Microsoft is shutting down its ebook store, a move that may frustrate a few users but probably leave many more people surprised that the books category existed in the first place. The software giant warned its ebook users today that, not only would the virtual store be closing, in a few months time they wouldn't be able to access any books they'd purchased.
We're going to talk about two contrasting studies here today centered on e-books, print books, parents, and toddlers. One study was published this week by Tiffany G. Munzer and colleagues who found toddlers interacted with parents more with print book reading than they did with e-books. Their study was done with 3 formats of book in a videotaped, laboratory-based, counterbalanced study of 37 parent-toddler dyads.
The price of the Kindle Paperwhite 2018 is right on point for what it offers. That's just so long as you're not looking for something other than an e-ink display and Amazon's own UI instead of a more open OS. If you're only comparing e-readers, this might well be the best choice in the world on the market right this minute. Today we're reviewing the Kindle Paperwhite 2018, the newest version of Amazon's midrange (just right) e-reader device.
Earlier this year, Walmart announced a partnership with Rakuten Kobo as the first step in a plan to launch its own ebook service in the US. The fruits of that partnership are now live in the form of Walmart eBooks, a new service that offers digital books, as well as audiobooks at a subscription rate that undercuts Audible. The service takes on Amazon, which has long dominated the ebook and ereader market in the US.
It would seem that Apple isn't the only one looking to shake up the ebooks scene. Walmart, as odd as it may seem at first blush, announced today that it will begin offering ebooks in the US as well. It won't be doing this alone, either, as it'll be backed by Rakuten, an e-commerce company operating out of Japan.
By now, Amazon's stranglehold on the ebooks market is fairly obvious. By and large, when people are looking for an ebook, they're going to Amazon, and while that obviously isn't true for everyone, it certainly is for many people. Apple is looking to do something about that dominance, renewing its focus on ebooks by working on a revamped Books app.
In this age of podcasts and other forms of streaming media, the audiobook format has been growing in popularity over the last few years. Amazon currently dominates the market, however, with its ownership of Audible, but it appears Google is about to make a big push back. The Google Play store has revealed that it will soon start selling audiobooks alongside its existing media like movies, TV shows, music, digital books, and more.
Kobo has launched a new limited edition Aura ONE ereader with expanded storage that can hold up to 28,000 ebooks. The ereader packs 32GB of internal storage, which isn't a lot when it comes to phones or tablets, but is quite substantial in the world of e-ink ebook readers. In addition to the huge storage, this limited edition model is also waterproof with a backlight that reduces blue light.
The Kindle Oasis continues to be Amazon's newest flagship e-reader, with impressive features like waterproofing and a large, sharp display. But now the company has revealed that one of the device's best features is coming to the bottom of the Kindle line-up. The cheapest Kindle model will soon be updated with support for audiobooks from Audible.
Amazon released what amounts to a full reboot of their Kindle app this week, for both Android and iOS. This new version of said app includes a fully redesigned inside and out, making a bunch of relatively small adjustments all add up to one major change. This version of the app taps into the Goodreads community, too, allowing users to learn from friends' reading habits and rate their own books on an already-established platform.
If it has been a long while since you last used a library, you may be surprised to learn that many of them have a digital library that offers up digital goods to card holders. Among these digital goods are ebooks, which can be downloaded with the appropriate app for a certain duration before the file expires. This is all free in the same way it is free to rent a physical book, and Google just made finding this content easier.
Kobo isn’t new to the ereader and ebook market, but it is new to the world of subscription ebook services. The company has launched its own ebook subscription option, giving voracious readers the option to pay a single monthly fee in exchange for access to tens of thousands of digital books. Such a service aims, no doubt, to compete with Amazon Unlimited, a similar subscription service, and other competitors.