Posted on 01/05/2012 6:14:02 AM PST by jimbo123
Bookstore owner Barnes & Noble Inc (BKS.N) on Thursday said it is considering splitting off its Nook electronic reader business, which has been the main growth engine for the company.
(Excerpt) Read more at reuters.com ...
Agree 100 %!
No offense taken
It’s not an exact analogy but I see ebooks as the natural sequel to old fashioned books just as cars replaced horses.
Doesn’t mean old fashioned books are going to vanish entirely just as horses haven’t vanished entirely.
But they will be more specialty items and sentimental items, where it will just make more sense to grab the ebook when all you want to do is to read the darn thing.
If this analysis is correct, it’s sure to have far reaching effects of the business of selling books - there just won’t be a need for as many book stores or for elaborate mega bookstores. It will inevitably move to a more specialty business.
And even without that B&N still has to compete with Amazon on old fashioned books so they have both headwinds to face - that of ebooks and that of Amazon selling conventional books.
B&N in Huntington L.I. just closed because the landlord felt some other business would be more profitable and more likely to pay higher rents.The store was always busy, but that wasn’t enough.
B&N invested a lot of capital in redesigning and rebuilding its stores five years ago in the NY/NJ area. Couple the notes owed on that project with the economic decline and the competition of Amazon and the future looks poor. Too bad. I like my Nook color a lot, and I,being retired, love using the store’s cafe as a library with good coffee. But it is very hard to compete against an entity with no physical overhead like Amazon.
Can you access Samba (http://www.samba.org/) shares from your rooted Nook?
I have my ebooks on a central (Linux) server and manage them from a Windows box using Calibre (http://calibre-ebook.com/). I’d like to be able to browse them via WiFi but currently plug in our Kindle & Nook to load books via USB.
I dislike walled-gardens on principal and certainly wouldn’t want to maintain two separate ones (AZN & EPUB).
B&N has the same problem Borders did. They cater to a very liberal crowd who comes in, buys a latte and reads for free all day.
Not a very good business model.
Why I like books:
“I like a thin book because it will steady a table,
a leather volume because it will strop a razor,
and a heavy book because it can be thrown at a cat.”
Mark Twain
Very true on all points.
Barnes & Noble is an unethical company.
They practice “bait and switch” scams.
Find a book on their website at a particular advertised price, go the the brick and mortar store, and they refuse to sell it to you at the price advertised on their website.
I tried that a few days ago, and they told me that they don’t “price-match.” WITH THEIR OWN WEBSITE! This is the book I tried to buy at the website-advertised price: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/pioneer-woman-cooks-ree-drummond/1101968872
Let them fade away.
sad about all business's that are going belly up...thanks to obama, this country is falling apart at the seams...Please Americans help us get him out in Nov. 6, 2012
My son works for their college division—Told me over Christmas that B&N was looking to Nook sales to keep the whole operation afloat for the next couple of years. If that’s indeed true, this “news story” makes no sense.
Only “two” worth noting -
1) ssh/scp
2) Android marketplace which overs hundreds of thousands of more apps than the locked down B&N app store.
Other than reading the eBooks, everything other than the browser has been obtained outside of the B&N app store. Is that enough for you?
That's the attraction for me, too. I still prefer to read an actual book, but the thousands of free books available online in every field of study is too much to pass up and I just don't like sitting at a computer to read them.
Exactly! I went to the library last night and came home with just a few books for myself (I picked up some for the kdis) instead of half a dozen or more. As much as I love my Kindle, picking up a physical book is something I find comforting. Maybe it’s psychological, lol.
I was able to find classics, religious works, and history stuff. Some women like shoe shopping, for me, it’s books. The fact that they are free or a dollar or two makes my husband that much happier ;)
The demise of Borders removed the Borders Mission Valley store in San Diego. That had the best computer science section in town. 2nd best is the Mira Mesa B&N. After that, you have to order from Amazon.
I went into 3 Barnes and Noble locations this week after not being inside for about a year. The first thing I noticed was a discernible reduction in inventory - actual racks being removed. At least 20% of the shelves were gone, replaced with open space, maybe a third.
I remarked to my wife “It looks like they’re getting ready to close stores” as we worked through our remaining gift card balances.
I firmly believe that the mass-retail bookstore model is dead. B&N appears to have come to the same conclusion - divesting of inventory and diversifying into toys, gifts and electronic publishing.
They could effectively run the same operations out of 1/3 or 1/4 the footprint and have been closing stores. One in Lansing closed before Christmas.
2 years tops, and they’re gone.
I buy a lot of books but stopped buying at B&N when they were hiding conservative books in the back of the store. I decided they wanted only liberal customers. I am not a liberal. Like every other business or profession liberals take over, they fail.
That is a hint for investment purposes. Those businesses and professions in bed with Obama/DNC will be going under. It’s guarenteed by the anti-free market and humanist ideology of their fascist leaders.
The banksters fell and brought property owners and investors down with them when they went to bed with Clinton. The media and hollywood...the private schools and universities, government motors and government electric, alternative energy companies, health care providers... Bail out of them because they all took the poison pill that will kill them in the not so distant future.
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