Digital, E-book | featured news

In the midst of an essay on teaching long-form reading that’s well worth your time, Alan Jacobs sticks in a little tidbit about how the Kindle saved him from losing the ability to read books.

FOR decades, even after it was renamed and relocated from its original home at Radcliffe, the Columbia Publishing Course seemed unchanging, a genteel summer tradition in the book business, a white-glove six-week course in which ambitious college graduates were educated in the time-honored basics of book editing, sales, cover design and publicity. Not this summer.

Author J.K. Rowling has joined the 21st century on her own special terms. One of the world's most famous digital holdouts, Rowling announced Thursday that a new interactive website ...

Harry Potter battled the forces of evil and now is set to conquer the web - coming to e-books in a groundbreaking deal that has delighted fans but alarmed the book industry that helped make creator J.K. Rowling a billionaire.

Last week, a consortium of Dutch publishers unveiled the so called “delay app”, which allows the reader to choose a story to read while waiting. It allows the user to chose a story from a well-known Dutch author to match the time you spent waiting, from 5 to 60 minutes. It still has some issues: the app contains a certain amount of stories so no new content can be added and it is only for the iPad and iphone.

Amazon.com Inc. on Thursday said that, after less than four years of selling electronic books, it's now selling more of them than printed books. The online retailer said that since April 1, it has sold 105 e-books for every 100 printed books, including printed books for which there is no electronic edition. The comparison excludes free e-books, which would tip the scales further if they were included.

As the digital revolution sweeps the media world, Barnes & Noble, the leader in bookselling for 40 years, is re-examining its business model.

Two days ago I went to the O'Reilly Tools of Change Publishing conference at the Marriott in Times Square. It's a pretty well-attended conference, focused on e-books, e-book readers and embracing digital change. Twelve hundred people showed up to hear about what's next. The book industry has not grown much in the last six years, but neither has the U.S. economy. However bookselling will change more in the next six years than in the previous 200.