Barnes & Noble has formally jumped into the e-book market this week, purchasing the e-book retailer Fictionwise for $15.7 million USD.
William Lynch Jr., CEO of B&N, added that the company will be launching an e-book store later this year and that they purchased Fictionwise because they had “one of the most popular applications on the iPhone, and they really understand merchandising.”
Fictionwise, which launched almost a decade ago, has sold about 5 million e-books and “will operate as an independent subsidiary of Barnes & Noble.” Lynch Jr. reminds that Barnes & Noble was one of the first large retailers to begin offering e-books, which it did in 2001, but quit the practice in early 2003 as sales were virtually non-existent.
Fictionwise co-founder Stephen Pendergrast noted that he estimates the US e-book market amounted to $100 million USD in revenue for 2008 and expects the market to continue to grow.
Result for: cad
Barnes & Noble has formally jumped into the e-book market this week, purchasing the e-book retailer Fictionwise for $15.7 million USD.
William Lynch Jr., CEO of B&N, added that the company will be launching an e-book store later this year and that they purchased Fictionwise because they had “one of the most popular applications on the iPhone, and they really understand merchandising.”
Fictionwise, which launched almost a decade ago, has sold about 5 million e-books and “will operate as an independent subsidiary of Barnes & Noble.” Lynch Jr. reminds that Barnes & Noble was one of the first large retailers to begin offering e-books, which it did in 2001, but quit the practice in early 2003 as sales were virtually non-existent.
Fictionwise co-founder Stephen Pendergrast noted that he estimates the US e-book market amounted to $100 million USD in revenue for 2008 and expects the market to continue to grow.
Result for: cad
Sony’s marketing team has taken aim at Microsoft’s Xbox 360 console in a recent press release, branding the console as too expensive and hyping the PlayStation 3 (PS3) as the best offer for your money. Specifically, Sony targeted the Xbox 360 Arcade unit, which it valued as $199. The press release claims that to get all the features of a standard 80GB PS3 model (at $399) for the Xbox 360 Arcade, you would need to spend between $449 and $499.
Sony cites the price of a Wi-Fi adapter (at $100), hard drive ($100 - $150) and an Xbox Live Gold Membership at $50 per year. Adding these to the price of an Arcade model would indeed push your overall expenditure to over $400, but interestingly, the press release did not show comparisons to the Xbox 360 Pro with a 60GB hard drive ($299) or the Xbox 360 Elite with a 120GB hard drive ($399).
Adding a Wi-Fi adapter to an Xbox 360 will cost you either way, but such a purchase depends on whether you actually require Wi-Fi, or if your setup will allow easy cable connection. Additionally, the press release claims that you will lose living room space with the Xbox 360 console when you start to buy add-ons, thus you, “add clutter to the entertainment center.”
The HD DVD add-on might apply here, but that is now obsolete. The Wi-Fi add-on is very small and clips right on to the back of the Xbox 360 console. All other peripherals from controllers to cables are similar in both systems. The Wii did not escape criticism either, with the press release claiming, “the Wii’s lack of enhanced features comes at the expense of a comprehensive entertainment solution.”
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