They didn’t create the first ebook device. Sony’s original Reader had more than a one year head-start on the Kindle. What they were first with though was a platform that made wireless ebook buying a snap; Whispernet was a game-changer.
Next, they had the vision to create a Kindle reader app for every platform known to man. Want to read a Kindle book on your Windows laptop? No problem. On a Mac? Absolutely. On an Android device, an iPhone, iPad or Blackberry? Check, check, check, and check. This, btw, is what made me comfortable building up a library of Kindle content. I pity the sucker who’s bought a ton of content from Apple’s iBookstore; that person is locked in with Apple for the rest of their lives.
Of course, the more ebooks I buy from Amazon the more I’m locked in with them down the road. But I don’t mind. That’s a key part of Amazon’s secret sauce. Btw, when I say “locked in”, I’m talking about the content platform, not the hardware platform. I plan to buy a Kindle tablet on day one, but if another Android tablet comes along a year or so later and is better, I’ll probably switch to it.
I’ve been asked why I don’t buy econtent from Barnes & Noble or Kobo. After all, they too offer apps on a variety of platforms. I’d rather stick with one reader app I’m used to and not have to remember which options are/aren’t available (or how they work) in other apps. Then there’s the practical side. if I want to search for a phrase I know I read but I can’t remember which ebook it was in, it’s easy to search across your entire collection…as long as that collection was purchased from the same ebookstore! Good luck searching simultaneously across your Kindle ebooks, your Nook ebooks, and your Kobo ebooks. It can’t be done. In fact, cross-library features like this are something I’ll bet each vendor will build up further, again, with an eye on keeping you loyal to them.
So the fact that I keep buying more and more econtent from Amazon, just like many of you, means I’m making it harder and harder to ever abandon them. But as long as they keep supporting all platforms I’m perfectly content to keep doing this.
reposted with permission from A Kindleville blog
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Amazon didn’t actually come up with the “app on every platform” idea either. Mobipocket had it first. But that just goes to show that Amazon followed through on a great idea.
The next logical step should be opening to ePub, then, but that’s not going to happen soon, it seems
It’s not going to happen soon because opening up to epub is *not* the next logical step.
On the contrary.
Epub may be an annointed “standard” on paper but in the real world it is a fragmented specification rife with glitches, variant intepretations, and multiple incompatible DRM’s. And epub3 is coming real-soon-now to add to the confusion. epub’s eventual retail level domination is *not* a law of nature nor a forgone conclusion. There plenty of examples of other annointed standards that failed in the marketplace despite the religious fervor of their supporters. (GOSIP, OSI, SGML, for starters.)
From a purely competitive viewpoint, the longer epub fragmentation continues, the stronger the Kindle ecosystem gets. Native support for even DRM-free epub undercuts support for the mobi/azw format. Amazon’s actions show they want all the parts of their ecosystem to prosper in the ebook era; storefront, hardware, reader apps, DRM, publishing… They want the full synergy and are not going to undercut one to prop up another.
Which isn’t to say that at some point in the future epub support might not be a bigger plus than a minus. But as long as the Kindle ecosystem is healthy and growing and the competition is fragmented it is to Amazon’s benefit to put all of its support behind their own ecosystem and let epub fend for itself. Let Adobe’s clients fight over the scraps Apple, Kobo, and B&N leave behind after Amazon gets the lion’s (first) share.
Smart competitors compete; they don’t provide aid and comfort to their enemies.
(If Microsoft had let Apple go belly-up when it was floundering–feds be damned–they wouldn’t be stuck fighting a two front war with Google and Apple as they are now.)
You say: “I pity the sucker who’s bought a ton of content from Apple’s iBookstore; that person is locked in with Apple for the rest of their lives.”
The only problem is that your statement is that it’s NOT TRUE! You’d know that if you weren’t such an Apple basher and instead did your homework. I have an iPad, a Nook, and a Sony reader, and I can easily transfer e-books that I purchased in the iBook store onto either my Nook or my Sony, where they display just fine. It’s also not hard, it takes only seconds, to convert them so they can be read on the Kindle. Protected books, those which have D.R.M. attached, can, of course, only be read on the iPad, but that’s true of the protection systems of any device, not only Apple’s. (Thus, the argument put forth by numerous consumers against D.R.M. systems.)
I’m not “locked in with Apple” for the rest of my life. I choose to use the iPad for most of my e-book reading because it’s a great device upon which to read an e-book, but if I want, or choose, to transfer my unprotected books to my Sony reader or my Nook, I can easily do so at any time.
To add to Joe’s skepticism that the iBookstore is full of DRM-free titles, I’d like to point out that Adobe’s system is less closed than those of Amazon or Apple because Adobe actually licenses the technology to anyone willing to pay. In fact, I can take an Adobe title and use it on any of these devices (and more that they haven’t listed):
http://blogs.adobe.com/digitalpublishing/supported-devices
I don’t agree with DRM, and it is obviously anti-customer, but at least Adobe isn’t a lock-in.
Also, Joe’s assertion that the iBookstore is bad is not the same as saying the iPad makes for a poor reader. You can install eReader programs that enable access to the more “open” Adobe and, in some ways, Amazon DRM systems.
Peter, I’m curious to know how many books you’ve bought via iBooks that can be converted to Nook or Sony (without breaking DRM). Most of the ebooks sold by Amazon, Apple and Sony have DRM wrappers. I’d love to know how you’re finding so many without DRM; alternatively, if these are DRM’d books are you truly able to legally move them to a non-Apple device?
Also, can you list the steps (or point me to them somewhere online) to do this conversion? I haven’t heard of anyone who’s been able to buy a DRM’d iBook title and legally move it to a non-Apple device. I’d love to hear more.
Btw, I’m not sure I really qualify as an “Apple basher”. I’m writing this comment from my MacBook Pro. I stood in line to buy an iPad on day one and I’ve been using an iPhone for the past 3 years. If I’m “bashing” I’m also “buying”! Further, I believe I’m stating the facts.
If indeed there’s an easy way for someone to buy a DRM’d ebook from Apple and legally move it to their Nook or Sony reader I’ll gladly correct this post. I’m sure there are a *lot* of consumers out there who would love to know how, so please send the details.
Amazon doesn’t have an app for “every platform known to man.” I cannot buy a Kindle book and read it on my Sony. (If I’m wrong, please let me know how to do it!)
Strictly speaking, Sony readers aren’t a software platform any more than DVD players or PMPs are. Even if Amazon wanted to port a Kindle reader to your sony reader, they can’t; Sony doesn’t actually provide the tools and documentation needed to port the Kindle app (or any third party software) to their reader, nor would they welcome it. WebOS, QNX, WP7, iOS, Android, Windows, and MacOS do. Big difference.
Nonetheless, there *is* one platform that Amazon (and B&N, and Adobe, among others) ignore: LINUX. Which is funny because Kindles are based off a form of LINUX.
Look at it this way: if Amazon went out of their way to hack their software onto Sony readers they would be making them more useful and attractive and Kindles less so. Not a good business decision. Everything in life isn’t a zero-sum game but this one is.
When you buy an ebook reader of any brand, you are knowingly or not choosing to tie yourself to one of four DRM camps and choosing not to be a part of the other three.
Your choice.
It is no different than choosing between a PS3, XBOX, or Wii and Amazon has no more obligation to let you read their books on a Sony than Sony has an obligation to make their games playable on XBOX.
I didn’t imply that Amazon had an obligation to let me read their books on a Sony (nor that Sony has any obligation to let Amazon create and install an app on a Sony device.) I merely pointed out that the statement in the original post — that “they had the vision to create a Kindle reader app for every platform known to man” — is untrue. There are, in fact, platforms/devices on which you cannot read Kindle books.
That said, you are correct in pointing out that when you choose an ebook reader, you’re tying yourself to a particular DRM camp. What you don’t mention (and neither did the original poster) is that those “camps” differ in approach. Amazon/Kindle offers lots of apps for various (though not all) devices on which one might read the books, but the books can ONLY be bought through Amazon. Sony, the Kobo e-reader, and some other ePub devices allow you to purchase books at more than one store, which means that you can in fact price-shop for non-agency-publisher books. Similarly, the iPad and iPhone/iTouch devices can load apps which allow you to read e-books from sources other than the i-Store — though Apple appears to be trying to limit that capability somewhat, at least in terms of whether you can purchase books from other stores directly from those store’s apps. I am not entirely sure where Nook falls on this spectrum; I’m fairly sure that e-books bought from B&N can only be read on a Nook, but I don’t know whether Nook devices can read ePub books from other sources (with the Adobe Digital Editions version of DRM.)
So essentially, when you purchase a reader device, you are not only choosing which DRM camp you want to lock yourself into, you’re also choosing whether to lock yourself into a single source of books or not.
Incidentally, you can also choose whether to allow a bookseller/device-maker to have access to everything you have and do on your [wireless] device, or keep your device and your library private (by, for instance, porting DRM-authorized files into Calibre and loading them onto your device from there, and avoiding all wireless contact.) The latter is easy to do with Sony and probably other ADE-DRM devices. I don’t know how difficult it is on Apple, Nook, or Kindle devices. Input, anyone?
You are confusing platform with product.
Mr Wikert’s statements are factually correct.
And my point is that when it comes to competing, closed “walled garden” systems are as valid as “open” multi-vendor systems. Which is why I brought in the example of the gaming consoles.
It is all a matter of knowing *what* you are buying.
You seem to think that Amazon’s system offers less value than the Adobe Adept system Sony adopted. (You remember that Sony started with a “walled garden” themselves, right? Back when they were an industry leader instead of just another Adobe client.) You are entitled to think so and you are entitled to commit yourself to the Adept camp.
But you do seem to be a bit confused about Calibre and DRM
(I am well aware of how Calibre and the Adept system works; I use the former and I own a couple Adept-based readers.)
Last I heard, Calibre only manages DRM-free ebooks. If you are managing ADEPT-DRM’ed ebooks with it then you are using a DRM-busting plug-in that is not part of Calibre proper to remove DRM. Which may or not be technically legal depending on where you live. If you are in fact using such a plug-in, then you should know that a similar plug-in exists to enable managing Kindle ebooks via Calibre. Similar plug-in exist for B&N’s proprietary DRM as well as the older ereader DRM. One does *NOT* exist for Apple iBooks.
So, to answer your final question: managing your (previously) DRM’ed ebooks with Calibre is as possible for Kindle, Nook, B&N as for generic Adobe DRM readers like sony, if you know how to find the same collection of DRM-removal plug-ins. And if you know how to do *that*, you can in fact buy Kindle ebooks for generic readers.
A lot of people do exactly that:
http://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=146367
Either you follow the rules and accept whichever DRM you bought into, or you ignore them and remove it. Either way, there is no reason to gripe.
Actually, it is quite easy to read Kindle books on Linux. Just use the Kindle Cloud Reader in conjunction with Chrome. You can even read the books offline.
True, but there is still no native app, right?
I’ve always found it odd that what should be a trivial port has never been released.
The cloud reader does open the door for universal kindle book access somewhere dwn the road once HTML5 takes over so at some point every device with a browser will be kindle (and epub, there are several online epub readers in development) capable.