eBooks? What iTunes eBooks?!

Sittin’ Here, Watching The Market Go By

Associated Press headline: “Apple sells 1 million iPhones in first 3 days”. Add to that the six million phones already in the hands of customers (all of whom, I should note, chose to update their software…right when I was updating mine). Doing some quick, nearly caffeine-free math, that’s 7 million web-enabled, application-ready phones in the wild.

And counting.

And:

Since there has been significant interest in using the iPhone as an ereader, I was, well, expecting amazing things from the publishing industry. Hopes. Dashed. On a weekend when headlines were there for the grabbing and customers were searching for both toys and content, the publishing industry, perhaps practicing summer hours, was curiously silent. Not a single major initiative, announcement, horns-blaring call to check out these great offerings on iTunes.

Call me crazy, but I’d expect an industry that salivates over moving 150,000 units to be all over the potential for reaching seven million “mobile is the future” customers. Are you not out there, listening to readers, gauging their interest? They want, you have, and you’re still hiding the goods. I get this isn’t the largest market you have, but is that an excuse to sit on the sidelines?

They’re eejits. They’re all Buridan’s Ass.

Apple — that is, Steve Jobs — will have come in and force them to decide.

— via Teleread

Ten Searches A Day

That’s the goal I’ve set for myself to get through the one-hundred-plus list.

So pop in here every day to see the latest ten. They should be up in the evening U.S. Eastern Daylight Saving Time.

So far it’s been a depressing and grim task.

I hope it gets better.

But I’ve dealt with print publishers.

Hey, you eejits , look at what’s happened to General Motors. Enter the 21st Century already!

Dennis Potter

Dennis Potter

Fictionwise
– no match –

eReader
– no match –

MobiPocket
– no match –

ereadable
– no match –

ebooks.com
– no match –

Microsoft Reader
– no match –

Diesel
– no match –

Powells
– no ebooks –

Sony eBook Store
– no match –

Amazon Kindle
– no match –

Not even Kindle! What the hell do you people put into e form?!!?

Don Lee

Don Lee

Fictionwise
– no match –

eReader
– no match –

MobiPocket
– no match –

ereadable
– no match –

ebooks.com
– no match –

Microsoft Reader
– no match –

Diesel
– no match –

Powells
– no ebooks –

Sony eBook Store
– no match –

Amazon Kindle
– no match –

Not even Kindle! And this is a recent author too!

B. Traven

B. Traven

Fictionwise
– no match –

eReader
– no match –

MobiPocket
– no match –

ereadable
– no match –

ebooks.com
– no match –

Microsoft Reader
– no match –

Diesel
– no match –

Powells
– no ebooks –

Sony eBook Store
– no match –

Amazon Kindle
– no match –

Not even Kindle! This is like a cultural crime!

Craig Rice

Craig Rice

Fictionwise
– no match –

eReader
– no match –

MobiPocket
To Catch a Thief – $5.99
Crime on My Hands – $5.99

ereadable
– no match –

ebooks.com
– no match –

Microsoft Reader
– no match –

Diesel
– no match –

Powells
– no ebooks –

Sony eBook Store
– no match –

Amazon Kindle
Crime on My Hands – $4.79

MobiPocket gets points for having two Rice books, one of which they pulled up even though it’s under a pseudonym!

All of Rice should be in e, dammit.

Colin Wilson

Colin Wilson

Fictionwise
– no match –

eReader
Slaves of the Death Spiders and Other Essays on Fantastic Literature – $5.99

MobiPocket
– no match –

ereadable
– PDF only –

ebooks.com
– no match –

Microsoft Reader
– no match –

Diesel
– no match –

Powells
– PDF only –

Sony eBook Store
Serial Killer Investigations – $11.19

Amazon Kindle
Hermann Hesse – $9.99
Existence and Evolution: The Novels of Colin Wilson – $21.60
Origins of the Sexual Impulse – $9.99
The Age of Defeat – $9.99
Access to Inner Worlds: The Story of Brad Absetz – $9.99 .
G.I. Gurdjieff: The War Against Sleep and The Strange Life of P.D. Ouspensky – $21.60
David Lindsay’s Vision – $9.99
New Pathways in Psychology: Maslow and the Post-Freudian Revolution – $9.99
Field of Vision: The Broadcast Life of Kenneth Allsop – $7.99

Amazon gets points for liberating the Wilson ebooks from PDF and offering all but one at a one-third-off discount.

Sony gets a point for having one Kindle doesn’t have.

All of them suck for not having The Outsider and Wilson’s novels, which are what I want to buy in e.

Connie Willis

Connie Willis

Fictionwise
– no match –

eReader
– no match –

MobiPocket
– no match –

ereadable
– no match –

ebooks.com
– no match –

Microsoft Reader
– no match –

Diesel
– no match –

Powells
– no match –

Sony eBook Store
– no match –

Amazon Kindle
– no match –

WTF?!!? Really? Nothing by Connie Willis is in e?! I’m going to have to take my copy of Bellwether and scan it to make my own ebook edition?

Cornell Woolrich

Cornell Woolrich

Fictionwise
Rendezvous in Black – $10.00 – Mobi
The Bride Wore Black – $6.99 – .lit

eReader
– no match –

MobiPocket
Rendezvous in Black – $10.00

ereadable
– no match –

ebooks.com
– no match –

Microsoft Reader
Refers to Fictionwise, Diesel, Powells

Diesel
– no match –

Powells
– no ebooks –

Sony eBook Store
– no match –

Amazon Kindle
Fright – $5.59

This really disgusts me. Why isn’t there more Woolrich in e?! He’s dead! What’s the delay?!

A question for Fictionwise: How the hell do you manage to stay in business? The listing for The Bride Wore Black came from a Microsoft referral! If Google had your search engine, we’d all be using Yahoo!

Kindle gets a point for having a decent price and a book no one else has.

Norman Spinrad

Norman Spinrad

Fictionwise
He Walked Among Us – $8.99
Journals of the Plague Years – $2.85 – multi
Mexica – $7.99 – multi
The Druid King – $9.95 – Mobi
Vampire Junkies – $2.49 – multi

eReader
– no match –

MobiPocket
The Druid King – $9.95

ereadable
– no match –

ebooks.com
– no match –

Microsoft Reader
Refers to Fictionwise, Powell’s, Diesel

Diesel
The Druid King – $11.92 – .lit

Powells
– no ebooks –

Sony eBook Store
The Druid King – $8.96

Amazon Kindle
The Druid King – $7.96

Fictionwise’s listing for He Walked Among Us came up via a Microsoft referral! More suck, Fictionwise!

And since Fictionwise owns eReader, why does eReader have nothing?

Kindle doesn’t win this time.

Why isn’t there more Spinrad in e? Where’s Iron Dream, Agent of Chaos, and Bug Jack Barron to begin with?