C’mon HarperCollins. C’mon. We know that books aren’t flying off shelves like they used to, but you’re not helping matters with policies like this – setting your ebooks to lock up after 26 rentals and forcing libraries to buy a new copy to keep them on shelves. Ugh.
Publishers HarperCollins and Simon & Schuster have signed a deal with Amazon to provide ebooks for the Kindle. The arrangements will allow the publishers to choose prices for the ebooks and according to HarperCollins CEO Brian Murray have left his company’s “digital future [...]more assured today than it was two months ago.” [Electronista]
During media megaconglomorate News Corp’s earnings call – which owns publisher HarperCollins – the Dark Lord Rupert Murdoch reveals, “We don’t like the Amazon model of $US9.99… we think it really devalues books and hurts all the retailers of hardcover books.” Ruh roh.
According to the WSJ, HarperCollins Publishers is in talks with Apple about providing ebooks for Apple’s yet-to-be-officially-announced tablet. It’s speculated that ebook markets such as Amazon’s would suffer if such an arrangement were finalised.
