Nineteen more publications sign up for the Sony Reader devices

Posted by Emma Heald on December 21, 2009 at 5:07 PM

Sony has now announced 19 new newspapers and periodical partners for its Reader devices, the Financial Times reported. The FT itself will be available immediately on the e-readers, along with the Los Angeles Times and the Chicago Tribune.

Other titles to follow later include the New York Times, the Christian Science Monitor, the Denver Post and the San Jose Mercury News. Amongst those signing on, the Dallas Morning News, the Providence Journal and the New York Observer are not available on Amazon's Kindle.

Although the exact revenue share has not been made public, it has been reported that both the Sony product and Plastic Logic's upcoming Que are offering better deals and more flexibility to publishers than Amazon's Kindle. "You can assume we're getting a better split than the Kindle," Dow Jones editor-in-chief Robert Thompson told the New York Times following the announcement of the Wall Street Journal's debut on the Sony Reader. "I won't actually say the price, but I wouldn't be here today if it wasn't a better deal."

Along with the WSJ, it was announced on Thursday that another News Corp title, the New York Post, was to appear on the Sony device in the near future.

As yet, revenue from e-readers has not been particularly significant, but could that be set to change in 2010 as more competitors enter the market? As the FT pointed out, the Sony e-readers do not as yet offer advertising, but this is something which Plastic Logic has promised for the Que.

Source: Financial Times