The Bookseller.com

2nd December 2008

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Ebook push begins

01.09.08

It can take decades for technology to go mainstream, notes the Times, now another technology that has been around for 20 years may finally go mainstream — the e-book.

Waterstone’s is to launch the Sony Reader, this week. It is not the first to market. Borders is selling the iLiad but its £399 price tag is hardly mass market. The Reader will cost £199. And it will not be the last. The e-book push is likely to get hotter later this year when, rumour has it, Amazon will release the UK version of its rival Kindle book reader, capable of downloading books wirelessly from the web. The Kindle costs about £200.

“There is a broad audience out there for electronic books,” said John Makinson, chairman and chief executive of Pearson-owned publisher Penguin. “To what extent they will be a major alternative to traditional books, we don’t know. The consumer will decide that.”

The Times

Borders digitisation iLiad e book Waterstones Sony Reader