iPhone E-Books Can't Match Kindle's Catalog

Consumers jilt e-book readers, download titles to smartphones

(NEWSER) - They’ve only been around for a few years, but digital book readers may already be going the way of the Walkman. In increasing numbers, tech savvy bookworms are downloading their favorite titles onto smartphones like the iPhone for a fraction of the cost, BusinessWeek reports. For travelers, “bringing an extra piece of equipment loses some of its value,” said an iPhone convert. More»

App works similarly to popular iPhone version, but no annotations

(NEWSER) - BlackBerry users no longer have to look longingly at others reading e-books on their Kindles or iPhones, as Amazon today released an e-reader app for their device. After the iPhone app launched last year, an exec tells CNET , “customers have been asking us to bring a similar experience to the BlackBerry.” The company has plans to offer a Kindle app for the Apple iPad soon, but no word on one for Android devices. More»

War with Kindle to transform business

(NEWSER) - Book publishers were locked in last-minute talks with Apple ahead of today's unveiling of the tablet, which has been touted as promising to change the publishing industry as radically as the iPod did the music industry. The tablet's model for books, which puts it in direct competition with the Amazon Kindle, moves away from the heavy e-book discounting the Kindle has brought, asking publishers to price books at $12.99 or $14.99, rather than the $9.99 Amazon favors. More»

(NEWSER) - Nicholson Baker wanted to like the Kindle, honest. But when he unwrapped it and began to see what all the fuss was about, he "tussled with a sense of anti-climax," the prolific author writes in the New Yorker. Things never improved. He slams the e-reader for having a "greenish, sickly gray" screen, cruddy images, and limited selection of books. Amazon "is very good at selling things," he writes. "It isn’t so good, to date anyway, at making things." More»

Amazon hopes to corner iPhone's eBook market

(NEWSER) - Amazon’s widely praised digital book reader is getting a second home on the iPhone, reports the Washington Post. Amazon is launching a free Kindle app today that has most of the Kindle functions. Though it won't have the Kindle’s ink-and-paper-like screen, the iPhone version will allow users to buy and download any Kindle-compatible book, adjust the type size, and bookmark pages. More»