If you’ve been around the block as long as I have, you remember the days before an audio codec was settled upon. EBooks are moving into adolescence, and the question is, which format will win, or does one format have to win?
For a while there, the two big players on the field were Amazon on one side, with it’s Kindle and proprietary format, which is an offshoot of MobiPocket format, and a reader that has a fairly limited range of formats it can read. On the other side was Barnes and Noble, with the Nook, and it’s own format which is based on ePub. Both Amazon and Barnes and Noble have DRM in their book formats. And, of course, they aren’t the only players in the field. Sony has it’s own reader and format, although, like the Nook and the Kindle, can read a variety of formats.
I won’t go into exhaustive detail here on the wide variety of readers and formats. There’s a great Wikipedia article to do the work for me. What I want to talk a bit about is what’s next. Amazon and Barnes and Noble were all geared up for a big fight, until a number of things happened to change the equation.
First, Apple came out with the iPhone, and both Amazon and Barnes and Noble released software that allowed you to read the books you’d bought on that device. Soon after came Android phones, and the same thing happened. Now, you didn’t need to own one of their devices to read books sold in their store.
Next, Apple released the iPad and Bookstore. It provides some serious competition to all three of these established players. On one hand, Apple gave it’s very popular iTunes Store like treatment to books. On the other hand, as most people who have read books on a reader like the Kindle know, a device like the iPad is actually not the most optimal kind to read books for long stretches of time. The truth, is, though, the iPad became the second most popular device to read eBooks in a very rapid amount of time, mostly to the detriment of the Kindle. All other readers have tiny market share in comparison to both of those players.
But with the soon to be plethora of Android tablet competitors (as well as tablets using E Ink) to the iPad, and the ability to read Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and Sony books on Android, it does seem that there isn’t a huge need to come to any sort of standard. But then, Google enters the fray, in a bigger way that just with Android. The Google eBookstore! Google decided to go with the ePub format for their bookstore, with Adobe DRM. Because they did that, users who buy books at the Google eBookstore can read those books on just about every device except … the Kindle, which does not support ePub.
So what happens next? This is my bet, although it will be interesting in a few years to find out whether I’m correct:
- Amazon and Barnes and Noble leave the hardware manufacturing biz when inexpensive, credible, good e-ink Android-based devices come out – those become the standard devices for eBook reading. (NB: The Nook by Barnes and Noble is actually based on Android itself, but I still think B&N will exit the hardware biz.)
- Sony’s eBook reader and store dies because no one uses it.
- Google becomes second only to Amazon in eBook selling, eventually toppling Apple from #2 spot.
- Apple, like always, remains the stylish, expensive niche player. They don’t have the same success with eBooks that they did with music.
- ePub and Amazon’s format both remain viable for years to come. Other formats wane in importance.
Next up, a blog post about what you should do if you want to self-publish your book as an eBook.
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