The Rich Affiliate

At the recently concluded Book Expo, Google announced that it intends to sell e-books before the end of this year.  This puts Google head to head with Amazon which is currently deemed the owner of the e-book arena.  It will be interesting to see if Google can make a dent in the success that Amazon has achieved thus far with the Kindle.

Google Strategy

Amazon may indeed have cause for worry what with the strategy that Google has chosen to adopt for this venture.  First off, the Google venture will allow publishers to directly sell their work to consumers via Google.  More importantly, Google will allow publishers to set their own prices for the digital versions.  E-book prices on Kindle are currently priced at just less than $10, a far cry from the $26 price tag for hardcover versions.  Google was quick to add though that the company reserves the right to change pricing if it considers it necessary.  

In contrast to Amazon, e-books sold by Google will not be downloaded to just one device.  Rather, consumers will have access to the e-books online and when they are offline, they can still read the books as these will be cached in their web browsers.  They can also download titles to a Web-enabled mobile phone.   

Worthy Adversary

What does this recent development imply for Amazon?  Some experts believe that Google’s extensive influence over the Internet may be a factor in its competition with Amazon.  Millions of people search do a Web search on a daily basis and there is no reason why Google cannot take advantage of this fact.  Further, on the publishing side, publishers and authors may be more willing to do business with Google provided they agree on a pricing scheme favorable to both parties.  If so, this could mean more titles will be available through Google.

However, Amazon has already gained considerable momentum in this market and a key challenge for Google has to do with reader experience.  Will users be comfortable reading e-books through their browsers or through a device like Kindle?  You can’t really curl up on the couch with your PC.  Meanwhile, Amazon’s Kindle 2 got rave reviews and the company is set to release Kindle DX, a larger version e-book reader.

Google Books

Google’s foray into electronic publishing is separate from its current Google Books service which allows users to search for titles that are out of copyright.  Currently, there are about seven million books that people can search through this service.  Google Books became controversial a few years ago when a group of publishers and authors pressed charges against Google for infringement.  Today, the company has reached a settlement agreement that has prompted it to make some changes to the service.   These changes have yet to be approved but once the issues have been settled Google hopes to be able to enable users to preview, read and buy out of print books.  Google also hopes to enable readers to access books online through their Book Search account, read books through institutional subscriptions and borrow and purchase books through the help of the service.