

Google eBookstore seems to have been launched - eitland
http://books.google.com/ebooks?source=gbs_sb_ebook_promo

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ewoodrich
I, speaking as a consumer, love this.

When iBooks was released, I almost gave up hope on ebooks, as Apple's platform
dominance could squash competition.

But as Amazon has expanded their offering with their same price model, and
Google and other "players" are moving in, competition will drive down prices a
la physical books (or at least I hope).

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brooklynite
This thing launched in late 2010
[http://thenextweb.com/google/2010/12/06/google-launches-
its-...](http://thenextweb.com/google/2010/12/06/google-launches-its-ebook-
store-in-the-us-3m-titles-available-today/)

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steelaz
Tried searching for a book, search field has auto-suggest, selected the title
I want and got 300 completely irrelevant results.

~~~
adambyrtek
Probably you are outside of the US, like me. In this case search returns only
public domain results.

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mapleoin
They also seem to be promoting an ereader from iRiver:
<http://books.google.com/help/ebooks/ereader.html>

The specs are similar to the kindle keyboard, but costs less ($99 without ads)
and has a better resolution 768x1024 vs kindle's 600x800. I hate that clunky
turn-page button in the middle though.

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MatthewPhillips
They launched this a year ago. What has changed?

~~~
k-mcgrady
The change is that you can buy books now. Previously there were only free ones
that were out of copyright.

~~~
MatthewPhillips
You definitely have been able to buy ebooks for a long time. Are you talking
about paper books?

~~~
k-mcgrady
Really? I thought it was only free books. Might be wrong, I use Kindle mostly.

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jmreid
How out of touch is Google? From:
<http://books.google.com/help/ebooks/ios.html>

"Recommended for iPhones with 256MB memory or above"

That's an easy way to confuse a set of customers that either don't know or
don't care about how much RAM their iPhone has. Why couldn't Google just list
the models that are compatible? Maybe their Android world of specs has clouded
their judgement.

~~~
Tyrannosaurs
Maybe with Android that list is too long?

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nicwest
> Google and authorised resellers have the discretion to set prices as they
> see fit. We will share the revenue from any sales with you according to the
> list price that you provide.

[http://books.google.com/support/partner/bin/answer.py?hl=en-...](http://books.google.com/support/partner/bin/answer.py?hl=en-
GB&answer=1079107)

At a guess I would say that publishers will not like this one bit.

~~~
nicwest
think I might have misread this apologies.

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wccrawford
Prices are high. Everything I've looked up seemed high, and everything I
bought recently from Kindle was cheaper there, then and now.

~~~
Mordor
What angers me most is not the high prices, but that so little goes to the
author. It's not only greedy bankers who are ruining the world for the rest of
us.

~~~
wccrawford
If the middlemen weren't providing a service, authors wouldn't use them. At
least, if they had any sense.

I agree that it seems like they get a pittance, but that is their choice. You
can chain yourself to the monster and get a lot of money, but only a small %
of the total money made...

Or you could go it alone and get a huge % of the total money, but only a small
amount of money total. Unless you're really awesome, and then this way would
seem to be better in every regard.

From what I can tell, Stephen King played with self-publishing for a bit, but
didn't follow through with it. Why? I couldn't find a reason, but it was over
10 years ago that he first tried it, and he's still using established
publishers.

I suspect it's because they take care of SO much stuff that it's cheaper and
easier for him to let them handle that, and he can do what he does best: Write
books. Of course, he probably also gets better deals than Joe Average, but
most of the major writers will.

~~~
Tyrannosaurs
My guess is that if Stephen King couldn't make it work with a massive
installed fan base and a global reputation then it's a non-starter (or at
least a very tall order) for an author who has neither of those.

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metatronscube
Prices in the UK are super high, and there are some really strange device
limitations (e.g. Can view on ipad but not the iphone). The application is
really flaky as well. I'm afraid compared to ibooks and Kindle apps it just
isn't up to anything much.

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nextparadigms
Google should try ad-based books and disrupt Amazon. What do they hope to
accomplish by offering the exact same service as Amazon, but with fewer titles
and higher prices? They are not even being competitive, let alone disruptive.

~~~
MatthewPhillips
Amazon is already doing this. No disruption required.

~~~
abraham
Amazon has reduced Kindle costs supported by ads but I'm not aware of any ad
supported books.

~~~
MatthewPhillips
No, but it's a pretty small step. There's another startup doing it already:
24symbols.com

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kablamo
Google has an android app so you can read the books on your phone. But its not
available in the UK.

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vidarh
Doesn't tell me clearly whether the book is DRM'd or not == no sale.

~~~
kijin
That was the first thing I tried to check, too. After Amazon's "1984" remote-
deletion incident, I wouldn't touch an eBook with DRM.

How many years did it take for major online music stores to start offering
DRM-free MP3s? I wonder if it will take longer or shorter in the eBook market.

~~~
garyd
Adobe provides the backend infrastructure for this and every other service
except for Amazon. And yes, they have DRM but its trivial to circumvent with
the proper tools. But consider the independent book stores that might stay
open a little longer if you suggest they get with the program. I mention this
because a longtime friend of mine opened her store 5 years ago and now that
occasional Harry Potter release is not something she can rely on, she found
Google's reseller program super easy to set up, maintain, and integrate with
her main & mobile web sites. Look up St Johns Bookseller if you're curious.

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garyd
This has been live for 3-6 months now.

