Google Phone as e-book reader, Wiley e-book gimzo speculation, BookMooch, and another loss for DRM

By David Rothman

Already some e-bookers see the iPhone as great for reading, at least when on the go.

Now how about the Google Phone shown in the Google concept image to the right, published in IntoMobile?

As suggested by items in Slashdot, Ars Technica, BusinessWeek, you name it, the rumors are proliferating. Will an actual gPhone pop up, and maybe tie in with Google’s wireless efforts? Or will we see just an operating system and set of specs for vendors? Either way, this could be a Very Good Thing for e-books as long as we have alternatives to the E-Book Museum approach.

Phone/e-book connection?

Not everyone wants a book-dedicated gizmo in the Sony Reader vein, and like the iPhone, the gPhone could be one more way to associated books with something far more important in most people’s lives, phones. If nothing else, the existence of a gPhone and all the apps it might inspire could encourage Apple to be more open with the iPhone. I just hope that the much-rumored Apple tablet will materialize, too.

Other items of interest:

–Random House might join the less controversial parts of Google’s book search project, according to a Reuters report out of Frankfurt—even though Random continues to support a copyright suit filed against Google by the Association of American Publishers. Meanwhile German publishers have launched a search site competing against Google.

–Wiley exec have hinted that "they and other specialists may get involved in driving the adoption of eBook readers," reports the IWR blog without naming them. "Could we see the eBook reader adopt a similar model to the mobile phone where users sign up to a subscription service, content of a particular kind in this case, and in return they get a sleek and sexy device? It’s certainly worked for the mobile industry, which now resembled the car world with its emphasis on styling and marketing." Oh, please, we don’t need Gemstar II, even with the subscription service wrinkle. Let’s not tie in content and gizmos, whether directly or through contracts.

–Separately and more sensibly, Wiley exec Joe Wikert has blogged some pro-E thoughts on textbooks and e-books, warning against a "simple conversion of textbook to PDF." Exactly, Joe; e-books can be so much more than p-books and, as VitalSource shows, can be better integrated with other course materials. Beyond that, students deserve a format like .epub that’s intended to be reflowable—so the cash-strapped among them can read it on a variety of devices.

–The New York Times looks at the BookMooch through which 40,000 readers share copies of p-books. Classics are popular, although I wonder how representative that is of the population at large–since BM denizens are committed readers. Interestingly, computer manuals aren’t such a hit at BM. Any connection between the two trends? One of the downsides of tech is that it demands so much time that we might better spend on, er, nontech books—old and new.

–DRM, the self-propagated scourge of the book industry, is taking another beating with the news that Apple is expanding its DRMless  iTunes Plus line and planning to drop the price to 99 cents, the same as the "protected" files. And of course Amazon has its MP3 store. So when will Amazon smarten up and experiment with DRMless books? Forget about proprietary DRM as a Mobipocket-protector. The real money is in content, and as Apple just may have learned, DRM is market poison. Luckily some people in the heart of New York publishing are finally beginning to show more open-mindedness about de-DRMing, and later today I’ll be previewing an important new book from an industry insider in favor of change.

–Uruguay is purchasing 100,000 XO laptops, according to the unofficial OLPC News. Yep—country solidly committed to a mass buy!

Related: Fun speculation at Stay ‘N Alive that Google just might launch the gPhone on November 5.

(Thanks to Tamas for the Google/Random-House-related pointer.)