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News, features and resources for media and publishing professionals. Tuesday, April 23, 2002 Blogs | Subscribe | Interviews | Events | Films | Book Blog Media Cynic | Forum | Advertising | Classifieds | Jobs New International Ebook Organization Launched Microsoft Corp. announced the launch of the International eBook Association (IeBA), a new ebook organization based in Europe that will support the worldwide ebook community and promote the opportunities and promise of ebooks. The new association follows the closing of the International eBook Award Foundation (IeBAF), which was unable to obtain additional funding from Microsoft, the main sponsor of the organization, or find any new sponsors. The IeBAF will cease operations at the end of the month. While the new International eBook Association plans to announce its own set of ebook awards, it does not look like they will be anything like the large monetary prizes given by the IeBAF, which offered $50,000 grand prizes. Instead, the focus of the new association’s work will be to address critical issues facing the electronic publishing community. The principal goal of the IeBA will be to facilitate and accelerate the adoption of ebooks. "The directors and staff of the IeBAF are to be thanked for their hard work promoting the possibilities of electronic reading. Alberto Vitale was a splendid and energetic chairman, and the Frankfurt eBook awards served a very important role," said Dick Brass, vice president of Technology Development at Microsoft. "But as the ebooks industry evolves past its first critical years, the need for large monetary awards to attract interest and attention has been replaced by the need to address commercial and technological issues. "Ebook sales are expanding, and some publishers report double-digit year-to-year growth," Brass continued. "However, we must work hard if the industry is to see ebooks that regularly sell hundreds of thousands of copies, as Stephen King’s Riding the Bullet did two years ago. At this stage, we believe creating an ongoing force aimed at eliminating barriers to acceptance will help the industry move forward faster than putting these resources into big prizes. We still believe it’s valuable to recognize excellence in ebook publishing, and I believe the IeBA will continue to promote awards in the United States and Europe. But the focus of the new association will be on policy and industry progress, not prizes per se." The tasks facing the new association include commercial initiatives, including working with the European Union and member countries to rationalize widely varying taxation and regulatory policies that are slowing the diffusion of ebooks. There are also technology issues, such as readability and display quality. To improve the acceptance of ebooks, the new organization will work toward improving the electronic reading experience itself. Related Links: · Microsoft Corp. Click here to return to the homepage of The Write NewsTM Click here to subscribe to our free weekly email newsletter. www.writenews.com Copyright © 1997-2007 by Writers Write, Inc. All Rights Reserved.