“Apple’s recent announcement and release of its iBooks Author tool was met with plenty of controversy,” Joe Wikert writes for O’Reilly Radar.
“My question is simply this: Why all the fuss? Apple’s intent has never been to improve the book publishing industry,” Wikert writes. “Just like Amazon and any other ebook vendor, Apple’s goal is to capture share of this rapidly growing segment. In Apple’s case, it simply decided to offer an authoring tool that’s capable of creating some pretty darned cool products. If Amazon were to do the same thing and create a terrific authoring tool for mobi or KF8 format, would the industry be as upset? I don’t think so.”
Wikert writes, “Apple’s EULA doesn’t really lock you into its distribution channel for your content. That restriction only applies to a “book or other work you generate using [the iBooks Author] software.” All Apple’s really trying to do is prevent you from tweaking the output of its tool to create content for other distribution channels.”
Read more in the full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Judge Bork” for the heads up.]