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Ever since electronic books emerged as a major growth market, New York’s largest publishing houses have worried that big-name authors might sign deals directly with e-book retailers or other new ventures, bypassing traditional publishers entirely.

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Now, one well-known author is doing just that.

Stephen R. Covey, one of the most successful business authors of the last two decades, has moved e-book rights to two of his best-selling books from his print publisher, Simon & Schuster, a division of the CBS Corporation, to a digital publisher that will sell the e-books to Amazon.com for one year.

Собственно, Кови просто забрал права на электронные книги у Simon&Schuster, и распорядился ими по собственному разумению. Первая ласточка? Ритейлер электронных книг в качестве издателя — логичный этап.

In an ideal world, huge amounts of content in EPUB format would come together with inexpensive, color, touch-enabled e-readers, making them solid textbook replacements and turning giant student backpacks into thin messenger bags.

This is hardly an ideal world, though. Yes, it looks like the inexpensive color e-reader will be a reality, but the same technology will also enable inexpensive color tablets. What is a school going to buy? A one-trick pony e-reader for its students or a really useful convergence device for a slight upcharge? Especially if the EPUB content does come together, then this will be viewable on any device (including said tablets). It becomes much harder to make the case for e-readers outside of bookhounds who value a device just for reading books.

What remains to be seen is just how cheap these new tablets can be, how quickly e-readers improve, and how fast content comes together for any platform. No doubt, 2010 is going to be a very interesting year for these intersecting markets.

As you may know, the current generation of book readers uses the E-Ink technology, which currently does B&W 800 x 640 on a flexible substrate. They project that color E-Ink devices will become available no earlier than 2011. Hi-res is important: readability studies shows that paper with 600 dpi is the gold standard. a 600 dpi 8 x 10 page is 4800 x 6000 pixels, which is still a pretty big image even for today’s computers.

I suspect that E-Ink devices capable of displaying hi-res PDF will be ~ 2015.

What does this mean for publishers and booksellers? For publishers, it means a (losing) struggle with e-book manufacturers over their share of the revenue pie. For booksellers, it means less revenue from simply delivering physically encoded books to people, and figuring out a way to move up the value chain–which I think is what Karl Pohrt is planning to do. I like the idea of a bookstore as a salon, but if I look around at other industries it seems that continuous physical presence is a more difficult business model to operate than old reliables like personal appearances, training classes, and consulting services.

По российской монополии на транзит газа из Центральной Азии нанесен мощный удар. Вчера в присутствии глав КНР, Казахстана, Туркменистана и Узбекистана Ху Цзиньтао, Нурсултана Назарбаева, Гурбангулы Бердымухамедова и Ислама Каримова был торжественно открыт газопровод Туркмения—Китай, который уже в 2013 году будет перекачивать в Поднебесную 40 млрд кубометров газа в год. По мнению экспертов, этот маршрут транспортировки энергоносителей в обход РФ снизит зависимость центральноазиатских республик от Москвы и закрепит за Китаем статус неформального лидера региона. Кроме того, новая труба может ухудшить позиции "Газпрома" на переговорах о строительстве газопроводов из России в КНР и возобновлении Москвой закупок туркменского газа.

When I’m looking for a new book on my Kindle and told I have to wait four months for the e-book version, I won’t be heading to the bookstore. Instead, I’ll click the back button and buy one of the 360,000 other e-books available now.

Here’s the price: $199 unlocked in stores. $100 rebate online if you have an active and old Google account. That $100 rebate is either to buy it $99 online from Google’s online phone store, for using on Android Marketplace or for using on any Google Checkout stores. Can also be used for T-Mobile or AT&T pre-paid Data SIM card service at $29 per month, no contracts required.

Google will push full VOIP usage on these, meaning no voice/sms plans needed at any carrier. Voice calls will go through Google Voice on Data SIM cards and will provide unlimited free voice calling. And SMS is replaced by unlimited free Gtalk.

Finally, Google will provide easy roaming data services in other countries. For example, if you go to Europe, you can roam on HSDPA data networks for the same price of 20€ per month, and if you only stay in Europe for a few days you won’t need to pay for the whole month. You may not even need to change the SIM card.

Скорее всего - враньё. Но какое приятное ))

Isa Dick Hackett, a daughter of Mr. Dick, said in an interview Tuesday that she was “shocked and dismayed” by reports indicating that the Google phone would be named after her father’s famous characters. “We were never consulted, no requests were made, and we didn’t grant any sort of permissions.

Ну, не всегда. Но ох как часто. Неужто и правда — природа отдыхает, а стыд глаза не выест.