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In a press event in New York yesterday, digital publisher Inkling announced a new publishing tool for professionals that will directly compete with Apple’s iBooks Author. The software company has made a lucrative business of selling ebooks for education, art, and more.
From yesterday’s event, it seems like Inkling wants to take things to the next step and push Apple and Amazon out the back door.
Inkling’s new publishing tool, Habitat, will allow professionals to seamlessly integrate their books into digital content. Unlike Apple’s iBooks Author, Habitat works with large publishing companies for digital overhauling. Habitat’s books-in-progress are located in the cloud, allowing multiple authors to work on the title at the same time. The publishing tool will also allow companies to integrate multimedia and enhanced content including images, audio, and video.
According to CNet, Inkling CEO and founder Matt MacInnis was quoted as saying that “Amazon is killing the publishing industry. He spoke in a recent interview with CNet about Inklings plans to become the most-used platform for delivering digital content. “ ”[Amazon] has amassed too much market power, and every single entity in the industry is interested in overthrowing the [near] monopoly. … If we’re distributing content more efficiently than Amazon is, or even if we’re only a fraction as successful as Amazon is, publishers still have a new revenue stream outside Amazon, and that’s good for them,” said MacInnis.
Habitat is currently available to the public and publishes items for iOS, Web browsers, and Amazon, Apple and Barnes & Noble digital bookstores. Open Air Publishing has been using the beta version of Habitat for a while. The company’s CEO Jon Feldman spoke with CNet on the matter. “All of our books from start to finish take about 12 weeks to 12 months,” Feldman said. “That’s several multiples faster than traditional publishing.”
Inkling hopes to change the publishing industry and chip away at the market share of Amazon and Apple.
“We’re on a mission to become the No. 1 platform for content that you use,” MacInnis said. “I see a day coming very quickly where people who want good, factual, curated knowledge — whether personal or professional — will Google it and tag it ‘Inkling’ and find what they’re looking for.”
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