Nook's Hidden Controversy

E-readers--they’re every avid readers dream and with the Christmas season right around the corner they are selling faster than candy canes. But despite skyrocketing sales, one e-reader is stirring up an immense level of controversy in the world of writers.

Say hello to the Nook. A slick, dual color, touch screen e-reader with 2GB of memory space and a Wi-Fi connection, which boasts itself for storing 1,500 E-books all for the price of $259. Offering more than a million titles from its E-book library, you would think the newest prized invention of Barnes and Noble, more popular than Amazon's Kindle, would be an enticing hit in the publishing industry. Yet most writers detest it.

Why, you ask? The answer is quite simple. Because of the new Barnes and Noble lend me technology. Thanks to this new technology, an owner of an e-reader can lend any book that they purchase to their friends for free. What’s more is that it does not necessarily have to be sent to another e-reader. It can be sent to any and from any iPhone, iPod touch, BlackBerry, PC, or Mac, by simply using the Barnes and Noble e-reader software, which can be downloaded for free off their website.

This leaves authors financially hurt and unable to protect their work, much like musicians whose work is freely distributed over the internet through peer to peer connections. Needless to say, the Nook’s technology has writers outraged.

“If all you have to do is wait for your friend to send a copy of a book to your nook or to your i-Phone, why buy? And if no one is buying, then fewer and fewer writers will be able to make a living by writing,” Michelle Richmond, author of “No One You Know,” said on her blog.

Though there is talk of a new model where the lending would become available through a licensing program, publishers are not happy with this resolution and continue to push it back in a relentless tug of war. Barnes and Noble itself has refused to comment in regard to these accusations.

Yet readers say the lending feature should pose no threat, since it is severely limited. E-books can be lent only once to designated individuals and for a maximum of 14 days. Furthermore, there are only a few titles that are designed for this feature. But what has left readers really astonished is the fact that when they lend the book, they themselves cannot read it; therefore, contradicting the era of technological advancement versus a library.

“I'm a little pissed off by this, especially since I was so excited about the Nook, but not entirely surprised. It's like when Microsoft introduced the Zune's sharing feature. They understood that people share physical media and want to share digital media, but still forced (probably at the record labels' behest, but whatever) a 3-play, 3-day restriction that was so strict nobody ever used the feature. And now Barnes and Noble is following in Microsoft's footsteps,” Gideon commented on a Gizmodo blog post.

Yet despite the array of controversies and problems, it looks like the Nook is here to stay, as it enters the sold-out holiday marketplace.