Google made its intentions clear today by announcing a deal with Sony to make a half-million public domain titles available for Sony Reader users. For free.
The announcement not only signals that Sony is serious about competing against Amazon, but also that Google clearly has plans in the online book space overall. The company’s Google Books project has been scanning books forever, despite the concerns of publishers over scanning of copyrighted works. This latest move sidesteps that problem by only offering books that are out of copyright, but opens the doors for Google to demonstrate the opportunity for publishers to reach readers through its platform.
For the moment, Sony will get to crow about having a far larger library of titles than the Amazon Kindle. However, that claim may not last long if Google partners with multiple device vendors in a bid to dominate the market through device-independence.