Devices and ecosystems for digital reading have changed dramatically since 2009 when our first "Current E-Readers" presentation was given at Tools of Change. This presentation looks at some of the steps forward (and back!) for interoperability and a sane ebook ecosystem.

1. Networked,
Mobile &
Landlocked
Current Ereaders
Liza Daly Keith Fahlgren
Threepress Threepress
liza@threepress.org keith@threepress.org

2. 2010 versus 2009:
Fragmentation vs.
consolidation

3. 2008 - Q3 2009:
Format consolidation
Mobipocket
Everyone else

4. Consolidated on ePub
Adobe
Widespread adoption of ePub DRM
and mobile SDK

5. Q4 2009 - Q1 2010
• B&N merged eReader DRM
with Adobe DRM
• No other support for eReader/
Adobe hybrid outside of
• Landlocked readers
may never be upgraded

6. Q1 2010
• Apple embraces ePub...
• ...but will use its own DRM...
• ...compatible with anybody?

7. Q1 2010
Blio
• ePub + PDF bundle?
• Compatible with anybody...?

8. Only 3 formats!
Page-based Reflowable
PDF ePub
Mobipocket
Some ebook know-it-all, Fall 2009

9. Requiem for an
ebook shopper
What has fragmentation wrought
on the purchase process?

10. “Y
ou
sh
all
not
pas
s”
Barnes & Noble
Fictionwise
Stanza
?
Kobo

11. “Y
ou
sh
all
not
pas
s”
Even though most of these devices and stores use ePub,
Barnes & Noble
there’s almost no way for consumers to understand which
devices will support which individual books, and when
Fictionwise
books can be exported from cloud-based ecosystems.
Stanza
?
Kobo

12. Can you think of a single Don’t expect people to put up
consumer product that is with this.
so difficult to buy? They have many easier choices
for entertainment.
(It’s hard to look at the
previous chart and not
conclude that DRM is the
primary culprit.)

13. Three ways to segment e-readers:
e-ink
Last year at our talk,
“A Survey of Current E-Readers”
we looked at the market through this lens

14. This year, we’re focusing on
ecosystems and usability:
Cloud
Interoperability

15. Consumers can choose
to read on one or many of these devices.

16. Approaching
Clouds

17. In a Cloudy World,
Networking Wins
Devices without web connections are
not “landlocked”, they are “landfill”

18. Menacing Clouds?
Privacy concerns and vendor lock-in
are critical to consider.

19. Happy Clouds?
But cloud-based systems offer users flexibility
and ebook capabilities beyond just text on screens.

20. Browser Required?
Google Editions and others may offer browser-based
clouds that allow greater access to the web and
greater interoperability... maybe.

21. Discovering New
Content
OPDS
BookServer and OPDS are part of the web
ecosystem and suggest that books and other
publications will be most easily discovered via the
internet rather than single-point retailers.

22. Thanks!
Liza Daly Keith Fahlgren
Twitter: @liza Twitter: @abdelazer
liza@threepress.org keith@threepress.org