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Microsoft Invests $300 Million In Nook e-Readers
First time accepted submitter NGTechnoRobot writes "In a turn for the books the BBC reports that Microsoft has invested $300 million in Barnes and Noble's Nook e-reader. The new Nook reader will integrate with Microsoft's yet-to-be-released Windows 8 operating system. From the article: 'The deal could make Barnes and Noble's Nook e-book reader available to millions of new customers, integrating it with the Microsoft's new Windows 8 operating system. The as-yet unnamed new company will be 82.4% owned by Barnes and Noble, with Microsoft getting a 17.6% stake.' Guess the lawsuit's over, folks."
Now even the summary doesn't RTFA. It's $300 = £185m, not $300 = £300.
I won't lie, that I can't deny
I did it all for the nook-e
The thing is, I don't want my e-reader to "integrate" with my PC. (I'm in the Kindle lock-in camp rather than the Nook lock-in camp, but that's not the point.) I want the device to be able to function completely independently. If I ever need to plug it into my computer at all, I consider that a usability failure. I feel the same way about my smartphone.
Calm down, dude, calm down. It's just another generic post-as-soon-as-the-article-comes-up, high-ID Microsoft shill. You've got to expect that sort of thing.
I agree - it's been one of my big complaints about iProducts. My Android phone updates over the air, as does my Nook Color. If I plug them into a PC then I get an added bonus (easy file transfer mostly) but I could use either one heavily for years without ever needing to plug it into a PC and not really miss out on anything.
Samsung is now the largest mobile manufacture, not Nokia.
iPhones and iPads as of iOS5.x now update over the air, without any PC or Mac interaction required (they can even activate OTA these days as well).
The item that I find interesting, and we are not talking about, is that Microsoft is taking an ownership position in their college bookstore operations. Now, why is MSFT doing that? I mean, yes, selling overpriced sweatshirts to the student's parents is amazing profitable - but it's not exactly in MSFT core line.
Why do I think that MSFT is trying to sneak into the online book selling business via text books? And why am I thinking about more DRM / lock down on text books?
Errr... unless you are lazily lumping everything that isn't Xbox into 'win "os"':
- Internet Explorer could hardly be called a miserable failure (it was a cross-platform product until Apple no longer needed it). It may not be good, but it did not fail
- Outlook is a failed product?
- Office generally, a failed product?
- Sharepoint, a failed product?
For those of us who are older:
- MS-DOS was a failed product?
- Microsoft BASIC?
- Visual BASIC?
- Word (before office)?
- Visual C, Visual C++?
Don't talk nonsense.
Nice to know we're important enough to get our very own paid MS hacks ready to pounce on this story.
You left off the part where they've bought their way out of a lawsuit that may have taken out their backroom-bullying Android licensing business (not to mention the DoJ investigation B&N was pushing for).
Isn't it de rigeur that anything Microsoft invests in heavily, especially outside it's core competence, fails?
expandfairuse.org
Wait ... I thought Microsoft was suing B&N over the Nook Color.
Now, I realize that we're not talking about the Nook Color in this deal specifically, but this deal smells funny to me anyway.
To date Microsoft has only been successful because it rode on the coat-tails of the already very successful International Business Machines and their PC platform. Everything you listed was because IBM was the "safe choice" for managers. Away from the PC world Microsoft has experienced few successes. (In fact I can't think of any.)
If it had been Atari-DOS that was sold to IBM in 1981, then we'd be talking about the Atari monopoly and Atari Explorer instead of the MS monopoly or IE. In this alternate reality Microsoft would be no bigger or important than any other programming corporation. (They might even have failed and disappeared.)
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
MS just buried the only lawsuit that could have blown a hole the size of Manhattan in their anti-Android patent portfolio.
"The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
Strange, no mention that probably the main reason MSFT is paying $300M to B&N is to buy their way out of the "android patent extortion" law suite that B&N seemed close to winning. And probably B&N will also stop asking the DOJ to investigate the patent extortion and MSFT will keep extorting money from android device manufacturers in exchange of not taking them to court...
But what does blathering on about nothing gains the shill?
Okay, for this explanation, first assume that Slashdot matters as much as it did ten years ago. I know, I know, that sounds like I'm horribly behind the times, but this IS Microsoft we're talking about, so it makes sense. The "horribly behind the times" part, that is.
Now, past that, assume that it's not just geeks and nerds that read this, it's also businessmen and managers and other "important decision makers". Yes, yes, again, same necessary sub-assumptions as before.
Then, remember that Slashdot's commenting mechanism is based on the first post appearing on top. And, most importantly, remember the key advertising term: "Above the fold". That is, the presumption by advertisers (generally with merit) that things higher up on a page or otherwise in a more prominent position will be remembered better, even subconsciously, by the readers. Plus, lump into that the presumption (again, generally with merit) that the first opinion people read shapes their initial feelings about a given subject.
See where I'm going with this? That's why we have the first post wankers, except that they're there more for the recognition than any marketing purposes. It's up to you to decide which is more damaging to sane conversation and discourse.
So, take all that and wrap it up in a bundle of generic marketing-speak. Put that Microsoft(r) name in their heads! Talk it up, too! And get it out NOW! Before the consumer blob has any chance to read anything else! And stay on point, damnit! Don't ever let the competition get recognized in your rant, unless it's in a bad light (re: the requisite dig at Google)! Slashdot gets traffic, so enough of that has to be made of high-paid executives and managers for Fortune 500 companies that we can convince them to use Microsoft(r) Windows(tm) brand operating system(tm) food product(tm), right? That logic worked back in the early 90s before the internet came out and Microsoft could buy advertising in any non-Apple-specific publication, it'll DAMN well work now, too!
So, that's it. Unravel the logic from the point of view of a company that can't mentally get out of the 90s, the last time they were unequivocally "winning". Or who willingly ignored the internet as a passing fad. Or whose primary high-paying customers are high-paid businesspeople. Then it'll all make sense. Well, it'll make sense why they think paying their shills to do this will mean profits later.
In fact, the more I think about how blatantly backwards and behind all of this is, the more I have this faint feeling in the back of my head that maybe these shills are actually an altogether-too-clever mockery of Microsoft that happens to fall on the wrong side of Poe's Law...
Perhaps you didn't read the vitriol in some of B&N's reports.
They made it very clear that they viewed Microsoft's approach as nothing more or less than brigandry.
I agree - it's been one of my big complaints about iProducts. My Android phone updates over the air, as does my Nook Color. If I plug them into a PC then I get an added bonus (easy file transfer mostly) but I could use either one heavily for years without ever needing to plug it into a PC and not really miss out on anything.
I'd miss out on my books being backed up and readable on my Mac, which is exactly what happens with eBooks bought on my iPad, either from Apple or from other sources as long as it is standard EPUB format.
Summary is misleading. It suggests the Nook devices will somehow relate to windows. However, the only concrete thing thusfar is that B&N will bother to make an app for windows phone and windows tablets whereas before they weren't going to bother. MS basically paid 300 million dollars to have their platform not be excluded from the nook market share. Basically, MS sees a chicken and egg problem (no users without apps, no app support without users) by throwing money at software vendors.
The timing is interesting though. As BBC noted, B&N stock soared and suggested a link between the MS deal and this, but there is also a large hedge-fund activity going on at the same time.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
You lost me at "On top of that Nokia will use Android on their lower end phones"
What about the part where he says Nokia is the largest phone manufacturer? Wasn't there just an article posted less than a week ago about Samsung taking the top spot from Nokia?
-I only code in BASIC.-
MS is buying a 17.6% stake in the exact piece of B&N that it was suing (the Android-based reader/tablet business.)
Given that B&N's strategy to counter the MS "pay us to use Android" lawsuit was to challenge the validity of the Microsoft patents that were used in the lawsuit, it looks a lot like a $300 million payment from MS to B&N to stop challenging MS's patents, in order that the patents won't be struck down in court.
I agree on the lack of need for PC integration, but lets not paint Kindle lock-in and Nook lock-in in the same light. At least with the Nook you are able to buy an ebook from any ePub retailer. There are many besides B&N. With Kindle you have no such luxuary.
Why do people keep repeating this? With a Kindle you can buy an e-book from any mobi retailer, and you can convert any epub that doesn't use DRM... but you generally don't have to since almost all ebooks are available direct from Amazon whereas only a fraction are available from B&N.
The only thing tying anyone to a Kindle is publisher-installed DRM on the e-book files that prevents them from moving books to their Kindle from other retailers or from their Kindle to a different e-reader.
But what does blathering on about nothing gains the shill?
Typically two things; 1) we discuss something irrelevant but which forwards the shills interests 2) we don't discuss the main thing. The main thing is:
Microsoft sued Barnes and Noble about patents; The lawsuit ended up being settled by Microsoft paying out 300Million cash!!!
This has the same stucture as the Apple monopoly payout which allowed Apple to survive it's down years. Take away from this:
=~ s,(.*),<sarcasm>$1</sarcasm>,g if any_point_you_wish();
MS has employees whose official title is "Technical Evangelist". I've never heard any other companies having employees like this. Obviously, the title is a euphamism for "shill". These are people who are actually paid to spend their work days going to internet forums and posting pro-MS BS.
turns out it's about the Nook application on Windows 8 based computers and not Windows 8 on Nook hardware with Nook software.
LoB
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus