Ebooks Articles on TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog

Penguin offers settlement in European Commission investigation into e-book price-fixing

by Steven Sande (Apr 19th, 2013)

The European Commission has been investigating Apple and major book publishers over e-book price-fixing since late 2011. Today the EC published a notice on its website inviting comments on Penguin's proposal to end its existing pricing agreements with Apple and refrain from entering into similar ...

Rumor: Amazon's Goodreads purchase cancelled a possible Apple partnership

by Mike Schramm (Apr 18th, 2013)

The Wall Street Journal says that before Amazon's purchase of the Goodreads service earlier this year, Apple was planning to possibly integrate the social reading-recommendation service into its own iBookstore. Apple and Goodreads, says the WSJ, had been talking for a year or more about ...

Tim Cook ordered to testify in e-book case

by Dave Caolo (Mar 14th, 2013)

According to Reuters, Apple CEO Tim Cook will have to sit for a deposition in the US government's case against Apple regarding e-book price fixing. US District Judge Denise Cote decided in favor of the Justice Department's request to have Cook on the stand. He will be made available for four ...

Smart textbook maker Kno introduces Kno Me, adding stats to studying

by Victor Agreda, Jr. (Jan 8th, 2013)

Kno turns old-fashioned educational textbooks into interactive learning experiences. Adding links, multimedia and features like flashcards and quizzes, Kno already offers a powerful experience for students. Of course there are tools for adding notes, comments and such, but each student also has ...

Apple's iBookstore to hit Japan this year

by Michael Grothaus (Jan 2nd, 2013)

Before Apple rolled out the iBookstore in Japan in 2010, it failed to negotiate the necessary contracts with Japan's biggest book publishers. As a result, the iBookstore in Japan was stocked predominately with free, public domain e-books. The only paid e-books in the store have been from very ...

Apple suspends 'most favored nation' in European iBookstore for 5 years

by Dave Caolo (Dec 20th, 2012)

Apple has sent an email to e-book publishers selling in European iBookstores noting that the "most favored nation" clause has been suspended until December 8, 2017, setteB.IT notes on Twitter. The change removes the phrase from the book-selling contract, which prevented publishers from selling ...

Apple says it will stop e-book price fixing in Europe

by Megan Lavey-Heaton (Sep 20th, 2012)

In a move that looks hopeful for the American market, Apple has vowed to stop fixing e-book prices in Europe, Macworld reports. As part of the agreement, Apple will terminate the agency-pricing agreements with the five companies involved in the European antitrust suit: Hachette Livre, Harper ...

iTunes getting a major makeover, slated for October release

by Mel Martin (Sep 12th, 2012)

Love it or hate it, we all spend a lot of time in iTunes on our Macs, iPhones, iPads and what have you. Apple announced a major update for iTunes, calling it "dramatically simpler" for using your own media files, and for navigating the iTunes store. The new iTunes will look like a large grid, ...

Apple calls Dept. of Justice settlement proposal unlawful

by Kelly Hodgkins (Aug 16th, 2012)

Apple is making it known that it will not accept the ebook settlement terms proposed by the Department of Justice, says a report in Paid Content. Under the DOJ's proposal, Apple would have to sever its current contracts and renegotiate new ones with three book publishers - HarperCollins, Hachette ...

Judge: Walter Isaacson doesn't have to hand over biography notes

by Steven Sande (Jul 30th, 2012)

It's beginning to look like we'll need to change our name to "The Unofficial Apple Legal Weblog," since we have a story of one more case involving Apple. This story is in reference to a class action suit regarding alleged price fixing on ebooks by Apple. Lawyers for the plaintiffs have ...

US Senator says DOJ should drop Apple ebook lawsuit

by Steven Sande (Jul 19th, 2012)

Senator Charles Schumer of New York (right) appealed to the U.S. Department of Justice yesterday in the Wall Street Journal to drop its lawsuit against Apple and a number of major publishers. The DOJ alleges that Apple and the publishers colluded to raise prices in the ebook market. Schumer ...

iBook Lessons: Picking vendors, price, and exclusivity

by Erica Sadun (Jul 5th, 2012)

iBook Lessons is a continuing series about ebook writing and publishing. There's a dilemma faced by many new ebook authors: how to sell a book for "not much at all" and still earn a decent living. Apple and Amazon policies complicate this decision. Amazon offers a multi-choice royalty system ...

iBook Lessons: Adding ASL support to iBooks

by Erica Sadun (Jun 29th, 2012)

iBook Lessons is a continuing series about ebook writing and publishing. Bilingual books have existed for a long time. Bilingual ebooks have also shown a presence in online stores. Adding American Sign Language (ASL) editions to ebooks? That's a proposition that has been hard to accomplish ...

iBook Lessons: The absolute beginner

by Erica Sadun (Jun 29th, 2012)

iBook Lessons is a continuing series about ebook writing and publishing. I get asked this a lot: what is the absolute minimum it takes to get started in ebook publishing. The answer is this: a manuscript in Microsoft Word .doc or .docx format, an Amazon account, and a smile. Everything else ...

E-book price fixing court date set for 2013

by Mike Schramm (Jun 25th, 2012)

The Justice Department has been ready to take Apple to task over these recent allegations of e-book price fixing, and now a court date has been set: Apple will have to face the music almost a year from now, on June 3, 2013. Apple, Macmillan and the Penguin Group are the targets in the case, and ...