Apple could begin paying out $400 million worth of cash and ebook credits to consumers by the end of the year, after a federal judge approved an unusual deal related to an Apple-led conspiracy to fix the price of ebooks.

On Friday, Reuters reported that U.S. Distrct Judge Denise Cote approved a settlement reached this summer under which Apple agreed to pay $400 million to consumers and $50 million to lawyers.

Those numbers are conditional, however, on an appeals court upholding a 2013 verdict in the price-fixing case, in which Apple was found to have colluded with five big publishers to fix the price of ebooks. The appeals court will hear Apple’s challenge on December 15, but few expect that the court will disturb the verdict.

In the event the appeals court does send back the verdict to be reconsidered, Apple will instead pay only $50 million to consumers plus $20 million to the lawyers instead.

The unusual…

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In Amazon/Hachette deal, ebook agency pricing is a winner

15 November 2014 by particularkev

Gigaom

In the deal that Amazon and Hachette Book Group finally reached Thursday after months of bitter negotiations, we don’t really know which side “won,” if one side did. But one survivor — perhaps surprisingly — was agency pricing for ebooks, the practice through which the publisher sets an ebook’s price and the retailer takes a commission.

Hachette said in a letter to authors and agents Thursday:

The new agreement delivers considerable benefits. It gives us full responsibility for the consumer prices of our ebooks. This approach, known as the Agency model, protects the value of our authors’ content, while allowing the publisher to change ebook prices dynamically to maximize sales.

That wasn’t a foregone conclusion. In 2010, [company]Amazon[/company] was vehemently opposed to agency pricing, though it ultimately capitulated. Agency pricing was at the heart of the of the Department of Justice’s lawsuit against Apple and book publishers in 2012, in which…

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Updated: Amazon and Hachette finally reach deal; Hachette will set its ebook prices

15 November 2014 by particularkev

Gigaom

Amazon and book publisher Hachette Book Group have finally reached a deal in the negotiations that have been going on since May. For months, Amazon removed pre-orders on Hachette titles, shipped them with delays and would not discount them.

The new agreement, announced in a joint press release Thursday, covers both print and ebooks.

“This is great news for writers,” Hachette CEO Michael Pietsch said in a statement. “The new agreement will benefit Hachette authors for years to come. It gives Hachette enormous marketing capability with one of our most important bookselling partners.”

“We are pleased with this new agreement as it includes specific financial incentives for Hachette to deliver lower prices, which we believe will be a great win for readers and authors alike,” David Naggar, VP of Kindle, said in a statement.

When the new ebook terms take place in early 2015, “Hachette will have responsibility for setting consumer prices of its…

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Glose Is A New Ebook Reader That Turns Reading Into A Social Experience

15 November 2014 by particularkev

Oyster Updates

9 November 2014 by particularkev

The links below are to articles reporting on the latest news from Oyster.

For more visit:
– http://www.digitalbookworld.com/2014/oyster-adds-user-curated-ebook-recommendations-to-drive-discovery/
– http://www.digitalbookworld.com/2014/oyster-goes-social-for-discovery/

The Future of Enhanced Ebooks

9 November 2014 by particularkev

The links below are to articles that look at the future of enhanced ebooks.

For more visit:
– http://www.digitalbookworld.com/2014/does-the-closure-of-atavist-books-signal-the-end-of-enhanced-ebooks/
– http://www.digitalbookworld.com/2014/lights-out-for-enhanced-ebooks/
– http://www.digitalbookworld.com/2014/resuscitating-enhanced-ebooks/

Google Play Books’ new reading mode lets you browse and skim nonfiction ebooks faster

31 October 2014 by particularkev

Gigaom

The digital format works a lot better for some kinds of books than others. For straight-text fiction, it’s perfect — as evidenced by 2013 sales figures showing that ebooks now account for nearly 40 percent of adult fiction sales. When it comes to nonfiction, though — cookbooks, atlases, travel guides and so on — ebooks haven’t done as well.

Now [company]Google[/company] is taking a small step to change that: On Thursday the company announced a new nonfiction reading mode for its Google Play Books app. The new feature, which is only available on Android for now, “lets you easily skim an entire book, browse all your notes and highlights, and quickly jump back and forth between different spots.” So, for example, a user could jump between recipes in a cookbook “using new quick bookmarks” or use “skim mode” to browse through a travel guide.

“Skim mode” in the Google…