While holding on to ownership of nearly 80 percent of its Nook division, a $300 million investment in Nook from Microsoft last fall, followed by an $89.5 million commitment from Pearson, which sees value in the growing electronic textbook market, are signs that Barnes & Noble can forge a way to secure enough of the digital business to offset the problems it faces in traditional bookselling.
Good information, but I think the basic premise of the article is flawed- B&N is now and has been for the past few years transitioning out of being a retail bookseller. They bet the farm on the Nook and it carried them past Borders, but there is no synergy or compatibility between ephemeral ebooks and the real thing- Ebooks are cannibals, they erode sales of physical books and give nothing back. B&N's move with the Nook is classic corporate short-sightedness. It excited the investors, kept the money flowing and bought them a little time, but they're not Apple or Amazon. It's gnawed enough meat off the bones of their core business to upset the stability of the whole operation.
The day is fast approaching for many communities when the rising sun will illuminate not a Barnes & Noble but a pile of whitening bones, flensed clean by needle sharp digital teeth.
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