That's the title of an article in Publishing Perspectives: Yes, Paris has done its utmost to maintain and sustain its 20th-century book culture. City Hall has ordered the Seine-side bouquinistes to stop selling trinkets, publishers continue to be wary of agents, and French e-book adoption is slow — even though retailers are eager to capitalize on consumer curiosity. French publishing is dominated by Paris and the old world ways therein. And despite — or perhaps in spite — of a growing and vocal youth movement advocating digital adoption, things are changing at the slowest . . . possible ....

From Intomobile: France Telecom has teamed-up with France’s Ministry for National Education to offer subsidized iPad 2 to university students. Under this scheme, Orange (which is owned by France Telecom) will provide the 16GB iPad 2 Wi-Fi+3G for 1 EUR per day (30 EUR per month) to any student willing to commit on a two-year contract. As part of the deal, students get 1GB of mobile data per month, along with unlimited data for emails (attachments included) and unlimited data on Orange’s Wi-Fi Hotspot network. A 12-month option is also available, but it raises the...

From an email: Following the announcement of our new product, the Cybook Odyssey, we received many questions regarding the HSIS technology. What is High Speed Ink System (HSIS)? HSIS is an architecture developed by Bookeen and results from 2 years of research & development. This architecture is made of hardware and software components in order to boost electronic ink. Cornerstones of HSIS which are incorporated within the Cybook Odyssey are: - Optimized software stack and algorithms, developed with quality and performance in mind from the ground up. The main goals are...

From the press release: Kobo, a global leader in eReading with 5 million readers in over 100 countries worldwide, has expanded its international footprint by partnering with #1 book retailer in France, FNAC.   FNAC has chosen Kobo to deliver a superior eReading experience to their customers, leveraging the Kobo eReading platform, one of the largest global catalogues in the world, top rated apps for any device, and Kobo’s leading selection of eReaders. Launching to market within the fourth quarter of 2011, in 81 stores in France and online with Fnac.com, this partnership will cement Kobo...

Today Amazon opened a French Kindle store, joining its already existing USA, UK, and German stores. The French store will serve customers in France, Belgium, Monaco, Luxembourg, and Switzerland. Along with the new store, Amazon is selling a French edition of its lowest-end non-touch Kindle (the one that sells for $109 ad-free in the US) for 99 Euros (US$133). The devices will ship on October 14th. I notice that the French Kindle store has a number of works by French author Maurice Leblanc available quite cheaply. It’s almost enough to make me want to learn French. ...

The Bookseller reports that three French publishers who had previously sued Google over unauthorized digitization of their books as part of its Google Books plan have failed to file the case by a September 6th deadline. The article speculates that they may be on the verge of reaching an agreement with Google similar to the one Hachette Livre entered into last year. A French publishers’ association and authors’ association also filed suit against Google at the same time as Hachette and fellow publisher La Martinère (which also settled) did, and have not said whether they also plan to drop...

From the press release: Paris, September the First, 2011 Digital publishers gather for: A different literary season This is a premiere in the publishing world, in France and in the world as well. At the beginning of the new literary season, a bunch of publishers and digital providers have decided to gather around an unprecedented event, through a website www.larentreelitteraire.org. A place fully dedicated to their books and news during this so special period of emulation. An event that can’t be missed At the initiative of Walrus, a digital book creative studio, digital publishers will meet around this very special place...

The Bookseller reports that Google has reached an agreement with publisher Hachette Livre to scan out-of-print French e-books. Between 40,000 and 50,000 books will be scanned, and Hachette Livre will decide which ones are made available as e-books. (I wonder if it will include any Arsène Lupin novels?) Google hopes to reach similar agreements with other French publishers. The deal took two months longer than it was supposed to, but both parties seem satisfied with its terms. A little strange, given how much acrimony there was in Europe over Google’s scanning projects not long ago....

Marie Lebert's review of the past forty years of ebooks continues over at Project Gutenberg News with eBooks: 1993 – PDF, from past to present. Lebert's post focuses mainly on the timeline of the format's evolution, so I heartily recommend you supplement it with Nate Hoffelder's OMG PDF WTF at The Digital Reader, which highlights some of the format's huge security issues....

From a LeMonde Article (In French, Mechanical Translation via Google): The National Library of France announced Wednesday, July 6, launching an appeal to private partners for the digitization and enhancement of its collections. “Today is a historic step,” said President BNF, Bruno Racine, during a joint press conference in Paris with the Minister of Culture, Frédéric Mitterrand, and the Commissioner General for investment, René Ricol. The BNF has identified 12 areas that can be scanned in partnership with private actors. These include ancient books from 1470 to 1700, a set of 300 000 French and 500 000 printed in the public domain,...

Recently we published two of Marie Lebert's essays on the history of ebooks, covering the early years around 1971-74. Lebert has in fact written more than 40 pieces that examine the past 40 years, and published them in French on Actualitté. Starting today, Project Gutenberg News will publish them in English translations, with a Spanish version to follow. The first one is called eBooks: 1991 – From ASCII to Unicode, and it's available now. Project Gutenberg News writes that the essays are filled with interviews from over 100 people and references to little-known or forgotten projects along the way, making them...

So says an article in The Bookseller: E-book sales in France amounted to 1.8% of total book sales last year, or €54m (£48.9m) excluding applications and licences, according to Antoine Gallimard, president of the French Booksellers Association (Syndicat National de l’Edition) and c.e.o. of Editions Gallimard. Although online sales of e-books rose by some 40% year-on-year in 2010, they still represented only about a third of the 1.8%, Gallimard told the SNE general assembly yesterday. The other two-thirds were made up of physical forms of distribution, such as CD-Roms and USB keys. If applications and licence revenues are added, SNE figures show...