Instead of my usual Editor's Pick, I thought I consolidate all the reporting of last week in one place to make it easier for you guys to find: BEA BEA: Endless Ideas and the BeBook at the show BEA: Tomorrow’s Library in the World of Digits BEA: are ebooks good for authors? BEA: A conversation about the agency model IDPF Digital Book 2010 Digital Book 2010: DRM Update and copyright protection in the market IDPF Digital Book 2010: Predictions for 2011 and beyond (and another question dodged) IDPF Digital Book 2010: Epub enhanced, interactive and connected (and a question dodged!) IDPF Digital Book 2010: Taking the Agency Model out for...

According to the Financial Times a number of European publishers are holding off on signing onto the iBookstore. They feel that the minimum pricing requirements might be illegal under UK law. One publishing executive told the Financial Times: “We are not absolutely sure the agency model is either legal or ideal for our authors and us.” Another publishing industry insider said the agency model was “price fixing by the back door” under UK rules. Although there could be a way around this legal hurdle, the uncertainty has left some publishers sitting on the fence. However, the article points out that some...

This is from the press release: Kobo, a global eReading service, today announced availability of its popular iPad application in all markets where iPad is available. Additionally, Kobo today released regional versions for Canada, UK and Australia and announced a New Zealand application is coming soon. The regionalized applications, built specifically for the iPad, feature local content, merchandising, and currency. All Kobo iPad applications come pre-loaded with five eBooks and connect to the Kobo eBook store, which features more than two million titles including current best sellers, classics, and thousands of free titles....

(SEE earlier story). Amazon Kindle forum members noticed the new Penguin Kindle books were disappearing from sight again, and this is the norm after an Apple-type "Agency model" agreement is made based on Steve Jobs's arrangement with the Big5 publishers, a requirement for them to use his iBookstore, and their agreement is that no pricing at other online e-bookstores can be below Apple's pricing with the Big5. Before coming back online with the generally higher pricing on new books, Amazon servers must reflect new pricing on all Penguin e-books and Amazon will add a disclaimer on each Penguin e-book that the publisher now...

IReader review has a good article on the ins and outs of iBooks new self-publishing option. The "kicker" is that in order to do it you have to have a Mac. The Mac requirement is an exceedingly annoying one. It’s the same with making games for the iPhone – you must have a Mac. The solution is to work with an iBookstore Aggregator. The article then goes on to discuss aggregators and tells you where to find them. Enjoy your new Mac! ...

It's rare that you get to see the people behind the product, but here are the CEO (on the left) and Marketing Director (on the right) of Endless ideas - Johan Hagenbeuk and Peter Zieleman. They hail from Utrecht in The Netherlands. At the previous show they were showing a 3G product which is now discontinued. They told me that the challenges of roaming in Europe made 3G impractical. Unlike the US, you can travel a short distance in Europe and then you will move to a different national carrier whose roaming arrangements are completely different. Thus, you...

Nora Rawlinson, Early Word; Michael Santangelo, Brooklyn Public Library; Steve Potash, Overdrive; Stephen Rind-Tutt, Alexander Street Press; Daniel Oblong, Sony Electronics Potash: services are evolving as more new devices are released. Success of library ebooks is a result of the librarian directing the priorities, not he provider. Publishers have one singular interest, revenue. What I've listened to for 10 years from publishers: people get books at libraries at libraries for free and that permeates a significant majority of publishing community - they don't understand libraries and value of libraries. White paper available on the Early Word website on...

Not only do they review the app, but they have an excellent comparison with the Kindle app for the iPad. Here's a snippet. The full review is well worth reading. There are a few advantages B&N eReader App has over Kindle for iPad - You can read newspapers and magazines. Perhaps the biggest advantage. Page Numbers. Lots of people want this as a feature on the Kindle. A very important advantage if you need to refer to page numbers for assignments or for any another reason. Lots of choice in fonts. That being said there isn’t any font as pretty as Kindle for iPad’s...

That's according to besttabletreview. The tablet was demoed in Beijing and runs the Android OS. In addition, Acer announced, but did not show, a new ereader which is supposed to launch in Q3 of this year. This is a reversal of Acer's announced policy of not getting into the tablet market. From the article: Looking like a Frankenstein’s Monster mix of a Kindle QWERTY keyboard sewn onto a 6-inch E-Ink screen, the LumiRead also has 2GB of storage, microSD card slot, 3G, WiFi, can play music and is hooked up to the Barnes & Noble eBookstore in the U.S.,...

Although humorous, the video does illustrate the confused state of publishing. No one knows how to accommodate all the different needs that each of the characters in the video represent. What is clear, however, is that none of the pundits, none of the publishers, none of the technologists — no one — has a clear vision of tomorrow’s publishing landscape. Some commentators predict that ebooks will soon be 25% of all publishing; others predict it will soon be 50%. But those predictions are really unhelpful without a plan for maintaining publishing standards while moving to a more standardless medium. Everyone says...

Reuters reports that Penguin and Amazon have come to an agreement allowing Penguin’s books to be sold for the Kindle once again. Penguin’s books had been absent since the April 1st agency pricing implementation deadline, a period of almost two months. The international iBookstore has launched—people in England who already own iPads can download the iBooks application and access the store as of May 26th, two days before the iPad’s official May 28th launch. However, at the moment only public-domain titles from Project Gutenberg are available—no commercial titles yet. The Bookseller reports negotiations with publishers are...

Alerted by a comment on my review of the eReader apps for iPhone, I checked the app store and found the Barnes & Noble iPad eReader ready to download. (CNet also has a report on it.) I don’t have time for a lengthy review right now—I was on my way into bed—but my early look isn’t too encouraging. It’s basically a carbon copy of the Kindle app, throwing in some features from iBooks such as showing “facing pages” (see below). And it seems to be only loadable from the Barnes & Noble store—using a “bnereaderipad://” link, as someone...