Ebooks in Europe, US and everywhere

I am from Europe and I am proud of that.
The printed book came up here, the radio, the web ...  Skype started here too.
It is not the fact that we invent things here ... it is just the fact that we take something that actually existed before and we put meaning in it.

What eBooks have to do with this?
If you looks at the world market for ebooks you will see that something does not really works.
In US the eBook market become a really important piece of the puzzle. You have to publish in order to have your content on those shiny iPad's, Kindle's and Nook's. But is this really publishing or is it something else.
How many of those readers of eBooks on iPad's, Kindle's and Nook's are really readers?
How many of them are reading for the pleasure of reading and how many are reading just because this new toy that "was bought 'cause everybody does it" has to be used for something.

I am not criticizing the wave of nice to have gadgets. The technology is really helpful and I am earning my daily living from it. The fact that people buy those tablets and readers it is actually a good thing because in the end they will really use them for something and all of us will benefit from it.

What I am criticizing is the fact that the ebook as it is right now it is not a real book and has no power to win real readers. A real reader buys a reading product and he enjoys the product and the use of that product.

When we read on a tablet or any reading device we enjoy the device not so much the book.
What is the relation between this and the Europe invention's portofolio.

Well ... I hope it has.
The eBook of today it is like the print before Gutenberg. It was invented before but it was not actually used.
The US citizens are open to new things. That's good for them and for the market they are living in. In Europe things are different.
I've just read a story today that was saying that in Russia the black market for eBooks is covering 100 000 titles. The legal market offers just 60 000 titles. Russia is not really a reference for Europe but it makes my point in the fact that there are readers but not buyers of ebooks.

It is not the about paying for something when you can take it for free. It is the fact that a lot of people do not see value in those books.
Let me give you a hint to support this concept of "no value".
A large part of my work is related with the are of publishing services. In this business I deal with lots of publishers who want to have the books converted in EPUB or kindle format ... the money ... peanuts.
For peanuts money you get .... well ... peanuts. That's what they get back from most suppliers and that's what the reader is supposed to buy.

May be not all readers are wiling to pay real money for peanuts related books.
May be this is the reason that European readers are not that much into eBooks.
Let's hope that somewhere not far into the future somebody with the same logic will manage to come up with an idea that will make the books real products. I have my reasons to think he will be from Europe.

Kindle e-book reader available on BlackBerries

Nice to hear that Amazon tries to grow up and make kindle a mature publishing platform. It has more to go but at leas they realized that "if we stay closed we day". Until now the reader is available on iPhone, BlackBerrie and of course Kindle ... and will be available in the near future on iPad and common Apple computers. I suspect a version for Windows Mobile and netbooks will follow. It's just a matter of marketing calculated delays like "we have to keep something for the next month too".
The next question is "Is the Kindle (software) reader a good reading platform of this century?".
Well I doubt, and this is not Amazon fault. It's the way we think about reading devices (and by "reading devices" I uderstand everything starting from the carved stone to the ultimate ebook).
I'll come back on this in the near future.

Amazon: feeling the heat

What a god thin is competition. Until recently nobody had really targeted the Amazon turf ... selling eBooks for Kindle. Until recently becouse now the game has changed. Why target Kindle, let's broaden the market. Let's make this a device independent market. Now there are at least 10 ebook devices fighting for a place under the Sun and Google prepares the release of Google Editions, the services that will make 500 thousand ebooks available to any device who is prepared to open them.

The Google proposal is simple: Google takes 37%, the publisher has the rest of 67% of the list price. The deal amazon had with the publisher was much though for them.
Now amazon has to fight back and it does exactly that. The new proposal: 70% for the publisher, 30% for Amazon. That's fair enough.
Now let's wait for Apple proposal.