iPad iBooks will be US only at launch?
By Thomas Ricker 
posted January 28th 2010 5:46AM
posted January 28th 2010 5:46AM
Update: Footnote on the bottom of the Apple Australia iPad site says "iBooks available in the US only." Evidence after the break.
Update 2: UK site is up sans iBooks which doesn't bode well for Europe considering it's the home for many of the world's top publishing houses. One sliver of hope was spotted in the iPad video promo that's footnoted with the following text: "iBooks available in U.S. and select countries." Hopefully soon rather than later. Screenshot after the break. [Thanks, Eytan D]
[Thanks, Robert S.]
@nickoutram
Look, far be it from me to tell another grown assed person how to waste their hard earned, but your excuses for this device are not in any way valid.
Your multitasking excuse is a peach and can be used for every half assed device ever created; "Look, accelerating will just put strain on the bad welding and wear down our cheap tyres...lets just push this car down the street and let people marvel at it's outer shell"
It's unacceptable...it introduces problems other less powered devices don't have and solves that problem in the most stupid way possible, as if the limitation is a feature for your benefit. "Well, yes sir if you only run one app your computer will be faster...so we made it so it can only run one app" heaven forbid they make the device fast enough to run more than one device. Imagine if Microsoft did that. "Yes it's faster than XP because it lets you do LESS!!!" Genius!
Your hatred for Flash is understandable...but having some idealistic stand is foolish when 90% of the web has it on there. Good luck trying to run hi-def H.264 video over current internet lines...flash can do it NOW. Youtube and Vimeo still haven't figured out how to fullscreen HTML5 videos yet!
Add that to the fact when I got my netbook Flash killed it, but since they started their 10.1 betas it's gotten better and better. Everything the iPad can do, plus more (I can actually surf the web, listen to music, while my IM app is online in my taskbar...so I can video chat with people) for less than half the price! With input ports!!!!
Should I expect a swarm of Apple douches with iPads at my local Starbucks soon?
But Australia gets a calendar! This would actually come in pretty handy, since it seems almost every time I talk with someone there they think it's a day later. Australia needs calendars!
Stop picking on Apple. It's not their fault the music biz^H^H^H^H, film biz^H^H^H^H, Book Biz is b0rked. Oh. Wait.
http://weisswurst.apina.biz/full/26439.png
The iBooks App has been omitted from the Canadian Apple site. It doesn't have the same footnote as the American and Australian site, but it does say "Some features and applications are not available in all areas."
I was defending the iPad up until this shocker!!! So no-one else in the world wants to read books huh? nuts.
I think the whole thing has been rushed somehow, developers haven't had to write software, not enough deals done with publishers, even the "ipad" name.
If they're missing the ibooks app I wonder how locked down it is going to be? why wouldn't it be available unless NOT having the bookstore made the app useless.
I'm getting the feeling there will be no uploading of our own books into this app.
Do you want to know when the e-book model fails?
When it's censored. When someone limits access to physical books, we pretty much think of them as evil. As long as you're limiting the spread of information, you're missing the point. You're sending us back in time, not into the future.
Please, more iPad stories.
iTampon is now up on UK store and also without iBooks. Damn that was one of the biggest selling points for me.
Also up on the German Apple site. Launching in march and april respectively. All links refer to sites held in english but the ibook feature is missing there also. No word about the price. It is only "unbelievable".
http://www.apple.com/de/ipad/
Hey, I'll be more than happy if the Stanza people make an iPAD version of their app. For me it's the best reader on the iPhone. Maybe not as pretty, but easily the most flexible and powerful. And it has its own book store, plus there a lots of other places to get books from.
Wow, this makes the iPon even more useless.