Vook’s VP of Business Development Matthew Cavnar told me on the phone that while the company is “kind of flattered” by some aspects of iBooks Author, since they look very similar to its own product, it isn’t fearful of being elbowed out of the market now that Apple’s decided to play.

Cavnar says iBooks Author helps raise the status of e-books in general, and helps promote them as a valid alternative to apps, which is good for Vook and other e-book publishers. And while the e-book creation tool “looks great,” in Cavnar’s opinion, it’s an option that comes with trade-offs many content creators and publishers won’t be able to swallow. Specifically, he sees a problem with the portability and limitations of the e-Books Author ultimately produces.

“When people want e-books, they want e-books anywhere,” Cavnar told me. In light of that, he believes any cross-platform solution inherently holds more appeal for publishers, since they also hold more appeal for end-users. Being platform agnostic appeals to what Cavnar calls “the switcher demographic,” which is basically anyone who works or plays on more than one company’s platforms.

iBooks Author won’t be as appealing to those users, since it creates a file that’s not quite epub2, not quite epub3, and not quite XHTML5, according to Vook’s blog, which makes it “one channel only,” or essentially proprietary. Also, while Apple will let you distribute the book independent of the iBookstore, if you want to make any money on the product, you have to go through the iBookstore and the iBookstore only. Exclusivity as a requirement won’t likely go over great with authors.

Apple is clearly trying to encourage writers and publishers to go all-in on its platform. If it had done this before Android rose to a majority position in the world’s mobile market, it might have had an easier time convincing folks that was acceptable. Now, however, cross-platform solutions like Vook still have a good chance of staying in this fight, by being where customers are, instead of where the big players would like them to be.

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A page from "Alice for the iPad" by Atomic Antelope

Since before Apple announced its education-oriented press event taking place this week, there’s been some speculation — including here — that a logical step would be to start selling digital textbooks directly through its iBookstore. It would make sense because Apple needs a way to juice iBook sales, it has a fantastic e-textbook reader in the iPad and because, well, what else would you announce at a small “education” event in New York City, the center of publishing?

It turns out, it might not be that complicated.

To begin with, if it were about books, it’s a little odd that many in the publishing business don’t know anything about what Apple’s about to announce. What if what the company reveals on Thursday is more consumer-oriented with an educational edge to it? It could be a publishing platform for building and making interactive kids books, with an emphasis on simple creation tools; something easy to use and geared toward helping people build their own digital storytelling projects. It could be like a publishing version of iMovie, iPhoto or GarageBand, a set of tools that enables anyone to put together and self-publish interactive books? That’s something that parents, teachers or independent content creators could use, and could certainly be considered “education.”

The word “book,” by the way, is hard not to use in this context, but it’s not very accurate. As Inkling CEO Matt MacInnis told me last week when talking about the future of digital textbooks, “textbook” is wrong when what were are really talking about are digital learning tools, instead of paper pages. “That’s going to have to go away,” he said. “The future of publishing is learning software and analytics and feedback and rich technology.”

Interactive books with feedback and rich content on the iPad aren’t only for kids, of course; here’s a list of some with good grown-up oriented content. Plenty of companies have already been using the iPad as a platform to publish interactive kids’ books. A search on the iTunes Store will pop up everything from digital-only publishers like Atomic Antelope that build beautiful children’s stories for the iPad, to TouchyBooks and several interactive book versions of Disney movies. But we have heard Apple’s announcement is geared toward the younger end of the K-12 set, and this could fit with that idea. It also wouldn’t be a huge surprise if people took a new set of tools for building visual stories with rich content and ran with it and it eventually became much more popular outside of content aimed at younger kids and students.

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The invitation has few details, but says it will center on education. The event will take place at the Guggenheim Museum on Jan. 19 starting at 10 a.m. EST.

So what will happen at the (very rare) Apple event in New York? Well, as the city is the center of the publishing world, it’s been rumored Apple is going to announce an expansion of its iBookstore to include textbooks. Perhaps an effort to replace multiple hardback textbooks with digital textbooks packed onto an iPad? SVP of Internet Services Eddy Cue, who is in charge of the iBookstore, is said to be one of the featured speakers at the event.

We’ll be there and live blogging the event, so be sure to check back here that day.

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I’ve been able to try out Amazon’s implementation of magazine and newspaper viewing, which went live yesterday. It does add a nice splash of color to otherwise text-heavy content, but if you’re looking for interactivity, you should probably look elsewhere. The periodicals offer more in terms of user interface advantages on the iPad then they do on the Kindle, owing mostly to touchscreen navigation, but special features like rich media and the kind of visual flair that made magazines like Wired on the iPad such a joy to read are lacking.

The Nook software appears to have more lofty aspirations. Its titles are billed by the company as “interactive, full-color” editions that also feature something called “exclusive ArticleView” with allows for user customization of how articles are displayed. The update isn’t yet live in the store, however, so we can’t say for sure how it will compare to either Amazon editions or native iPad apps.

Whether you choose to subscribe through native apps, or through either the Kindle or Nook stores may depend on your device usage habits. Amazon and Nook subscriptions both work well across multiple platforms, meaning that you can subscribe once and access them on your iPad, dedicated e-reader, and possibly your Android device or iPhone, too. iPad periodical subscriptions for dedicated apps typically only work on the iPad itself (although some offer print subscriptions that carry over to the iPad, so you have two possible formats for reading).

In some cases Amazon or Nook editions may also be cheaper, but that wasn’t so in many of the examples I checked. National Geographic, for example, which benefits greatly from the iPad’s beautiful display, is $19.99 for an annual subscription through the App Store, and $1.99 per month on the Kindle store. The Kindle version is a lot less visually impressive, and costs more money, since it lacks a flat yearly subscription.

So I put it to you: Where will you buy your iOS magazines and newspapers now that new options are available?

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The Wall Street Journal has reported that major textbook publishers have made deals with ScrollMotion Inc, in an effort to bring their textbooks to digital devices — including Apple’s upcoming iPad.

McGraw-Hill, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt K-12, Pearson Education and Kaplan Inc are all named as ScrollMotions’s latest partners (customers?). According to WSJ, ScrollMotion;

…has already developed applications for Apple’s iPhone and iPod Touch. ScrollMotion takes digital files provided by publishers for the iPad, adapts them to fit on the device, and then adds enhancements such as a search function, dictionaries, glossaries, interactive quizzes and page numbers.

Pretty much all the things you’d expect from a a digital edu-book. Other cool features said to be included in the iPad deal include;

…applications to let students play video, highlight text, record lectures, take printed notes, search the text, and participate in interactive quizzes to test how much they’ve learned and where they may need more work.

Only in recent years have tablet devices begun to offer a glimpse at a practical digital realization of many educators long-harbored dreams. It helps enormously that they’re book-shaped (almost removing the physical and psychological barriers laptops and desktop computers put between people), and, sometimes, they’re almost affordable. Sadly, their adoption has been hampered by lackluster design. Until the iPad appeared, the Kindle offered the best digital textbook platform for students and teachers, although that’s not saying much; the Kindle is slow, features a greyscale-only screen and offers a cumbersome input method. Most importantly, the Kindle does only one thing. It does it competently, to be sure, but it doesn’t dazzle.

It’s no wonder then, that textbook publishers are paying close attention to the iPad; it not only improves on the Kindle in almost every way (perhaps with the exception of battery life) but introduces an input paradigm already very well established and understood by millions of iPhone or iPod Touch owners. Some critics decry a lack of multitasking and expansion; but consider the far more powerful reality that the iPad just happens to be the easiest-to-use computer ever made.

For a teaching/learning aid, on the trajectory of “intuitively easy” it lies closer to the humble pen and paper than to a TFT screen with a bunch of plastic keys and a pointing device.

Publishers were already dipping their toes into the digital book market, but only tentatively. Now the iPad is just around the corner, it looks like they’re losing those prior inhibitions and preparing to dive right in, though they’re trying not to sound too enamoured. Rik Kranenburg, president of McGraw-Hill’s higher education unit, said;

People have been talking about the impact of technology on education for 25 years. It feels like it is really going to happen in 2010. Nobody knows what device will take off, or which ‘killer app’ will drive student adaptations. Today they aren’t reading e-textbooks on their laptops. But ahead we see all kinds of new instruction materials.”

Prickly Issue

Of course, the issue of Price remains prickly. Amazon sold its e-books at $9.99, despite the wishes of publishers who wanted to charge a bit more. Now, following a bit of a public spat with publisher Macmillans, prices of some e-book titles on Amazon.com (and, presumably, international Amazon sites) are beginning to change. Amazon maintains they set book prices at $9.99 to make it fair for consumers. Cynicism, on the other hand, offers an alternative reason, that includes the phrases “loss leader” and “market dominance.” I’ll leave you to decide which is most likely.

Meanwhile, one man who never seems to give two hoots about what’s fair, right or even logical – Rupert “Mad Dog” Murdoch – took a break from hating on Google to declare that he supported (and preferred) Apple’s pricing model for titles in the iBookstore. In a News Corp. earnings call yesterday, Murdoch said,

We don’t like the Amazon model of selling everything at $9.99… We think it really devalues books and it hurts all the retailers of the hard cover books. We are not against [electronic] books. On the contrary we like them very much indeed. It is low cost to us… Apple in its agreement with us […] does allow for a variety of slightly higher prices.

It’s interesting to note that a lot of criticism and debate surrounding Apple’s foray into e-book sales has been negative. Many bloggers have grumbled bitterly about Apple “doing to the publishing industry what they did to the music industry” and even yesterday All Things Digital was making reference to the “scarring” experienced by the music industry.

But what exactly did Apple do to the music industry that was so terrible? Last time I checked, Apple pretty much saved it, bringing sanity to a media landscape that, before the iTunes store arrived, was a fragmented sales and accessibility nightmare, where prices and content distribution were so appallingly inconsistent across competing services/platforms that scores of customers resorted to illegal file sharing as the de facto method for getting music.

If Apple can bring to the publishing industry the same format homogeny, pricing stability and content distribution/management methods that it brought to the music industry, that’s good for everyone. Everyone except Amazon.

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Newspapers and magazines — the entire news print industry to be honest — have been suffering a long and torturous decline for much of the last decade as more of us turn to the Internet and electronic devices to get (increasingly personalized) news and other content. While publishers have generally been slow to adapt to shifting delivery platforms, change is — finally — afoot. Publishing supergiant Condé Nast is now taking its first tentative steps to embracing the digital realm with a series of iPhone apps designed to deliver its most popular titles electronically.

Adage reports that the first title will be GQ magazine, released this December in the app store and priced at $2.99 (the regular print edition of the magazine costs as much as $4.99).

Adage’s Nat Ives writes:

The new app platform could help the company squeeze circulation and real ad revenue from digital. Because the apps will include all the editorial and ads that the print editions do, the Audit Bureau of Circulations will consider the apps to be paid circulation just like newsstand sales and subscriber copies. That’s important because advertisers only want to pay for ad space in issues that the audit bureau defines as paid.

So the digital edition of GQ will be identical to its dead-tree counterpart, but cost appreciably less. It might also offer compelling extra content and rich media at (and this is so very important to publishers) little-to-no extra cost. After all, an embedded video is an impossibility in a printed magazine, and a digital edition offers unlimited virtual column-inches for expanded editorial.

Condé hasn’t completely abandoned its old methods for generating profits. Indeed, it’s relying on the fact its digital issues will be counted as paid editions because print ads command higher rates than online ads.

Size Matters

So, will you buy GQ on your iPhone? I suspect there won’t be too many people who do. Seasoned iPhone users are keenly aware that the device’s form factor makes for a dissatisfying reading experience of even modest duration. The iPhone is hardly the most comfortable platform for reading anything more than email. Sure, apps like Stanza and Instapaper make reading on the iPhone far more fluid and tolerable than, say, reading lengthy web pages in Safari. But they can’t change the fact that you’re still peering at tiny text on a 3.5 inch screen. Only the most dedicated of readers will suffer such eye-strain-inducing limitations, all the while dreaming of something just as light, just as thin, but much larger. Y’know… a tablet.

This is something Condé Nast understands very well. Its upcoming app isn’t about bringing its various print publications to the iPhone — it’s about the timely positioning of its product to take advantage of the upcoming tablet.

Says Sarah Chubb, President of Condé Nast Digital:

This iPhone is just one platform. We plan to be, and generally try to be, anywhere our consumers are.

We think that the minute Apple is ready, if they ever are, to announce that they’re going forward with a tablet, that we’ll be ahead of everybody.

I can’t say I’m a GQ reader, but that’s not meant as a judgement against that particular title. I just don’t buy newspapers or magazines. Practically no one I know my age (or younger) does. It’s not hard to see why; these days, most people enjoy regular, inexpensive access to the Internet. Services like Twitter and RSS feeds ensure we get only the news and content we want to read, when we want to read it — and what’s more, it’s usually free.

$2.99 is too much for a magazine that exists only as pixels on a (small) screen. 99 cents seems far more appealing and most likely would shift more (virtual) copies. It’s more appropriate, too, since the traditional resource, print and distribution costs associated with a dead-tree publication don’t apply in the digital realm. Perhaps when Condé Nast’s printed magazines have finally gone the way of the Dodo, its digital issues will hit that magic sub-dollar price.

In the meantime, I’m excited Condé is doing this. No, not because I’m about to start buying GQ. I’m excited because I know it’s only a matter of time before other big print titles start appearing on digital devices. (And not just watered-down content portals like the New York Times.) It’s already happening, albeit quietly, behind closed doors. A few months ago word got out that Time was in talks with other publishers, collaborating on e-reader standards. Around the same time, it was reported Apple was negotiating content deals with several media companies “rooted in print.” And while we’re still waiting for Apple’s tablet to arrive, e-readers are cropping up all over the place, jostling for a position in what is sure to become a massive new market.

Print is dead. But, at long last, Digital Print is here to replace it, and it’s just around the corner. That’s welcome news for an ailing publishing industry finally starting to take electronic platforms seriously.

Tell us in the comments if the new age of digital publishing is going to get you reading newspapers, and whether you think Apple’s gonna object to some of GQ’s more, um, “adult” front covers!

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On the O’Reilly Radar blog, Mike Hendrickson analyzed figures from Nielsen Bookscan retail sales data. This is data collected in the U.S. from bookstores like Barnes & Noble and Borders, or online from Amazon.

The Nielsen figures make for depressing reading, illustrating how the computer book market has seen a steady decline in sales since mid-2008. Hendrickson notes there are “few signs the book-buying slump is going to turn around anytime soon.” In total, the market saw more than half a million fewer units sold in the first half of 2009 than were sold in the same period last year (the red line in the graph below.)

O'Reilly Report - Computer Books 2009 First Half Unit Sales

Only eight subjects (from a list of over 100 categories) saw a year-on-year increase in sales by the end of the first half of 2009. “The market performance this year is the worst we’ve seen since the fall of 2001,” Hendrickson said.

Of the eight subjects showing improved year-on-year sales, “Mac Programming” tops the list, followed by “Objective C,” “Online Video,” “Global Position Device,” “Computerized Home” and “Mobile Programming.” However, all major categories have seen lower first-half sales for 2009. Interestingly, the biggest “loser” in the list is “Office Suites.” Also in that list; “Mac OS,” “Spreadsheets,” “Digital Photography” and “Windows Consumer.” The figures seem to mirror the recent sales decline seen in the computer market in general.

O'reilly Report - Categories

The report also claims that of all programming languages, Objective C has seen the biggest growth in sales, fueled by a feverish interest in iPhone and Mac development.

O'Reilly Report - Programming Languages

Hendrickson refers to the report as “…lots of bad news peppered with small glimmers of hope.” He adds that some of those glimmers include improved sales driven by the release of Windows 7 and major new versions of Sharepoint and Visual Studio due for release later this year. Also on the radar is Mac OS X Snow Leopard coming “soonish,” Hendrickson comments, bringing with it a “nice boost for computer book sales.”

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Good Saturday and a Happy Weekend to one and all, it’s time to sit down, relax and wrap your big eyes round this week’s App Store Roundup.

This week on TheAppleBlog, we got in there super fast with an in-depth look at iMovie ’09, iPhoto ’09 and iWeb ’09. Of particular note was our very own Liam Cassidy describing iWeb as an, “embarrassing, backward cousin,” to the breathtaking updates of iMovie and iPhoto.

And in other news, Darrell Etherington reported on rumblings from two separate sources about a potential new iPhone.

With some of the week’s most notable news out of the way, let’s roll on to our weekly App Store Roundup.

This week I’ve been looking at Distant Shores, Sax Man, Photo fx and LifeTicker.

Distant Shore (99 cents)
Frankly I’m not a fan of LOST. The same location again and again, the same characters every episode, the same premise… it’s infuriating. I’ll take my re-runs of Cheers any day, thank you. However, this app — a virtual desert island which you can wander at your pleasure, soaking up the tropical ambiance — is a wonderful concept. You’re even able to cast off a message in a bottle and read messages from other stranded players. Think of it as LOST, albeit without the uncannily beautiful people, the perpetual onslaught of pointless puzzles or the hairy hobbit rockstar.

Sax Man (99 cents)
The folks over at Yudo are doing good things with their 1 Dollar Game series. The latest addition, while not strictly a game, is a fun little musical toy. Indeed, as a virtual saxophone Sax Man allows you to seriously get your jazz on.  In a control-scheme reminiscent of the utterly breathtaking Ocarina for iPhone, to play the Sax you simply blow in to the iPhone’s microphone while holding the corresponding key combination for a given note. It’s not too tough for beginners and musicians, particularly those experienced with wind instruments will find playing Sax Man to be a breeze.

Photo fx ($2.99)
Like Quantum Leap’s Sam, leaping from place to place and searching for a way home, my journey — from one disappointing photo app to another — searching for the perfect set of iPhone camera tools continues. The developers, The Tiffen Company, actually make real photographic filters, so it seems they know a thing or two about photography. The app itself is intended to simulate Tiffen’s glass filters, optical lab processes and photographic effects. On first look, this app is incredibly promising — feature-rich, easy to use and a wealth of interesting filters and effects.

LifeTicker ($9.99)
Allowing you to keep track of important events in your life — meetings, birthdays, medical appointments — LifeTicker could be an essential tool for some. Or at least as essential as a calendar. I’m gonna skip the pleasantries on this one: the app looks ugly, is light on features and vastly overpriced (even at $9.99 which is, apparently, a limited time 50 percent off launch-price). Users looking for an alternative that integrates more effectively with your lifestyle should try checking out Google Calendar (with NuevaSync) or Apple’s iCal (with MobileMe), both of which sync with your iPhone and are robust enough to feature notes, reminders and contact invitations.

Just One More Thing

Earlier this week, TheAppleBlog’s Darrell Etherington spoke about the recent rumors pertaining to a possible Premium Game Section in the App Store. Currently, in the game section of the store, the sub-categories relate to gaming genres such as puzzle, racing or casino.

If the rumors actually happen, it means that Premium Games will be an additional category in the App Store. Within this category would be products from the big game companies and the pricing would reflect this, with a download costing around $20 (regular players will know that games currently range from free to around 8 bucks).

EA's disappointing MySims Kingdom for Nintendo DS

When I say that the substantial price increase is a reflection of the fact that these are games from big companies, to be more specific, I mean that the big game companies desire to charge you more, much more, for games. This potential move by Apple absolutely does not mean that the games will be higher quality, better graphics or deeper gameplay.

So why is this happening? It’s all a matter of perception: as Pocketgamer.biz note, Apple sees the touch and iPhone as serious contenders in the handheld game wars, up against the DS and PSP where games are upwards of twenty bucks each. This new section in the App Store means that there will be a special shelf in the store for the games from the larger global publishers.

I’d argue that we’re seeing more innovation, more compelling gameplay, and more quality produce at appropriate price-points since launch in the App Store than on the DS and PSP combined. This is because the App Store allows independent developers to bring their wares directly to us on the same store shelves as the big boys, something which just does not happen (at least not enough) on Sony and Nintendo’s handhelds.

And while Apple’s potential move won’t directly stifle this innovation, it may draw the flow of cash towards premium products from risk-averse game publishers, towards games that some consumers will incorrectly perceive as higher-quality and better value for money and away from independently developed gaming pearls like Rolando and Trace.

That’s all for this week’s App Store Roundup, as ever, thank you for joining me for a rundown of the week’s most interesting releases. I’ll be back next Saturday with my picks from the week, in the meantime, drop by the comments and let me know which apps you’ve downloaded this week.

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After our first week proper in 2009, we’ve run smack-bang in to a hurricane of Apple news courtesy of this year’s Macworld event.

Over at Apple’s final MacWorld Keynote, standing in for Papa Jobs, Uncle Phil unveiled brand new iLife and iWork suites, alongside completing the Macbook Pro lineup with a 17″ model touting 8 hours of battery life.

And, to finish proceedings off, Apple revealed special singing guest Tony Bennett, allowing the adoring audience to bask in the warmth of his orange glow as he crooned the keynote to a close.

While everyone else at TheAppleBlog has had their eye on Macworld, I’ve been rolling around in the App Store and getting friendly with the latest additions.

This week I’ve been looking at Keynote Remote, Wallpaper Notes, Cisco WebEx Meeting Center and Bank Panic.

Keynote Remote ($0.99)
If you’re passionate and prepared, presenting can be a true pleasure. Keynote, being the polished application that it is, makes both preparation and execution a breeze. When I present, the Apple Remote is a key tool: enabling me to present in a fluid and relaxed manner. Using the Remote, I’m not looking at a screen or even notes, I’m looking at — and engaging with — the audience. If you want your presentations to be more effective, don’t bother with this app, go back to basics — learn your subject inside out, practice, relax and, on the day, enthuse.

Wallpaper Notes ($0.99)
Apple’s embedded Notes app is already out-dated; there’s no desktop or web sync, no reminders functionality, no bells and a distinct absence of whistles. I replaced Notes with Evernote, which incorporates a cavalcade of note-taking features. Wallpaper Notes does nothing special, bar one killer feature: saving notes as iPhone wallpaper, meaning that a quick check of the screen keeps you informed. A cunning work-around indeed.

Cisco WebEx Meeting Center (free)
Back when I worked for the European-arm of an American mobile media publisher, I learnt two important things: a white vest and organic American Apparel underwear are only ever acceptable work-wear when working from home, and, when we conducted large-scale meetings with our cousins ‘cross the pond, Cisco’s WebEx was an invaluable tool in bringing us together. Long-awaited by iPhone-touting business folk, this mobile implementation of WebEx incorporates audio-visual presentations and even chat functionality.

Bank Panic ($0.99)
It’s a morbidly apt premise for a simple iPhone game and I love it: bankrupt stock brokers have taken to hurling themselves out of high-rises due to the global financial crisis. It’s your job to stop the depressed Dow dealers snapping their supple skulls on the hard floor by catching their falling bodies in your miracle blanket. Now if this deliciously horrid plot wasn’t reason enough to purchase the game, here’s the really clever bit: the game’s difficulty is linked to the real-world value of the Dow Jones — the lower the Dow drops, the tougher the gameplay gets.

Just One More Thing

It seems that this week’s Roundup has been of a decidedly productive nature, covering tools for meetings, note-taking and presenting. Even Bank Panic has serious under-currents with its amusing use of the declining Dow Jones feeding the stock-brokers’ suicide rate.

So it’s time we lighten the mood a little as, like Sauron’s great big burning eye in the sky, I’m going to turn my cyclopean gaze to the future and draw your attention to a very promising iPhone game due out soon.

Bovine Dragon Software are the designers behind Trace, an inventive game that involves drawing the platforms that your character traverses in each stage, released last year. About to pop its youngling head out from the womb of development is Bovine Dragon’s latest creation, Gomi.

From the cutesy preview videos, it seems that Gomi is a mash-up of Mario Galaxy, Katamari Damacy and LocoRoco, wrapped in graphics that look like they were drawn in Microsoft Paint. According to the developers, the eco-friendly, grinning Gomi will be out by February, in the meantime, check out the videos to see the game in action.

Over the course of the holiday season, I decided to invest in Gameloft’s Uno for iPhone. The game is bug-ridden, clunky and slow, certainly not worth the five bucks I paid for it. And I should have known better – I’ve previously worked for a big mobile publisher and developer, based on my own experience and general industry chit-chat with my peers, I know exactly what goes in to the development of these games.

Perhaps it’s an effort to appease the needs of licensors, or to hit unrealistic release dates promised by uncommunicative marketing and sales departments, maybe it’s to please investors (who are often shielded from a proper overview of the business by misguided MDs) or it’s as distasteful as knowingly rushing a title out with a recognizable logo pasted on to it (that acts as a horridly misleading seal of quality), there are a multitude of possible reasons as to why games from the big developers and publishers are often offensively shoddy disappointments.

I’ll summarize my point as such: look at Tapulous, Hand Circus and Illusion Labs –  bastions of quality independent development. It’s time the big guys started taking notes from the little guys.

That’s all from the App Store for this week, I’m quitting my jibber jabber for another 7 days and I’ll be back next Saturday with more apps. In the meantime, drop by the comments and let me know what apps you’ve been looking at.

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The giveaway represents a long-term marketing strategy, not a one-off promotion. According to Neelan Choksi, Lexcycle CEO:

“We are thrilled to bring Stanza readers a sampling of the wealth of titles published by the Random House Publishing Group imprints. But this is just the tip of the iceberg: we look forward to extending this promotion to make even more free titles available.”

Presumably, Choksi and Lexcycle are hoping that the move by Random House will result in other major publishing houses following suit. Penguin Books currently offers an iPhone application, featuring book excerpts, podcast and blog postings, and critical essays. They eventually wish to offer full titles for sale through the app as well, but Stanza has far greater appeal and market penetration, so they may change their strategy based on the success of Random House’s campaign.

The free Random House title are currently available in a special category in Stanza’s iPhone/iPod touch Online Catalog.

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