NEWEST: ONLINE ONLY
Paperless publishing gets nod from King of Horror 3/15/2000
By Margot Douaihy
March 15, 2000 --- Stephen King's new novella, "Riding the Bullet," was released yesterday exclusively in electronic book (ebook) format. Readers can download "Riding the Bullet" onto a personal computer, laptop, or ebook device from online content sites. King has mentioned no plans to publish the new tale in traditional print.
Amazon.com is offering free downloads of the novella via Glassbook Reader software. Barnesandnoble.com offered the free download yesterday only, but as of today has started charging the regular price of $2.50.
The public reaction to "Riding" has been so staggering that both Amazon.com and BN.com were temporarily disabled and unable to provide the download yesterday. Even Simon & Schuster's main content provider, Softlock.com, is experiencing a crippling user backlog that has made the download process impossible. Softlock.com promises to deliver the download via email "in the order the requests were received."
Horror master goes cyber
While King is one of the biggest names in the publishing industry, this author of over 30 best-sellers is a relative newcomer to cyber-distribution. He wrote "Riding the Bullet," -- a 66-page ghost story -- specifically for ebook circulation while recovering from injuries sustained after a near-fatal accident last year. "I'm curious to see what sort of response there is and whether or not this is the future," King told the Associated Press.
Simon & Schuster -- King's publisher -- said publishing ebooks expedites the conventional process, bringing the author's work to an international audience substantially quicker. "What's exciting is that we are able to go from Stephen King's computer to the reader in a fraction of the print-book publishing arc," Kate Tentler, a Simon & Schuster exec said.
The term "ebook" refers to both a format and a CE product. "Riding the Bullet" is in ebook format -- text that you can download from online content providers and read via your computer or a special device.
Hardwired ebook devices, on the other hand, should be thought of as electronic libraries. They are about the size of a regular paperback book and let users download and store text, as well as perform internal searches. The amount of books you can store depends on your device's memory. The market's flagship hardwired ebook, the Franklin Rocket eBook sells for $299 list and offers a 4MB memory which can hold about 10 books. The high-end EB Dedicated Reader sells for $1500 list and is equipped with color and a modem. This pricier model includes a PCMCIA memory cartridge that stores as many as 500,000 color pages.
The state of e-ffairs
As awareness continues to grow, manufacturers and online content providers are expanding their options and "upgrade" potential. Powells.com is currently offering up to 20 percent discounts on most RocketEdition titles and the Rocket eBook recently lowered the price of their 32MB memory upgrade to $149.
Simon & Schuster also announced that they are expanding the electronic distribution of the wildly popular Martin Dugard novel, "Knockdown." The eBook versions will be published for the Rocket eBook and Softbook.
Drawn by the rising interest in ebook technology, new players are taking the field. The Wall Street Journal reports that Gemstar International Group Ltd. and France's Thomson Multimedia have agreed to cooperate in the production of ebook devices. The firms will also seek to devise simpler techniques for downloading content, and will make available material including full-color catalogs, reference books and technical publications.
As for the immediate future of ebooks, we should see the trend toward PDA adaptability continue. In just one example, newbie online content provider PeanutPress.com now offers free Peanut reader software that lets consumers buy books for Palm or the Windows CE (now known as Pocket PC) personal digital assistants.
And in his keynote address at International CES 2000, Bill Gates demonstrated software which, Microsoft claims, comes close to the convenience and visual quality of conventional printed text. Dubbed Microsoft Reader with ClearType, the software will be included with the new generation of Pocket PCs. Computer displays have traditionally lagged far behind paper as a medium for reading more than small amounts of text at a time.
This article is an etown.com exclusive.
e-town.com
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As for the immediate future of ebooks, we should see the trend toward PDA adaptability continue.
I disagree with this statement if I understand it correctly. Content rights (or the loss thereof) and security are issues that other formats fail to effectively address. It is much more likely that the dedicated eBook devices will adapt certain PDA functionality in higher-end models as dictated over time by user needs.
If security is compromised for a non-dedicated device then it is lost for all devices as will be the publisher and author monies. Successful decryption of a dedicated eBook would be good for that single unit only as would its monetary loss. Henry explained this at some length during the last CC.
A secure dedicated device costing under $100 is the solution IMO to the double chicken and egg problem as Henry termed it.
Regards
Stew |
