In theory there would be a huge advantage to having a bookstore that was not locked to one device. Historically the music industry was caught on the hop when Apple launched the iPod. Because it could play MP3s the iPod was the perfect companion to the Napsters/Kazaas of this world. That was a business for Apple, but not for the music industry, which later found itself locked into the the Apple store. Eventually online stores started offering DRM-free MP3s for sale, but as we know, the slow-to-react music industry has not recovered since.

The same is true of books. Why lock down books to one device? But of course Amazon is trying to do exactly this with the Kindle. So it makes sense then to disrupt them faster, with a service which syncs across platforms and devices. Step forward Kobo Books.

Kobo is a cloud-based book store, previously only available in the US but today launching in the UK in a first push into Europe.