this is a tablet (bnTv800, the T is for tablet).

The Nook X has yet to be confirmed by B&N but past leaks have given us a few hints. I know that B&N has commissioned a for Dummies book, and I know that a product listing for a BT keyboard showed up on the B&N website. I still haven’t managed to get my hands on either item but they tended to support B&N’s past statements that they had a new tablet in the works.

Update: That B&N branded BT keyboard is now available on the B&N website.

This new model hasn’t shown up on the FCC website yet, and I have not found it on any other resource website like Google’s list of supported Android devices. But I am sure it will show up in short order.

The Droid Guy

Techcrunch is reporting that they have seen a prototype of the next Kindle Paperwhite:

 The marquee feature of the new device is a high-resolution 300 ppi screen that will bring the company’s e-reader displays back into technical parity with devices from competitors like Kobo.

In addition to a higher resolution screen, the new Paperwhite will be getting a few more hardware improvements. We’ve seen a prototype of the device which has a front screen that is flush with the edges of the device, rather than recessed, and is made out of very matte glass of some sort, not plastic. Despite moving to glass, the new units are said to be lighter than this year’s models.

The device is reportedly code named "Ice Wine", and it is going to launched sometime in the second quarter of 2014 (assuming nothing goes wrong).

There’s no word on the screen size, but I can point out that the new screen is going to increase the sharpness from 212 ppi on the current Kindle Paperwhite to over 300 ppi. That is a sharper screen than on the Kobo Aura HD, which comes in at 265 ppi.

If this part comes to pass then the new Paperwhite will have to cost considerably more than the current model. That higher resolution screen is going to require a higher resolution backplane, and that will cost more to produce. This could result in a premium priced Paperwhite which would be sold alongside the lower cost current model.

On a related note, the higher cost of higher resolution screens is part of the reason why so many ereaders have an HD E-ink screen with a resolution of 1024 x 758. That is a stock size offered by E-ink, which means it is already being mass produced and thus cheaper than a higher resolution screen would be.

The new device is reportedly going to have a new shell which looks like the back of the Kindle Fire HDX, and a new power button on the back. It’s also going to have page turn buttons.

Yes, Amazon is going to go against the design trend embodied in their last 3 touchscreen-equipped Kindles. The new model will have page turn buttons similar to that of the Nook Touch; the buttons will be flush with the case and be "squeezable".

There’s also a report that the new device will have a new font and improve typography, but I’m not going to put much weight into this claim. Apparently whoever wrote this post for TechCrunch knows very little about Amazon’s ongoing efforts to improve typography, because he wrote:

Typography has long been one of the Kindle’s big failing points.

Yeah, so the improved fonts and improved typography that Amazon has debuted with the 2012 Kindle and other Kindle launches is all crap? Not in comparison to other ereaders on the market or what was possible 5 or more years ago, no.

Update: I need to correct myself. It seems I was the one not keeping up on the latest opinions of typography experts, because a number of them do think the Kindle fails at typography. Needless to say, I don’t agree.

The mobile reading app Readmill is back in the news again today with a new retail partner, and it’s going to make them an even more tempting prize for Amazon.

Readmill has signed a deal with Penguin UK so that customers of the Penguin UK ebookstore can quickly and easily send their purchases to Readmill, and then read the ebooks in the Readmill apps for Android, iPad, and iPhone.

In the near future that ebookstore will be updated with new "Send to Readmill" buttons on the download page, removing yet another speed bump that has made it difficult for readers to concentrate all of their ebook purchases in one location.

Penguin UK is something like the 70th retailer to sign up with Readmill since it launched 2 years ago. Readmill’s partners are a motley bunch of companies including ebookstores like eBookmall, publishers like Wizard Tower Press, and even self-pub services like Bibliocrunch. All of these sites sell or give away ebooks (including DRMed ebooks), and they have all elected to help their customers use Readmill.

As a result Readmill is becoming a focal point in a growing decentralized network of indies, and that is going to make Readmill a worthwhile acquisition for Amazon. (And the fact that Readmill’s revenues are based on tracking their user’s reading behavior and selling the data doesn’t hurt either.)

Amazon has a policy of trying to buy any of their smaller competitors before they can grow into a serious threat. That’s why Amazon owns Zappos, Diapers.com, and The Book Depository (3 niche retailers that were beating Amazon in their niches), and at some point Amazon is probably going to apply the policy to ebooks – if they haven’t already done so.

Edit: I was just reminded on Twitter that Amazon has already bought ebook competitors – remember Stanza?

Now, if you’re thinking that Amazon’s only competitors are the big ebookstores then it’s time to start thinking laterally.

For one thing Amazon would probably never be allowed to buy a major competing ebookstore (the SEC wouldn’t allow it). And for another the major publishers are never going to let a single major ebookstore grow up and replace Amazon; they would be replacing one ruthless behemoth with another.

In short, the only competition Amazon could be interested in buying would be one or another indie startup.

This opinion was inspired by a comment left yesterday on a post about breaking Amazon’s monopoly (such as it were). David Haywood Young argued that centralized systems (like Amazon) could be taken down by a network of indies:

There’s no obvious reason these centralized systems have to dominate internet sales at all. Set up an easy-to-use system for content owners to offer their wares from wherever they choose to host ‘em, and handle sales by at least one common protocol, and the only central system of use will be an index…which will really only be useful to most insofar as it is also a recommendation engine.

If we expand upon that idea, this indie network could include independent startups that each specialized in one or more task: production, distribution, payment processing, marketing, reading, or discovery. Rather than trying to do everything and failing to do any one task well (like Kobo, B&N, Google), each startup would try to be the best at just one task. Customers and creators would ideally be able to navigate the network seamlessly, with much of the work done automatically behind the scenes.

Now, this indie network doesn’t really exist yet; it’s more of a concept than any type of actual coordinated effort to grow the ebook market. But it could exist, and they way that Amazon is acquiring startups will work to either control it or at least control the most important parts.

Amazon is going to want to look for the startups that are becoming the major nodes in the indie network, and then try to buy them. Readmill could be on its way to becoming one of these nodes; they already have dozens and dozens of connections, so if Amazon bought them then Amazon would be in the middle of everything.

Do you know another company that was already on its way to becoming a major node?

Goodreads.

This book community had developed expertise in book discovery. They had invested in a discovery engine, and by encouraging users to assemble their own virtual bookshelves Goodreads had also managed to introduce an organic discovery component.

That’s why Amazon bought Goodreads earlier this year, and for a similar reason I think Amazon is probably looking at Readmill.

Thoughts?

P.S. I would also add Smashwords to the list of potential nodes, but it isn’t one yet. At this point Smashwords has only the most tenuous connections to ebook production services, and their ebookstore is too focused on their own website (it can’t be embedded in author websites, for example). Right now Smashwords is a major node in a network with major ebookstores, and not an indie network. But Smashwords could also become a node in that indie network if they tried.

Remember that dual screen ereader concept design that Plastic Logic demoed at CES 2013?  It’s found a home.

A startup called Printless Plans is working to develop a new platform for the construction industry. They’re looking for a solution which would avoid having to print out the voluminous blueprints needed anything more than a basic construction project, and they think PL’s dual screen ereader is a perfect fit.

They’re calling it the Zephyr.

It combines two of Plastic Logic’s 10.7″ screen panels to produce a surface area that measures 15.4″ when laid flat. Each panel has a resolution of 1280 x 960 pixels, giving the Zephyr an impressive 1280 x 1920 resolution (minus a pixel or 2 for the fold).

Correction: A reader noticed that there is an extra seam in the device shown below. The Zephyr has 4 screen panels, not 2, making this a 21.4″ ereader with a resolution of 1920 x 2540. Thanks, Tom!

Okay, that’s not so impressive when compared to say the Kindle Fire HDX 8.9, which has a screen resolution of 2560 x 1600 in under 9″, but the Zephyr is still larger than any previous ereader. And at 150ppi, the sharpness of the screen(s) on the Zephyr matches that of Sony’s 13.3″ writing slate.

Update: I ran this idea by a construction engineer I know and she would never buy it. It’s too fragile, too costly, and everyone has already gone digital. They’re using pro grade tablets to display blueprints, so there is no need for this funky device.

There aren’t any details yet on connectivity, but the Zephyr will be equipped with a touchscreen to make manipulating blueprints easier. I for one would love to see how they managed a touchscreen with a fold down the center; that is probably the most technically complicated part of the design.

There’s also no firm details on price or release date (nor would you expect any at this point), but according to Plastic Logic the Zephyr prototype will be on display later this month. Printless Plans and Plastic Logic will have the Zephyr on display at the GreenBuild trade show in Philadelphia, Penn. It should be possible for attendees to play with it and try to kill it.

The latest monthly sales figures from the American Association of Publishers are going to add grist to the mill for those who say that the ebook market is leveling off.

The AAP reported that the book market as a whole was up nearly 6% in August 2013 ($633.5 million from $598.4 million), and it was also down 4.8% for the January to August period ($4.26 billion from $4.47 billion).

The combined digital sales (audiobook and ebook) for the first 8 months of 2013 totaled $882.8 million, down 3.5% from $915 million during that period last year. In the adult segment, downloadable audiobooks were up 14.4% in the first 8 months of 2013 while ebooks increased by 4.8%. Religious ebooks were up 2.6%, while kid’s ebooks dropped by 40%.

The ebook segments are just beginning to get out of the shadow of last year’s sales, with YA ebook sales slowly recovering to where they were last year. Digital sales (ebook plus audiobook) for August 2013 alone totaled $144.4 million, up about one and a third percent from August 2013.

Update: Publisher’s Lunch has caught me in a math error. The August figures show that the total digital sales were down 1.7%, not up. (My mistake was that I accidentally swapped the August 2012 figure with the August 2013 figure, and thus the ratio was inverted.)

The YA ebook segment was down 7.6% ($13.3 million from $14.4 million), while religious ebooks were up 4.9% ($4.9 million from $4.7 million). Curiously enough, adult ebook sales broke with their previous trend of steady growth and took a dip in August; they were down 2.9% ($114.8 million from $118.2 million).

Adult audiobooks, on the other hand, were up 18.3% ($11.4 million from $9.6 million). Along with religious ebooks, this was one of only 2 digital segments that increased in August.

Like we have seen in previous reports, last year’s release of The Hunger Games movie resulted in a volume of ebook and paper book sales that could not be repeated in 2013. But the shadow also appears to be wearing thin, so with luck in the next few months we should have a better idea of whether the market is growing, shrinking, or holding steady.

Or rather we will know how well the 1195 publishers who share data with the AAP are doing; the above data does not reflect the entire market.

P.S. As always, here are the charts from the AAP.