iBooks: Perfect for iOS readers

Pros: Buying books through the app store. Great highlighting, syncing, dictionary, and a ton of layout options. Two-page layout on the iPad, and fewer glitches than any other app.

Cons: Doesn’t work on any non-iOS device. Not your Kindle, not your Nook, not any E-Ink ereader. If you want to use one of those devices, you’ll want to use a different app. There isn’t even a desktop version of iBooks, you can only use it on an iPhone or an iPad. There’s also no real iBooks website, and navigating through the Books section of iTunes is a proper pain, so you’ll need to come to the app with a title in mind.

The gist: iBooks is also the only app that will let you buy books through the app store and your iTunes account—that ability is turned off for all other ebook apps. But that ease-of-buying-books is not what makes iBooks the best ereader app; instead, it’s the fact that all the others have significant downsides. iBooks has all the core functions—note-taking, highlighting, search, dictionary, and layout options—and they all work. If your iPhone and/or iPad is your main ereader, look no further for your new favorite app.

OverDrive: A must-have for everybody

Pros: Library ebooks. From your couch. For free.

Cons: Layout and navigation is kludgy. There is no search, highlight, note-taking, etc.

The gist: The OverDrive app lacks a whole whole lot of polish, but it’s the only one of these with a USP: this is how you borrow library ebooks (and even audiobooks) and put them on your phone. If you’ve already got a library card, you’ve got everything you need. If not, why not?

Kindle: You are heartless, sir

Pros: Exclusive Kindle singles by great writers mean I’m probably never going to delete this app. Syncs to Kindle devices, so a must-have for that crowd. Also, the iPad app can now do Kindle Fire mags, but unless you have, for some reason, both a Kindle Fire and an iPad, that feature is pretty useless. They’ve finally started using page numbers, so that’s good. And the Kindle store has the widest selection, in my own, strictly unscientific, tests (for example, the Kindle store has the Hunger Games, and iBooks doesn’t).

Cons: Amazon makes me feel unclean. I still buy things from them, but I never enjoy it. Once you get Amazon books, you’re locked into Amazon forever. Also, they have a tendency to delete people’s accounts for no reason (“warmest regards!”). And they never give money to charity.

The gist: Basically, if you already own a Kindle, using this app during your commute is easier than lugging your Kindle around. If you don’t already own a Kindle, don’t go over to the dark side now. (On a strictly technical level, the Kindle app has a lot of polish—it’s right up there with iBooks. The major downside is the ick factor.)

Nook: The less competent major corporate bookseller

Pros: The most innovative highlighting system out there, a press-hold-swipe process that’s pretty cool. The table of contents in-book is also really well done, my favorite of any of these apps. A nifty second app called B&N Bookstore that collects reviews and info about books and puts it all in a mobile layout (but unfortunately doesn’t let you buy ebooks).

Cons: Syncing between devices often glitches out. In fact, almost everything about this app often glitches out. There’s a permanent overlay in my library that reads “no matches found.” B&N just can’t seem to get this stuff right.

The gist: Barnes & Noble had a moment there where it looked like it might be just as good, in a technical sense, as Amazon, and with none of the icky Amazon vibe. That moment is over. B&N’s software and firmware (with the exception of the Nook Simple Touch, which people seem to love) is fundamentally cruddy, plain and simple. Don’t bother with this app unless you already have a Simple Touch. In which case, remember where you left off when you switch devices, because the app won’t.

Kobo: Such promise, such disappointment

Pros: Some of the most innovative ereader functionality in the world. Reading Life is a fun summary of your activity, and Kobo Pulse is an awesome way to socialize reading. Also, Kobo lets you read your Kobo books on a wide variety of other, non-Kobo devices, so you’re never in danger of being locked in, the way you are with Amazon or Nook. The Kobo app also boasts an onboard Instapaper interface that automatically syncs with your account.

Cons: Astonishingly lacks basic functions. There’s no search function, the page-turn situation is horrible, there are no page numbers (!), the place-finder is maddening, and there’s no ability to get samples of ebooks. Basically the app is phenomenal for everything except actually reading books.

The gist: Reading Life and Pulse are such awesome innovations that I really wanted to like the Kobo app, but I just can’t. First of all, there’s no search capability, something I’ve come to rely on in ereader apps, not just as a book reviewer but as a reader (if you forget who a character is, for instance, you can search for the first time they’re mentioned).

You're 40% of the way through the scroll bar, but only 25% of the way through the book???

The page number situation is horrible, in that page numbers don’t exist. You get page numbers within chapters (4/24 in ch. 3), and a percentage of the whole book read, but you never know what page you’re on in a traditional way, i.e. a single, global page number (125). That means that if you lose your place, good luck finding it. The place-finder at the bottom is unusable. It scrolls through the entire book, but with some invisible, greater space given over to the chapter you’re in.

So that bottom blue scrolling bar (pictured above left) maps out like this:

[p 1-52] [c u r r e n t c h a p t e r] [pp. 75-346]

However, they show you no navigational markings, so attempting to skip back three pages can easily send you back three chapters instead. Infuriating.

Worst of all, the Kobo store gives you no book preview option, so you can’t read excerpts of books before you buy. Previews are perhaps my favorite feature of the ebook revolution–they’ve become an integral part of my reading experience. Even if they fixed many of these other flaws, I need previews, and I’m not going to keep a whole different app just for that.

It’s a ridiculous example of an app that entirely eschews traditional functionality and strives to be unique. Where B&N is merely incompetent, Kobo has made active decisions that make their app unusable. It’s mind-blowing, but true.

The Kobo Touch, our top pick for casual readers.

A whole gaggle of new ereaders hit the market this month, just in time for the holiday season. We’ve updated our ereader comparison for this new slate: find it here, and find out why we don’t believe the hype about the Nook Tablet, and why the Kobo Touch is our top choice for casual readers.

In other news, we’re taking off for the rest of the week for Thanksgiving. We’ll be back on our regular schedule next week, when we’ll kick off our third annual Best Books series.

See you then, and happy Thanksgiving.

[Chamber Four's ereader comparison]

News of Amazon shutting Lendle down today marks another sad chapter in the history of modern publishing.

Lendle, as the name implies, was a site that helped Kindle users utilize the lending feature included in some Kindle ebooks. They don’t pirate books or sell lending credits or increase the amount you can lend, they’re only a sophisticated bulletin board to match up borrowers and lenders.

When I first read that they’d been shut down, I was furious—but really, it makes a lot of sense. Amazon has never thought much of lending ebooks—it’s never allowed library ebooks on the Kindle, and when Barnes & Noble first announced the Nook’s LendMe feature, Bezos denounced it for being “extremely limited.” When Amazon caved and copied that exact lending feature, their execution of it was both obnoxious to use and riddled with bugs.

So, obviously Bezos wants credit for reader-friendly features like ebook lending, but doesn’t want customers to actually use those features, no matter how “limited” he claims they are. File this one under: another reason not to buy a Kindle.

The good news: you can still find people to borrow and share ebooks with, at such sites as BooksForNooks.com, K BooksForMyEreader.com (formerly BooksForMyKindle, but they probably got cease-and-desisted), and eBookFling.com. At eBookFling, you can actually buy a lending credit (reportedly for $1.99), so you don’t have to own a single Kindle book to borrow them. Personally, I would’ve shut that site down and left Lendle up, but far be it from me to tell Bezos how to polish his head.

This is going to be an interesting one to watch, we haven’t had an AmazonFail in a while…

Apple v. Amazon

First there was terror. When the iPad was announced, Jeff Bezos messed his cargo shorts when he heard Apple was supporting both ePub and the Agency model. He promptly caved and let publishers walk all over him—although he did it, of course, with a minimum of maturity, because that’s how he rolls. But Bezos (not to mention publishers) got proper snookered by the sneaky Jobs.

Despite all the furor over Apple’s embrace of the agency model (which might not even be legal in countries where they regulate their corporations), the iPad isn’t selling many iBooks. Penguin claims to be leading the pack (you know, if you don’t count free Gutenberg books, which are “selling” twice as much as Penguin). But let’s not forget that iBooks aren’t very popular, in the scheme of iPad apps—in fact, Feedbooks distributes more books.

If the iPad does start selling tons of iBooks, well, publishers are screwed then, too. Apple can evidently force prices down to $9.99 if it feels like, and in April 2011, they can simply rescind the agency model agreement. Ha!

All this has led to, shall we say, some tension in the publishing industry. Publishers are choosing up sides, and even unleashing their wrath on unsuspecting authors who want to publish ebooks. Then there are the obligatory rumors that Kindle’s grip on the market is slipping, but since there’s a Kindle app for the iPad (not to mention iPhone and soon Android) I don’t understand how Apple will ever win a book fight.

And by the way, Google’s launching its own ebookstore, which I’m guessing and hoping will use Adobe ePub formatting. Meaning neither Apple nor Amazon customers will be able to read Google ebooks. Because Apple hates Adobe, too! Why? Well, more on that after the jump…

Apple v. Adobe (or apple v. flash?)

Nobody ever really expected the iPhone to get Flash, but when the iPad debuted without it—meaning no Hulu, among many other things—it was at the top of everybody’s “What the iPad’s Missing” lists.

Because Apple and Adobe are two of the biggest, most prominent technology companies in America, both saw fit to resolve this disagreement with all the poise and civility of two collicky toddlers slapfighting in a sandbox.

Adobe responded hastily to the iPad’s lack of Flash, saying in part:

It looks like Apple is continuing to impose restrictions on their devices that limit both content publishers and consumers.

That one little sentence is so many things. It’s true, OK, but it’s also whiny, passive-aggressive and petty—especially considering that they must have known this was happening before the iPad actually launched.

Steve Jobs responded with a public list of complaints about Flash, including such things as its impact on battery life, its reliability, and its ability to work with touch input. All decent points, but all things that should have been worked out (in private) years ago, especially since Apple and Adobe have worked together productively for years.

Instead Jobs went for the childish public retaliation, and Adobe got itself in a (bigger) huff and struck back with these smarmy We Heart Apple ads. (For a more tasteful statement of frustration with Apple, read this piece by Adobe Photoshop honcho John Nack.)

Personally, I think these companies are both being bullheaded and thin-skinned. Jobs makes some good points about why Flash might not be great to run, but refusing to allow it on his devices hamstrings the user experience. There are lots of cool things out there that use Flash (like Bendito Machine), and, personally, I want the ability to decide for myself what I do with a computer or a phone or anything else I pay for and own.

Apple often treats its customers like Luddites incapable of understanding statements like “Flash uses battery faster than html5.” That’s OK for my mom, who maybe actually doesn’t understand that, but I’m willing to make trade-offs (and they are definitely trade-offs). I don’t want to have a device’s usefulness—or especially the content available for it—artificially limited by the questionable moral (read: censorship) policies of a single corporate ethos.

After all, limiting content is semi-defensible (not really) when it’s porn, but Apple also rejected a political cartoonist’s app on the grounds that they don’t allow satire on the iPhone. Only after that cartoonist won the Pulitzer Prize was his app accepted. That kind of thing is downright scary.

Apple carries a heavy stick these days, but we’re staring at censorship by capitalism here, and that unnerves me deeply. (Oh, and by the way, Android’s getting Flash.) Adobe DRM and Flash are disconcerting because they’re proprietary and ubiquitous, and that’s certainly bad. Still, Jobs’s willingness to sacrifice his customers to win a pissing match is no less disconcerting.

Anyway, after all that the implications for ereaders are simple: a schism between Adobe and Apple means no library ebooks on the iPad. Which makes the iPad a no-go for ereading, in my book. I hate all DRM but until it goes away, Adobe is my DRM of choice.

• What’s the purpose of libraries in the 21st century? Salon says the new main branch of the Cambridge Public Library (just blocks from C4 HQ) isn’t practical. The Guardian says libraries still matter in a digital age, and so does an Australian librarian (via). And Ars Technica reveals how libraries help America’s poor. We already know Macmillan hates libraries. I don’t enjoy this line of discussion.

• What’s the last great book you read? John Crace in the Guardian discusses how difficult it is to find a great a novel these days, because there are far too many books and publishers will tell you each and every one of them is mind-blowingly fantastic. I couldn’t agree more. Crace recommends genre fiction; meanwhile, on the Guardian’s books blog, a post about how shorter can be better for fiction. And then, crime novelist Ian Rankin discusses/defends crime fiction (via). I’m inclined to agree with all this, the only problem is that I’ve been reading all the Edgar award nominees—supposedly the best of the year in a genre that’s right up my alley—and not a single one of them has been great. It’s a nice theory, though.

• Piracy is still a hot topic, though now people are complaining that “piracy” is such a sexy word it makes people want to pirate. The ethicist at the NYT says you can steal a copy of an ebook you previously bought—counterpoint. Despite the ethicist, IsoHunt will essentially be shut down has essentially been shut down. Finally, Big Content wants the U.S.’s new intellectual property enforcer to eliminate peer-to-peer file-sharing. Good luck with that.

• Here is an article from the NYT about literature and cognitive science. Basically, it’s about how empathy relates to reading fiction, and how readers process interrelated or overlapping points of view. Or “what the scholars call levels of intentionality.” Read it.

Obligatory iPad and Amazon news—and lots of other stuff—after the break.

• Some obligatory iPad news— Farhad Manjoo says resisting the iPad is futile, and on the day of its release 300,000 people didn’t even try. Also, a quarter million ebooks have already been downloaded, which seems like a lot. The big iPad question, from an ebook standpoint, is whether it will replace E-Ink ereaders. The answer is an overwhelming yes. Umm, or no. Or kind of. So probably not, in other words. That wasn’t too confusing, right? Anyway, the comics app looks pretty outstanding. Here are some more reviews of the iPad, and that’s just about enough of it. Wait, one more, for haters: will it blend?

• The obligatory Amazon v. agency model news— After Amazon finally capitulated to the agency book-pricing model (and a transition that was anything but seamless), they made sure everybody knew who was raising prices. Random House doesn’t want an agency deal, though, possibly because they hate authors. More likely because it doesn’t make any sense to make less money on each ebook and also sell fewer books. Meanwhile, HarperCollins gave away so many ebooks that it seemed simply too good to be true. Finally, between agency models and Apple iPads, what would you do today if you were Jeff Bezos? (I would cackle and cackle, simply because I could.)

• A few weeks ago novelist Carrie Vaughn left Grand Central Publishing, and wrote this post about why she did it (via). It’s an interesting piece, and it’s mostly about a non-compete clause. Coincidentally, Grand Central is responsible for this travesty of literature, which is very bad.

• Quick takes: the Guardian on the “lost Booker”; David Mamet on drama; Elmore Leonard and sons on writing; a terrific essay on Maoists in India by Arundhati Roy, part one and part two; what constitutes fair use?; how not to title a novel.

• Random of the week: A pair of brothers spent several months “squatting” on the side of a wall in Rio de Janeiro as part of an art installation. Here are some more pictures.

Maybe Amazon has a rogue algorithm that gives anything looking vaguely like “Harry Potter” its own midnight release party. T-minus 82 hours!

Hopefully this ad stays front and center on Amazon’s homepage for all 82 of them.