23rd April 2009

Shortcovers Announces Users in 160 Countries

shortcoversTorontoShortcovers by Indigo Books & Music, Inc. , a digital destination that enables people to discover and experience their next great read on the mobile device they already own, today released user metrics from its first two months. Additionally, Shortcovers announced product updates, new publisher content and its developer program for mobile device manufacturers.

“We’re pleased with the response to Shortcovers in just the first two months, and are learning more every day about what our users want out of a mobile destination for ebooks, magazines and newspapers,” said Michael Serbinis, CIO & EVP of Indigo Books & Music. “Far and away, our biggest successes are our global reach and platform diversity. We thought iPhone would dominate downloads, but we’re very popular on Blackberry and Android. Readers tell us again and again how much they appreciate that our service is available on devices they already own.”

Specifically, Shortcovers released the following information about its growth and global reach:

* Users in 160 countries. Top global regions include the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Australia, India and China
* More than 100,000 people have tried Shortcovers, and 10,000 registered with the service
* The average purchase is just under $10 USD
* The most popular purchases include the Twilight series and Outliers
* Authors have contributed thousands of books, chapters, short stories and other works directly through Shortcovers.com

Shortcovers also announced the following features in upcoming product updates:

* Reading personalization and enhanced paging, providing a more book-like reading experience
* Enhanced browsing and discovery, including best sellers, award winners and other notable sources
* Integrated purchasing for Blackberry and Android
* Support for Android and new mobile devices to be announced

Additionally, mobile OEMs are working with Shortcovers’ Developer Program, announced earlier this month. Featuring open APIs, a mobile SDK and developer forums, Shortcovers launched the Developer Program to further the company’s vision of reading on any device, anytime, anywhere. Shortcovers expects the first major release from an OEM using the Shortcovers SDK in the fall of 2009.

Publishers are also embracing Shortcovers’ open platform as a way to reach new readers. This week, House of Anansi Press made the new release Heaven is Small by Emily Schultz available to readers free of charge through Shortcovers. The promotion ends Friday, April 24.

This entry was posted on Thursday, April 23rd, 2009 at 8:21 am and is filed under Digital Products. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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