Comments on: ‘iSlate’ said to be dedicated e-book reader: More eBabel on the way? Today’s Apple-ology

By: apple islate

apple islate — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 20:45:53 +0000

I want to see what iSlate has to offer before I invest in an e-reader of any type. If I can have the e-reader plus, lots more, that is the one I want.

By: asphalt

asphalt — Wed, 30 Dec 2009 18:41:58 +0000

i long for the day when the choice among e-readers will be based on price, and how a reader’s functionality fits the user’s style — that is to say, i long for the day when “which books do you want to read, and how much do you want to pay for them?” is a completely device-independent question.

By: Rob Preece

Rob Preece — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 22:51:11 +0000

I don’t have any inside info but I’d be REALLY shocked if Apple introduced an ebook-only device.

Rob Preece
Publisher

By: Michael Pastore

Michael Pastore — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 17:37:10 +0000

Apple’s iSlate will *not* be a dedicated ebook reader; it will be touchscreen, multipurpose device that reads ebooks very well.

It will be announced on January 26, 2010.

Michael Pastore
50 Benefits of Ebooks

By: GJN

GJN — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 13:18:24 +0000

A dedicated Apple eBook reader? Never, never, never. It’s totally inconsistent with their corporate worldview. A dedicated media player for ALL media woud be more like it.

By: Felix Torres

Felix Torres — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 12:10:56 +0000

Apple has long-standing ties to Adobe so its not impossible they might use Adobe-proprietary DRM rather than their in-house Fairplay DRM. Of course, Adobe would have to offer Apple a reason to use Adept… Maybe a zero royalty license? Apple certainly has their own datacenter and license servers so they have no need of Adobe and its technology or its tax. Adobe needs Apple but Apple doesn’t need Adobe and, in the past, when Apple didn’t need Adobe (TrueType!) they didn’t hesitate in dropping them. Could be interesting.

Main issue is that Apple, like Amazon, sees no reason why the content it serves should be usable without Apple hardware/software. Adopting Adept would make whatever content deals they negotiate with magazines and newspapers available to their competitors which, of course, runs counter to Job’s philosophy (“What’s mine is mine, what’s yours is negotiable”) so I don’t see Apple drinking the Adobe kool-aid even if Adept were offered up free.

The best that the Adobe camp can hope for, methinks, is that Apple doesn’t do DRM’ed ebooks at all, just magazines and newspapers (and video, audio, etc) and allows the user to install the bookstore app of their choice (Kindle, Stanza, B&N eReader, ADE, Txtr, whatever). After all, *if* Amazon is truly being as aggressive on pricing as its naysayers claim, then there would not be enough profit in ebooks to justify Apple setting up a contemporary content bookstore.
So, unless Apple is going to sell *their* ebooks at $15 (possible; their reader *will* have color and the Apple faithful are nothing if not faithful) I’d say Apple is going to focus primarily on subscription content rather than discrete sales.

It will be a nice test of ebook pricing claims, though, if Apple jumps in and makes liars out of the BPH’s by matching Amazon pricing.

By: Bing

Bing — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 11:39:51 +0000

Historically, Apple has been forced to use proprietary formats. In fact, Steve Jobs made a public plea to the record companies almost three years ago to lay off DRM. Currently, most of Apple’s music is available DRM-free. The movie studios have not been so easy to convince. If there is DRM for Apple eBooks—if there are Apple eBooks—you can be assured that the DRM is there by request of the publishers, not Apple.

http://www.apple.com/hotnews/thoughtsonmusic/