Barnes & Noble, Book Retailer | featured news

Barnes & Noble, the country’s largest bookseller, said data thieves hacked into payment devices at 63 of its stores nationwide and may have stolen credit and debit card information from customers.

Barnes & Noble posted a loss for its fiscal fourth quarter on sales that barely inched higher. The loss, while narrower than the one a year earlier, was larger than expected and revenue growth fell short of hopes. Sales of the Nook e-reader fell.

Microsoft Corp will invest $300 million in Barnes & Noble Inc's digital and college businesses in a deal that values the businesses at $1.7 billion.

Here's an interesting idea: that Barnes and should consider splitting the company. Separate the physical bookstores from the virtual business of the Nook and allow that digital business the room and capital to compete with Apple's iPad and Amazon's Kindle?