This article by Erica Sadun in TUAW explains why Apple fails to compete with Amazon in the electronic book market. iBooks is a cul-de-sac. Tough titty if you want to read your iBooks on anything other than an iOS device. There isn’t even an OS X reader¹. Amazon, to its credit, offers a Kindle application for anything that has a screen. Buy an Amazon book and it’s future proof. You will probably be able to grab a chapter on your fridge door next year. This is the one reason I never buy from the iBookstore. It is why Apple needs to get its act together and offer some real competition.
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¹ Can anyone please explain why Apple has not seen fit to offer a free iBooks app for Mac in the App Store? It surely isn’t lack of ability, so it must be a part of some mysterious long-term strategy to strangle iBooks at birth.