If the e-book reader was meant to come along and knock the old paper book off the top of the heap, what can a smart phone, tablet or any other connected mobile device do if it has the power to purchase and display books within a web browser?
This is where Google is headed next with Google Editions, an online service for booksellers that will allow consumers to read books on anything with a web browser, from desktop to laptop to mobile phone.
After the book is purchased through the web browser it will also be available offline, explained Tom Turvey, head of Google Book Search’s publisher partnership program.
“The way the e-book market will evolve is by accessing the book from anywhere, from an access point of view, and also from a geographical point of view,” he said at the Frankfurt Book Fair.
What this means is that instead of downloading and owning a digital edition of a book as you would through the Amazon Kindle or Sony’s Pocket Reader, you are essentially paying to access it from the cloud, with the ability (presumably through Google Gears) to go through an offline version as needed.
Well, we’re moving everything else to the cloud … why not books?
By Marie Boran, via Gadgetrepublic.com
