The March Toward E-Book Readers Continues

Image representing Barnes & Noble as depicted ...
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The e-book reader competition heats up this week.  Barnes and Noble is set to announce its own reader device next week, and the Amazon Kindle is finally going international.

Information about the new B&N device is already beginning to leak out, with Gizmodo posting the first photos and information about the reader.  It has a 6-inch screen, utilizing the now common black-and-white e-ink display.  Beneath that is an ipod-like touch screen to facilitate navigation and other commands.  The device will tie into the newly launched Barnes and Noble e-book store, where the publisher’s own titles will be deeply discounted.  Rumor has it that the device will also tie into the huge library of books digitized by Google.

News on the Kindle front underscores the inroads this e-book reader is making.  Amazon has announced that it will unveil next week a new international version of the Kindle that will be able to download its Kindle books in over 100 countries.  This has huge implications for writers, who now suddenly potentially can build a world-wide audience.

What is even more interesting is a comment by Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, as reported by the International Herald Tribune, that Kindle titles now account for 48 percent of total book sales in instances where Amazon sold both digital and physical copies of a book.  “This has grown much faster than any of us ever anticipated,” Mr. Bezos said, according to the IHT.

Business Week reported on its website last week on the surge in sales of e-book readers this year, with an estimated 900,000 units to be sold in the US this November and December alone.

Meanwhile, the tech world is abuzz about an anticipated Apple Tablet computer, configured especially to handle e-books, which analysts expect to the launched early next year.

If you wish to get deeper insight into the e-book revolution, consider signing up for the FREE WEBINAR on e-book publishing, scheduled for Wednesday, October 21, at 1 p.m. Eastern Time.  This webinar is sponsored by Digital Book World.

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