Barnes & Noble closing all ebook stores except US and UK

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by EowynCarter

You are messing up Google books and Google play books.

And I don't care that much about indies. I can get them on other websites.
It's all about access to books from the mainstream authors / publishers.

These days Indies *are* mainstream.

Especially the ones with reverted ex-tradpub titles.
Or ones moving on from tradpub.

Lois Bujold being the most recent tradpubber to go at least hybrid.

http://www.amazon.com/Penrics-Demon-...U?tag=mr060-20

As for Google, Nate's been all over it:

http://the-digital-reader.com/2015/0...-ebook-piracy/

[Calenorn]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

And they built ten times more than the market could buy.
(Give or take a million or two.)

Well, yeah. But I did my part; bought two of them!

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by Calenorn

Well, yeah. But I did my part; bought two of them!

I got four and four cases for the (list) price of one.
Nice stocking stuffers at Radio Shack liquidation prices.

[odamizu]

Originally Posted by FizzyWater

A simple Google search will help you find your way.

LOL! I love this! How did I never see this before?

Originally Posted by fjtorres

Even if they don't plan to, the international closures increase the doubts about the viability of the US store. Classic death spiral.

It's looking like a death spiral to me, too.

I just want to know if BN is going to transfer Nook accounts to another bookseller like Sony did, or if we're just going to lose (official access to) our ebooks.

[EowynCarter]

What make you think kobo is at risk of going under?

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by EowynCarter

What make you think kobo is at risk of going under?

There isn't much evidence that it is danger of folding but there are three red flags that indicate all is not well in Kobo land:

- The appointment of a Rakuten in-house turnaround specialist as Kobo CEO last year.

- Rakuten buying Overdrive, which specializes in business to business ebook sales operations. Rakuten is much like Ali Baba and eBay in that all three make their money hosting smaller retailers rather than as actual consumer retailers themselves, like Amazon and Walmart. Factor in that Rakuten has never used their "online mall" website to support Kobo and Kobo starts to look like a misfit in the Rakuten empire.

- Kobo public statements in Canada (their strongest market) that they would be unable to compete against Amazon without price fixing and the recent revelation that the Canadian government is investigating the big publishers (and Kobo and Apple) for signs of price fixing collusion.

http://the-digital-reader.com/2015/0...ng-conspiracy/

Add them up and the odds of a Kobo divestiture or shutdown is, while still low, non-zero. Of the two, it is more likely Rakuten would try to spin them off but the recent declines in BPH ebook sales don't make Kobo quite as attractive as it was when they bought it.

There is also a looming threat in the form of Kindle Unlimited that is starting to be a significant part of the ebook landscape. It's role isn't totally clear yet but it is accounting for significant revenue to authors.

The next year or so threatens to be as significant as 2010 was.

[conan50]

The answer to these failing and the potential of failing ebookstores is DRM-free ebooks.
You can buy mp3 music anywhere and play it anywhere. These ebook DRM schemes are a continual threat to ebooks future. The alternative is piracy (not advocating it) or stripping DRM from ebooks. And the latter only works until they find a new way to block doing it.
DRM-free ebooks is what we need badly. Amazon helped set us free regarding mp3 music downloads, too bad they couldn't have done it with ebooks. There are a few ebook publishers who are forward thinking, but not enough.

[murg]

Originally Posted by Nabeel

At the risk of sounding really stupid, what are you implying?

Kobo at some point may make the decision to lock down either their devices or ebooks.

This is what B&N is currently doing. And see how well it's working for them.

[Fbone]

Kobo's last few contests haven't operated correctly and were shut down early. There have been reports of promo codes not working at all. Website design not up to their competitor's standards.

From what I read here Kobo's customer service hasn't undergone any remarkable improvements lately.

Kobo's prices are consistently higher than Amazon.

There is still no major US retailer selling the latest products.

Added to the previous comments it doesn't instill confidence that Kobo is a long-ish player in the ereading community.

[Dylrob]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

They were via a Windows 8 app only.

Well that was dumb.

[AnemicOak]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

And all the smaller publishers who sell directly, and Smashwords.

Originally Posted by HarryT

And Apple. They may not be popular with many people here, but there's no denying that they're a significant player in the game.

Originally Posted by pdurrant

And all the smaller publishers who sell directly, and Smashwords.

Originally Posted by Nate the great

And Apple.

And (god help us) Google.

Originally Posted by Apache

And we will still have Baen.
Apache

Originally Posted by pdurrant

And (in the UK) Sainsbury, although I do wonder for how much longer.

Originally Posted by HarryT

And Waterstones, of course, which is a very good ePub bookstore.

...and

eBooks.com
OmniLit
Books A Million
Large publisher stores
places like Weightless Books & Bookview Cafe



Interestingly I just noticed that B-A-M is selling old model Nooks now (Simple Touch for $40, HD+ tablet for $80).

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by AnemicOak

Large publisher stores

Like Harper Collins' store?
Or the Hachette store that never got to beta?

[odamizu]

Originally Posted by murg

I hope you guys realise that when Kobo finally goes over to the dark side, we're all going to be royally screwed.

Originally Posted by Nabeel

At the risk of sounding really stupid, what are you implying?

Originally Posted by murg

Kobo at some point may make the decision to lock down either their devices or ebooks.

This is what B&N is currently doing. And see how well it's working for them.

Ouch. No more joking. That's the dark side all right, and there are no cookies there.

[AnemicOak]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

Like Harper Collins' store?
Or the Hachette store that never got to beta?

S&S's store isn't bad or wasn't in the past. Neither was Penguin's when I used it in the past, although my experience isn't recent. The HC store pretty much sucks, but it is an option for ePub's.

[FizzyWater]

I never went back to S&S after they closed a few years back (when the used to sell eReader format books at a nice price - about 30% off cover - regularly).