PG did a quick Google search and couldn’t find any mention of iBooks in Apple’s big “moving to services” announcement yesterday.
Is there any reason to think Apple is going to pay much attention to iBooks going forward? Anything Amazon should be worried about?
They put a new guy in charge last year who’s supposed to be a big deal. Other than that… who knows.
Having cut a video deal with Apple, Oprah WiNfrey is bringing her book club along:
https://edition.cnn.com/2019/03/25/entertainment/oprah-apple/index.html
Ha! Watched a Jeff Dunham (speaks with dummies) show and he tells us that Hell has cable – and only one channel. I’ll give you three guesses which channel it was. 😉
(Hint – There’s a reason your comment reminded my of it …)
“I keelyah!”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GBvfiCdk-jc
As with most of the “reveals” yesterday, the book club was short on details. I don’t recall them even mentioning where the book club would be accessed. Did they mention Apple Books during that segment? That would be the obvious place for it, though no word was mentioned whether this was a free place to hang out or a new subscription service. Please correct me if I’m mistaken.
My guess is it’ll cost a subscription like everything else mentioned during the event. Maddening lack of details. Even Apple journalists biased in favor of Apple were disappointed and baffled by the event.
Is there any reason to think Apple is going to pay much attention to iBooks going forward?
Apple’s behavior since the price collusion trial gives no indication they care about books. While many authors want Apple to have a different objective, there is no evidence that Apple has an objective of being a major presence in general online book sales. Their behavior indicates they are just maintaining a placeholder in case they might need it someday.
There isn’t enough money in books to interest Apple.
All the profits in the entire US book market ($27B or so per year) is barely a few weeks of iPhone profits.
Apple’s share of that industry is miniscule to start with and with their”buddies”in BPH circles looking to minimize ebook sales their is no incentive for Apple to do even as much as Google. Which is as little as possible while staying in the business at least nominally.
They do have some interest in news and magazines:
https://www.cnet.com/how-to/apple-news-plus-how-to-get-apples-new-magazine-subscription-service/
Oh and by the way, Apple renamed iBooks as Apple Books.
https://www.apple.com/apple-books/
Their new naming scheme is Apple everything instead of i-everything. Putting distance between the phone business and everything else.
Hmm, the news subscription is already under fire:
https://techcrunch.com/2019/03/26/no-need-to-subscribe/
They’re only interested in things that will make their fanboys/gals go wild and things they can overcharge for.
Level playing fields annoy them …
There are no level playing fields. The idea is a hoax. Everybody does whatever they can to rip the field.
Flip that script. If the Apple ecosystem lacks something important, it might bleed users to Android. Apple has to have a ‘complete’ ecosystem, or it’s products are at a disadvantage.
The collusion incident may not be the only issue. Apple Books was one of Steve Jobs’ last projects. Apple under Tim Cook has lacked Jobs’ visionary appeal. However, the change from iBooks to Books was more than just losing a letter. The interface is vastly improved, cloud support, including PDFs, is more reliable and robust, and the changes are so recent, we have yet to see what more Apple hopes to do with Books. Like Kobo, Apple may be banking on audio books. They certainly received prominent display space in the new app.