Scribd, one of the largest social publishing site has began testing a new e-book store which it hopes to compete with the growing popularity of Amazon’s Kindle Store and the Kindle e-book reader. But aside from establishing the Internet’s largest online store of user-uploaded contents and publications, Scribd is also hoping to disprove the criticism that it might be perpetrating online piracy of printed books.
According to the Scribd, its online store would benefit document sellers through:
- Generous Revenue Split: Keep 80% of revenue, with no monthly membership fees
- Flexible Pricing and Preview: Make real-time changes to pricing, preview, and download options for your works
- Instant Analytics: Receive sales data immediately
- Built-in viral marketing: Share previews of your “for sale” items quickly and easily using Scribd’s social features
- Multi-platform distribution: Ensure your works are available on most future mobile and e-reader devices
But aside from these benefits, those who will opt to sell their documents on Scribd will be able to manage their own digital rights by allowing them to set their preference on how their documents will be used by Scribd users. These include:
- download the PDF
- viewed on Scribd only
- download PDF with DRM
- download ePub with DRM
After setting the preference, Scribd will also help ensure that there will be no unauthorized downloading of documents from the Scribd site through its Copyright Management System (CMS).
Additionally, Scribd is also preparing to launch an iPhone application for the Scribd store which is very much like the Kindle for iPhone app.
So, would a Scribd E-Book Reader not too far behind?
