If you claim you've always wanted to read War and Peace, but dreaded lugging around the 700-page Russian epic, you may need a new excuse.
On Thursday, Microsoft and Barnesandnoble.com unveiled a plan to sell paper-free books that can be read on personal computers and handheld devices using Microsoft's Reader software.
Under their "eBook initiative," barnesandnoble.com's customers will soon be able to buy and read thousands of titles using Microsoft Reader, a free software application designed to deliver a clear and customizable on-screen computer reading experience rivaling that of traditional paper-based text.
Barnes & Noble and barnesandnoble.com said they have agreed with Microsoft to develop and market the Microsoft Reader eBook store. Financial details of the agreement were not disclosed.
Microsoft's Dick Brass, vice president of technology development, predicted the sale of electronic books will reach US$1 billion in 3-4 years, and could overtake the sale of print books in ten years.
"I think this next revolution is going to supercede superstores and the Internet," said Steve Riggio, vice chairman of Barnes & Noble. "I think that in the not-too-distant future, virtually every book in print will be in electronic format."
Barnesandnoble.com will create the store on its Web site by mid-2000, and Barnes & Noble, the largest US book retailer and a major shareholder in barnesandnoble.com, will promote the books and sell the reading devices at its locations.
The companies admit that in the first few years, books will be predominately transferred over the Web to PCs and laptops.
Content providers will likely avoid the perils faced by the music download industry, whose growth has been checked by the lack of high-speed Web connections. Complete CDs of music files can take hours to transmit to a PC user with a 56K modem.
Text files, which generally do not have pictures or sound features, are far easier to compress, and therefore can be transmitted much more quickly.
"I think Moby Dick compresses to 250 or 300 kilobytes and that means that it can be downloaded probably in less than a minute on most systems," Microsoft's Brass said, referring to Herman Melville 500-page classic tome.
"I think eBooks are ideal for the current state of the web where most people do not yet have broadband," he said.
In time, eBooks on dedicated devices be the primary form of reading books. By then, content will also contain audio and video, such as a chef demonstrating how to prepare a meal described in a electronic cookbook.
The companies said that the new electronic books will never completely replace paper books, but suggested that eBooks could eventually be a reader's first choice.
"You will see promotions where you buy one [version] and get the other for free," he said. "You'll know things have come full circle when the eBook is the one that people want and the pBook [paper-based book] is the one that people get for free."
Barnes & Noble's Riggio said the initiative could reduce costs to book makers, and eventually will shrink the retail price of electronic books. Publishers could also stir up additional revenues from titles that are not cost-effective to reproduce or are out of print.
"For not much than 100 dollars, we can digitally convert an out-of-print book," Riggio said.
Microsoft, already the largest publisher of electronic encyclopedias, has inked deals with publishers such as Penguin Books, a unit of Pearson Plc., and R.R. Donnelley & Sons to convert their print titles into electronic books.
Deals with other content providers and handheld reader manufacturers will be announced in coming months, Microsoft said. New dedicated eBook hardware products are expected to be available by summer 2000.
Copyright 1999 Reuters Limited.
