Hearst Unveils Skiff E-reader.
I feel like we've been here before. Like back in 2007 when the industry went crazy and bought anything that was digital: Publicis purchased Digitas, Microsoft purchased a Quantive, Google purchased DoubleClick, WPP purchased 24/7 Real Media. There was a race to "own" digital; to be the leader in digital. The goal was to secure a future and win business in a changing advertising landscape. And some of the buys just didn't even make sense. I get that Microsoft had to buy Avenue A/Razorfish in order to buy Atlas, but it was still an awkward buy and a bit of a conflict of interest. The same goes for WPP purchasing 24/7 Real Media. I'm still not sure why they did that and what they're planning on doing with it (have they done anything with it?)
Well we're seeing this all over again with the race to be the best e-reader. Still, is there a conflict of interest when a publisher creates an e-reader? It might be the best and most usable, but will they support non-Hearst media? There are a lot of questions about this move and time will tell (although we won't have to wait too long...these days it only takes a few weeks before we know if somethings a hit or a bust).
In 2009 alone we saw the introduction of 10+ e-readers from the Kindle to the Nook to the Papyrus and now the Skiff (is that the name of this thing?).
We've been told that history repeats itself...coming out of the 2007 free for all we saw some winners in Publicis and Google. In 2010 we'll have to see who emerges as the winner of the e-reader. Oh, and let's not forget about Apple's highly anticipated Tablet...
Here's a fun video. Great work by Berg London:
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