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London, Paris, Fairbanks

Chris left her native Germany in 1994, to study and work first in Paris, then London. Starting out with a degree in physics, she has been a teacher, translator and archivist, and worked in commercial software development and operations. She returned to science in 2011 and now lives with her domestic partner 25 miles (40 km) outside Fairbanks, AK.

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Of ebooks and bookstores

In 2011 I got an ebook reader. I also moved from a European capital city to a small place in a different country, and now seem to be more attentive to the institutions that make a difference to one’s quality of life. (*) Two of the places I care about are Gulliver’s Books up here in Fairbanks, and Burlingham Books, the bookstore my friend Ann Burlingham opened a few years ago in her hometown, Perry, in the state of New York.

When I had surgery last summer, Melinda got me a black-and-white Nook reader that Barnes & Noble just had come out with. I picked this model to compare with Melinda’s own Kindle, and because B&N looked somewhat more like the underdog compared with the Amazon juggernaut. The Nook, but not the Kindle, has the ability of displaying ebooks in epub format that are locked down with Adobe’s digital rights management (DRM) software, such as books sold through other stores than B&N or lent from libraries.

The other day at Gulliver’s Books, there were posters all over the store inviting customers to buy ebooks via the Gulliver’s Books website. The idea I could circumvent the Barnes & Noble lock-in and funnel some of my ebook money back to independent businesses was both intriguing and appealing, so I checked it out. Turnes out, both Gulliver’s and Burlingham Books offer this service, in an identical way: via a Google eBooks store. Here is how buying an electronic book for your Nook from your independent brick-and-mortar bookseller’s website works in practice:

Use the “Search Google eBooks” function on the bookstore’s web site. The integration is pretty smooth, including a shopping cart functionality. Prices appear to be identical with B & N, on the books I checked.
After hitting the Checkout button, log in via your Google account. The actual buying/online pay module is clearly provided by Google.
Once you’re done, there will be a link to access your Google eBooks — more or less well integrated with your local bookstore’s site — or you can go to Google Books directly and find it there, either to read online or download.
Hitting the Download button, you get an .acsm file. It won’t be readable on your ebook reader. Reading the book offline requires Adobe Digital Edititons.
If this is the first time you’re using the Adobe software, you have to download and install it, create an Adobe ID, and also register your ebook reader.
Now you can open the .acsm file in Adobe Digital Editions, which is at the same time an offline reader, simple books database and digital rights management application. ADE will download the book itself in epub format and allow you to read it or drag it onto the reader.
Voilà, you have the same HarperCollins (or whatever) ebook on your Nook that you would have bought from Barnes & Noble.

Phew! No question, this is a lot of steps, and I went wrong twice the first time round. However, and that’s the important part, it’s not quite prohibitively complicated. Once you’ve got ADE installed, it’s there. You may not want anything to do with any of this terrible DRM software, but this would mean, currently, no ebook reader. (Also, I need it for library books anyway.) ADE is clunky, for example by not letting you eject the Nook without closing the software, but it’s still no show-stopper. I dislike having nearly all my online activities go through Google, but this is a small extra price to pay, and unlike Barnes & Noble, Google hasn’t tricked me into giving up my VISA card number, so at least I have a small measure of control. Also, with all due respect, I’d rather trust Google to implement online payment than my local independent bookstore.

The bottom line is: If I’m buying ebooks from my computer where everything is installed, the complexity is tolerable: about the same as any online purchase via a clean interface, and with near-instant gratification. Given how much I dislike being locked into the big chain store for ebooks, this is worth it for me.

I’ll still use B&N - when I’m at an airport connected via some free wifi, the convenience (and likely even security) of buying right from the Nook, with three stabs of my finger, is just too great. It would be helpful if the requirement to go through your home computer could be dropped — “buy your ebook here” kiosks in local bookstores, with a USB interface to plug in your Nook, for example.

Ebooks are apparently up to 8% of book sales in the US. In France or Germany, they’re still below 1%, but there’ll be a growth in market share over the next year or two. The UK should be somewhere in-between. There is a lot I like about reading some some type of books this way, in particular at the cheap end of the market - paperbacks and classics. I’ve been reading a little bit more and enjoying it. There’s also a lot I could write about what I dislike about ebooks. I don’t want them to take over, but feel they’re here to stay. And the last three I bought came from independent bookstores.

(*) Not that the inhabitants of large cities shouldn’t care about their small stores and neighborhood institutions — obviously they should, and if they don’t it’s not something to be proud of. But it’s a lot easier to feel that someone’s commercial success depends on you, personally, in a small community.