Our platform focus continues this fine Sunday with the e-Book Echo, our take on the week in the digital publishing world. When I interviewed an executive with Barnes & Noble earlier this year his message was clear: they wanted their e-books to work on many different readers, to make it easier for the customer. They are proving they mean that as this week, hot on the heels of the Nook, they started selling another reader through the eReader online store. The JetBook Lite is a budget reader with a 5-inch screen that only sells for $150. That low price gets a bonus of $50 worth of e-books in the form of an in-store credit to get it filled up. This reader uses a non-backlit TFT screen in place of the more traditional e-Ink screen, meaning there is no annoying delay or flash when the page is turned. This screen works in bright sunlight and in low-light situations, and can be rotated to landscape orientation if preferred.
The JetBook joins the eSlick reader from FoxIt that B&N was already selling through its eReader and Fictionwise online stores. The eSlick is a 6-inch reader with an e-Ink screen that works like the Nook and Kindle, and B&N is offering a $100 in-store credit with the purchase of that $259 reader. It is clear they are sticking to their message of getting their content on as many readers as possible.
An e-book summit held recently made an unpopular argument that advertising in e-books is needed to make them financially viable for publishers. The panel claimed that the $9.99 price that Amazon has standardized for Kindle e-books is not enough for publishers to keep getting new content, nor for covering e-book distribution costs. Many who follow the industry don’t buy that this price is insufficient to cover distribution costs for e-books. That cost is much lower than paper books, and it is hard to believe that publishers can’t make money on these digital editions.

{"source":"https:\/\/gigaom.com\/2009\/12\/20\/e-book-echo-bn-now-selling-two-readers-in-addition-to-the-nook\/wijax\/49e8740702c6da9341d50357217fb629","varname":"wijax_f95dd78ea42dde1590eb70c59fb2936f","title_element":"header","title_class":"widget-title","title_before":"%3Cheader%20class%3D%22widget-title%22%3E","title_after":"%3C%2Fheader%3E"}