Barnes & Noble may not be having as much success with their nook as they'd like you to believe. Search "nook" via Goolge images and you end up with furniture.
Barnes & Noble
This should have been almost expected by most casual B&N observers. Steve Riggio, lone tie to B&N founder Leonard Riggio, has stepped down from the world's largest book retailer throne. In his place they have crowned William Lynch, who has been with the company for about a year, in Riggio's stead. Check out the pragmatic article by MarketWatch, if you want.
It's an American book business tradition, growing more corporate.
Lynch has a background in e-commerce including running the Home Shopping Network's online component. He is also the architect of B&N's e-reader the awkwardly named nook. On the surface the promotion of Lynch and receding of Riggio speaks of complete shift in the company's approach. Apparently Godiva chocolate and Starbucks coffee weren't going to cut it in the future.
Mitch Klipper, who has been promoted to the position of CEO of B&N Retail (those huge stores that sell chocolate and remaindered books) had this to say about the new king of nook, er, Barnes & Noble.
"I am excited to work closely with William as we reposition the retail business and create a more integrated operation that can better meet the growing needs of our customers."
Read: We are going to use our storefronts long enough to win the war for e-book supremacy.
I am a veteran of the Barnes & Noble retail experience, having once worked for the retailer (their term for their stores, which were once called bookstores). I won't say anything about Lycnh, as I know only about the feathers in his cap. I will say that Riggio leaving and a HSN guru taking his place leaves me very little confidence as a reader of literary books.
Amazon Scared?
I won't be buying an iPad anytime soon. I just don't see the point. But then again I don't see a point in owning a Kindle either, as both platforms do not contain many of the books I read, and in any case, I am horrified by the slash and burn imperialism of these warring powers.
But here is a brief but interesting article from macnewsworld.com about Amazon and Apple's sprint to corner the publishers in order to corner you. One interesting thing to note is the absence of Random House in either company's corral. Random House is owned by Bertelsmann and Bertelsmann has been a longtime bedfellow of Barnes & Noble.
When B&N was subject to antitrust investigation in the early days of the new century they successfully unloaded half of BN.com to the German media company and was able to proceed with the deals that were too considered too monopolistic. In 2003, when the heat had cooled, Bertelsmann sold the shares back for the usual luchre and a special place in Barnes & Noble's distribution heart for their titles, in particular Random House.
So... No wonder Bertelsmann's Random House is not playing readily with Apple and Amazon. They know you can't have your cake and eat it too.
Bookstore Hat Tip: Between The Covers Rare Books
I had a difficult time obtaining a copy of Masters Of The Dew by Jacques Roumain, which I included in the two part piece on Haitian literature. It is Out-Of-Print and I realized that it would be slightly more difficult than usual, but I am a seasoned veteran of that trade and figured I'd be able to dig one up somewhere.
Using Advanced Book Exchange (ABEBooks) I was at firs amazed at the scarcity of the title. I found a reasonably priced trade paperback reprint from the 90's and ordered it. Two days later the order was canceled. Somewhat late for me to read it for the review.
I then sent out eight or so inquiries to other internet based used book dealers. Two retailers responded.
Kind of comical when just last week I had mentioned the closing of Baldwin's Book Barn and the decline of reliable used & collectible book dealers.
So how'd I get my copy? I called Between The Cover Rare Books, a respectable honest-to-goodness rare book dealer out of New Jersey. I spoke to a friendly bookseller who located the book, described its condition to me and shipped the book immediately so that I could have it by Saturday afternoon.
Sure, I ended up spending a little bit more for a first edition copy instead of a mere reading copy, but the experience and service was well worth it. Just wanted to give some love to the folks there for doing a fine job.
BTW: They have a slightly higher grade edition of Masters Of The Dew in stock. If you were thinking you needed a first edition of it...
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