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Google eBooks Apps Now Available for iOS, Android; Nook & Sony Reader Supported.

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This morning, Warner wrote that the Google eBooks digital bookstore is now open for business, but that the iOS app isn’t yet available. It looks like Android and iOS platforms now have native apps to access and synchronize with Google’s eBooks store, which will require a Google or Gmail account. Now, books purchased are stored in the cloud, and your progress–the last place you left off while reading–can easily be synchronized across devices, in case you switch between phones or digital readers.

To download the apps, you can go to Android Market on Android or the App Store on iOS for the iPad or iPhone version and download Google eBooks for free.

Google is touting its eBooks as being the choice for untethered reading. You can read on a number of devices, including tablets, smartphones, notebooks, and readers. The other benefit that Google is advertising is the choice of e-books available. Similar to Nook and Kindle, your latest progress will be synchronized across multiple devices, making it easy to switch between devices as you’re reading.

Google eBooks uses Adobe DRM for both PDF and EPUB files, meaning books purchased can be downloaded and used on Sony Reader devices, Barnes & Noble Nook, Nook Color, and other devices that support Adobe DRM formats. A full list of compatible hardware that will work with Google eBooks is available here. Paid books will appear alongside Google’s repository of 3 million free public domain titles.

The digital book market is beginning to heat up with big players such as Apple (iBooks), Barnes & Noble (Nook), Amazon (Kindle), Sony (Reader), and Borders and Kobo bookstore to name a few. Now, Google is throwing its ambitious weight behind the market. Also, as a related market, the digital periodical market may be the next area that Google can tackle after it wrestles the books market. As magazine and newspaper publishers have been unable to agree to terms with Apple over a periodicals and subscription model, Google’s self-proclaimed open Android platform may be the next logical choice. Whether periodicals may appear through Google’s straight-forward books-like interface sans glitz or through another app or means is yet to be determined, but smartphones and tablets are breathing new life into the print publishing market and will continue to evolve that market as it transitions to digital.

Via: Google Books

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