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Category: General (Page 2 of 3)

Blackberry Playbook, Galaxy Tab Wi-Fi Come To Play

April 13, 2011 /

The dust has settled since the launch of Apple’s iPad 2 tablet and it’s pretty clear that no competing tablet computer is going to dethrone the iPad anytime soon. The Motorola Xoom had a lot of promise, but launched at too high a price and missing features like Flash support and comparable apps that could have differentiated it from the iPad. There’s still hope for the Android powered tablets and others in the future, but this round belongs to Apple.

While I don’t really expect Blackberry’s upcoming Playbook or Samsung’s new Wi-Fi only Galaxy Tab to make a dent in the iPad’s dominance, at least they are launching priced to play ball. The 16GB Playbook is priced at $499 which matches the entry level iPad. I saw a Circuit City ad for the 16GB Galaxy Tab 7″ tablet for $349, but it appears that they don’t have any available right now. Those price points suggest that Blackberry and Samsung are serious about competing head to head with Apple in the tablet sector. As the Xoom’s paltry 100K units sold has proven, tablets that cost more than the iPad that are not made by Apple will not sell.

I won’t go into their features here because all of these tablets are well spec’d and I think any of them would be a fine choice. The important thing is that now the consumer will have a choice in the sub-$500 price range, without getting locked into a data contract. The iPad has a lot of other good things going for it, like the Apple Stores, but now we’ll be able to really see if the tablet market is a passing Apple only fad, or something that is here to stay.

Update: Sadly it appears that the Blackberry Playbook is not quite ready to play afterall. This NYT review says that while the Playbook is due for release April 19th, it is shipping with a littany of missing features.

But — are you sitting down? — at the moment, BlackBerry Bridge is the only way to do e-mail, calendar, address book and BlackBerry Messenger on the PlayBook. The PlayBook does not have e-mail, calendar or address book apps of its own. You read that right. R.I.M. has just shipped a BlackBerry product that cannot do e-mail. It must be skating season in hell. (R.I.M. says that those missing apps will come this summer.)

This is absolute madness, just madness…

Parallel Reading With The Kids

April 12, 2011 /

Gothic Charm SchoolMost parents read a lot of books to their kids when they’re young, before they can read for themselves. In due time, children grow and begin reading on their own.  And somewhere along the way, children begin reading books that their parents have not.

Most of us are pretty busy once kids come along regardless of whether we work in or outside of the home. Trying to do all of the things that support a household doesn’t leave a lot of time to vicariously attend school with our kids by reading their books. And the reality of sharing a physical book means that we won’t get a shot at it until they’ve finished it and moved on and perhaps lost interest.

As I’m already under orders not to add any more stuff to our cluttered abode, having multiple copies of physical books isn’t acceptable either, not to mention the expense. Given these challenges, I hadn’t thought much about solutions until I happened upon Gothic Charm School. I found it discounted at my local Borders store closing sale and thought my goth inclined daughter would like it. And flipping through the pages I thought I’d enjoy it as well, so later I bought an eBook version of it to read on my Nook. The eBook wasn’t very expensive and, of course, took up no more space in my house!

The GiverSince that time, I’ve added The Giver and Masters of Doom to my parallel reads. It’s really been quite enjoyable having something common and interesting to share with the kids. Not only that, I feel like new life has been breathed into my own ongoing education.

Even with the added expense, I would encourage all parents to parallel read with their kids. eReaders and a growing library of eBooks have made this easier than ever before. And just imagine the look of shock on your child’s face when you threaten to release them if they don’t clean up their room! (Just kidding of course. Release is not something to joke about!)

Is Book Loving A Fetish?

April 8, 2011 /

Bibliophilia, sounds kind of dirty, doesn’t it? Well that’s how I felt, in a good way, after a pleasurable visit to Myopic Books in Chicago’s Wicker Park neighborhood yesterday. I was in the area for a meeting and had some time to kill so I started exploring the neighborhood. I love books and bookstores, so I was really happy to find Myopic Books even if I only had a few minutes to browse.

When I walked in, I was immediately reminded of O’Gara’s Books in Hyde Park, but much bigger. Shelves and shelves of books in wooden bookshelves stacked to the ceiling. Just books everywhere. I was surrounded and infused by the wonderful smells of books! I love eBooks, but nothing can replace the aroma of the printed page.

Experiencing such an emotional response, no doubt heightened by the loss of so many of my beloved Borders bookstores, it occurred to me that perhaps my love of books had become a fetish. There are fetishes for pretty much everything, so this is probably not unique. I just hadn’t noticed it before, taking bookstores for granted. Never thinking that someday they’d begin to disappear.

I was so happy that I just had to buy something! I found a copy of Masters of Doom that I knew would be perfect for my son the hacker genius. And I’ll probably get an eBook copy for myself, which interestingly enough cost about the same as the used hardcover. I’ll definitely have to visit Myopic Books again sometime!

Digital Manga Guild: Part Of The Solution!

April 1, 2011 /

Okay, we’ve all read scanlations at some time in our manga reading lives. And we’ve all felt, or should have felt, guilty that reading illegally scanned and translated manga does nothing to support and thank mangaka for their work. Well now you can do something about that! Join the Digital Manga Guild and become part of the solution! In the latest Akadot newsletter this morning I read:

Did you know that the Digital Manga Guild just got 508 titles from Japanese publishers? I’m pretty excited because it won’t just be yaoi, but shojo, shonen, seinen and josei! I wish I had the time to join, but maybe you could help out at digitalmangaguild.com!

The Digital Manga Guild needs translators, editors, and letterers to succeed. And everyone involved will be paid for their efforts based on title sales. With 508 new titles, I think that’s an opportunity that should not be passed up. So if you have the skills and love manga, give the guild a shot and bring more of the manga you love to the ones you love in a way that supports the artists.

C2E2 And The Future Of Comics

March 18, 2011 /

Today is the beginning of the 2nd Chicago Comic and Entertainment Expo (C2E2). In addition to having fun, I’m hoping to see something of the future of comics in the digital age. There are already a number of ways of reading comics on various devices, but the number of titles is limited. And right now the lack of a digital comics standard means having to juggle applications going from my Nook, to my Mac, to my PSP or iPhone.

I hope that perhaps I can get some hands on time with the different comic apps and see for myself how they stack up. And, hearing from industry insiders about the direction that publishers are moving in should be interesting as well. Right now I suspect that Apple’s iPad has the inside track on becoming the preferred future home of digital comics. The following list would seem to bear that out.

Back To The Future: Neighborhood Bookstores

March 8, 2011 /

Now that winter is giving way to spring, I was eager to get back outside for my customary lunchtime walk abouts. A lot has changed since the last time I engaged in these jaunts. In particular, the Borders bookstores that used to anchor my routes downtown and in Hyde Park are no longer open. So what is a bibliophile who needs fresh air and exercise to do now?

Powell's Books

Powell's Books in Hyde Park

Fortunately, my neighborhood, home of the University of Chicago, has no shortage of small bookstores that were here before the appearance of Borders and have now outlasted it. As a student, I spent a lot of time in the bookstores that line 57th Street, so I decided that now would be a great time to revisit and rediscover these treasures of my youth.

First I visited Powell’s Books which sells mostly used books. This was my most frequent destination during my college years and in many ways has scarcely changed at all. Upon entering, I was pleased to find that my favorite sections were exactly where I remembered them to be. I swung by Physics first and found some pretty cool books, including a primer on electric propulsion. Yeah, ion engines! Then I headed straight to the basement corner containing Science Fiction where I was pleased to find a great selection with paperbacks priced from about $2 – $5 on average. I also found a small selection of manga including Evangelion Campus Apocalypse Volume 2 for $5, over 50% off of the $10.99 cover price! Back upstairs in the graphic novels section, I would find my best bargain of all, Alter Ego: Avatars and their creators, brand new and sealed for $4.95, 83% off of the $29.95 list price!

Powell's Sci-Fi Corner

Powell's Basement Sci-Fi Corner

After leaving Powell’s, I passed by the O’Gara and Wilson bookstore. Old habits never die, I rarely visited O’Gara’s as a student because they usually didn’t have the science fiction books I was looking for. I’m glad to see they are still in business, but I will visit them another day!

57th Street Books

57th Street Books

My final destination was 57th Street Books, part of the Seminary Co-op. This was, and still is, a small bookstore selling new books and magazines. It also has regular reading and other events that one generally expects of a bookstore. I wanted to check out their magazine and manga selection. eBooks are great for books that are mostly text, but graphic novels and magazines are still a week spot. So I still buy those in physical form usually.

The magazine section wasn’t quite as big as I remembered, though it was never all that huge anyway. Nice selection, but I couldn’t find any web design magazines today. The graphic novel section was quite good, though manga itself was pretty light. I did find a copy of Tezuka’s Ayako, but at almost $30, still too expensive for me. They had some volumes of Black Jack too! The staff was really friendly too. I ended up just buying a copy of Wired magazine and, thanks to the helpful staff found that my wife still had a membership there, from more decades ago than I care to admit to! The membership was good for a 10% discount.

Further west, Barnes & Noble runs the University of Chicago bookstore, which I visited last week. The general bookstore is pretty small with only a tiny manga section. But other than that, it’s like any other B & N, and since it’s farther away than the other bookstores, I won’t be getting over there too often.

I haven’t given up on eBooks, but for now at least, neighborhood bookstores will continue to play a role in my life as a reader of books.

My Bookstore Spoils

My Bookstore Spoils

Borders Epitath: Bad Romance

March 7, 2011 /

Today is the last day for the Borders bookstore in Chicago’s Hyde Park neighborhood. The kids are out of school today, so I decided to take them there to see what might be left and to say good bye to the store.

Throughout the closing process, the staff had maintained a very neat and orderly store as was still the case on this last day. The second floor had been cleared of books and closed off since last week. That was when I bought what would prove to be my last arm load of manga for $1 per book. At that time there was still about a bookshelf full of manga and about twice that of science fiction. Today there was nothing left except 3 shelves of romance novels.

We were all rather disappointed that all remained were romance books. Or as my oldest daughter loudly proclaimed, “trashy novels!” We did eventually find 4 or 5 sci-fi novels amongst the trashy ones, but nothing we wanted to buy, even at 50 cents each. So we left the store for the final time and got pizza at Cholie’s nearby.

On the way home, my oldest son expressed his belief that it was eBooks that killed the Borders. While this is certainly a part of the story, I could not help but wonder if all of those unsold romance novels were taking up space that should have been used to sell books people actually wanted to buy. Watching the end of my neighborhood Borders has also convinced me that paper books have become too expensive. When the closing sale began and the book prices were cut %30, people came in droves. People always come out for closing sales, but maybe if the books were 30 or 40 percent cheaper all the time, there would not have been a need to close the store at all.

Barnes & Noble’s Conquest of Space

February 25, 2011 /

The growing popularity of eBooks, the success of online bookseller Amazon, and the implosion of Borders would seem to argue that large bookstores are more liability than asset. But Barnes & Noble is seeking to refute that logic by hosting in-store events to promote PubIt authors. PubIt is the eBook self-publishing platform Barnes & Noble launched back in October of last year. Michael at Good eReader writes,

Barnes and Noble is taking advantage of their tangible retail spaces and large book stores, that are a great place to showcase their own authors and build their brand internally. Meanwhile Amazon has a virtual website only and cannot put its own authors in the forefront, while their Digital Text Platform continues to be THE most popular self authoring program on the internet.

Marketing eBooks has been a concern of mine from the very beginning of the Learncrest venture. The online avenues are apparent and easily available, but how does an eBook author cross over into 3D space to promote his/her digital works? Now it looks like B & N is providing just that bridge and going somewhere that Amazon cannot easily follow.

In another current promotion, Barnes & Noble is offering a free cup of coffee to anyone who comes into their stores and tries out a Nook Color eBook reader. Again, this isn’t something Amazon could easily match to promote the Kindle. But I think it may also reveal that B & N’s underlying strategy is not very different from that of a movie cineplex. As high as movie ticket prices may be, that’s not really where a cinema makes its money. Movie theatres make most of their money from concessions sales. The profit margins on soda and popcorn are very high, and I suspect that the same can be said for the sales of eBooks relative to paper ones.

People spend a lot of time on the internet, but we are still physical beings living in 3D space. Free Wi-Fi and in-store promotions that encourage customers to bring their Nooks to the store with them, coupled with events to promote eBook authors is a powerful one two punch to promote your most profitable products. And, of course, it doesn’t hurt to have good old fashioned books on the shelves to be purchased in either physical or digital form.

How well this strategy plays out against Amazon remains to be seen. But with Barnes & Noble’s eBook market share having risen to 25% and strong sales of the Nook Color, they must be doing something right.

What About Borders? Let There Be Libraries!

February 17, 2011 /

A quick Googling of “Borders” will turn up a lot of stories about how difficult it will be to fill the building vacancies that the store closings are going to bring. Many of these buildings are two stories and on the order of 20,000 square feet. I thought some about the closing Borders in my own neighborhood, then I thought about the deficiencies of our local public library and it struck me. Why not turn these closed bookstores into public libraries!

The buildings are already made to hold books. They are also already important social hubs in many areas. Turning them into libraries would not require large construction costs and I suspect the land owners would be willing to deal on the rent rather than be stuck with something no other retailer would likely want in a down economy.

While it is hard to imagine local governments wanting to spend the money and effort to convert these bookstores to libraries right now, the cost not to may be greater. Because they are social hubs, generally located near other retail establishments, these bookstores brought a lot of business to other stores that they now stand to lose. Converting the vacant bookstores into libraries could maintain, and perhaps even increase this traffic saving jobs and creating new ones.

So please, somebody, let there be libraries!

Pump Up The Manga On The Nook!

February 17, 2011 /

After reading this excellent review of Sundome on the UK Anime Network site, I popped over to Barnes & Noble’s web store to see if it was available on the Nook. It was no big surprise to me that it was not available as an eBook. But I was surprised and happy to see that there was a “Tell the publisher you want this in Nookbook format” link. Amazon has had a similar link for requesting a Kindle version for years now, so I am happy that Barnes & Noble is now providing the same to its customers.

Sundome Vol 1 Image

Barnes & Noble now has "Tell the publisher you want this in NOOKbook format" links

I don’t know just how effective clicking that link is, but I would like to encourage anyone who wants more manga on the Nook and the Kindle to click those links like your lives depended on it! Right now, I don’t know of any better way to demonstrate demand for manga eBooks. And, of course, buy manga eBooks when possible!

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