The company said it will offer more than 700,000 titles with new releases available for $9.99. In addition, Barnes & Noble said it will be the exclusive provider of digital books on the Plastic Logic e-reader, a device that will compete with Amazon’s Kindle and is slated to launch early next year.

The company says it expects it selection will increase to well over a million titles within the next year and will include every available eBook from every book publisher. Users will also have access to more than a half-million public domain books from Google, which can be downloaded for free.

William J. Lynch

Barnes & Noble’s offerings will not be compatible with the Kindle or Sony’s eBook reader.

"Today marks the first phase of our digital strategy, which is rooted in the belief that readers should have access to the books in their digital library from any device, from anywhere, at any time," said William J. Lynch, President of BN.com.

"Our goal at Barnes & Noble is to build a service that revolves around the customer, enabling them to have access to hundreds of thousands of titles and read on their smartphone, PC, and many other existing and future devices."
 

Plastic Logic

Plastic Logic has done some pretty cool things in the past, and I’d be interested to check out this reader first hand. This video posted to YouTube back in 2006 shows some nice flexible display technology the company has put together in the past with the 150ppi SVGA:

The new reader will no doubt be a neat gadget, but will it catch on or will it suffer the same lack of interest that the Kindle has suffered? I don’t think this device or devices like it are going to make traditional newspapers extinct, although they’re not going to help the cause of the print versions. Newspaper print sales are already on a sharp decline:

Electronic readers probably do threaten print newspapers more than say the Amazon Kindle threatens books. People collect books. They pay $25 (give or take) for a book and after they read it, they keep it displayed on their shelf. A newspaper on the other hand is a much smaller investment, and is usually discarded after reading, whether thrown out, left in the office, or left in an airplane seat.

On the other hand, that’s kind of the convenience of the print newspaper. You don’t have to worry about leaving it somewhere. It doesn’t break, and it doesn’t require hundreds of dollars up front (I’m just speculating that this device will be somewhere in that price range, based on the Kindle’s price). Still, none of that changes the fact that print sales are falling.

Plastic Logic is showing the device off at the Demo Conference in San Diego, which is continuing through tomorrow.  The reader has apparently not been given an official name yet, but it is scheduled to go on sale in 2009. The publications that will be available through it are still a mystery.