So, new battle lines are drawn: e Pub (universal open format, DRM primarily from Adobe’s ACS4) vs. .azw (Amazon’s proprietary DRM of the Mobipocket format) vs. good old fashioned HTML, DRM by…well, probably Google. HTML 5.0 does not currently stack up well against e Pub (which is XHTML) as e Pub contains specific metadata referring to publishing specific content such as table of contents. Fast forwarding, Google could turn its Chrome OS into an ereading environment complete with DRM and open up application development to those wanting to innovate using HTML (which itself is a format/platform in evolution). All of this dovetails nicely into Google Edition, the search megagiant’s plans to conquer the commercial ebook world.

Alex is betting that one of the reasons that advanced development for HTML as a flexible book format (there are many books available in HTML, but they work only in web browsers) stems from the fact that few ereaders contain web browsers because E Ink does a poor job of rendering web browsers. Using the dual-screen approach somewhat solves that problem. On the other hand, Barnes and Noble’s Nook, also an Andoid device, has a dual screen but the color LCD does not currently support a web browser.

There is some clarity in all this confusion: it is clear that a key player in this ebook melee will be the developer community. Developers will gravitate toward the platform that offers them scale, room to innovate and make money. Waiting in the public shadows, perhaps with the ability to tie the pieces together (format, device, development, content, sales) is Apple. Even without a formal announcement, it is Apple’s opportunity should it move from somewhat stealth to full-scale attack. As we speak, Apple’s brass is apparently talking to publishers of all stripes as well as key developers before taking the ereader plunge. The Magic 8 Ball says yes, with a Spring 2010 launch. Will the ereading battle end at that point or only get more interesting?

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A net receipts formula is differerent than a more standard 15% royalty of list price of a print product. Most e-book retailers take a discount of approximately 50% of an e-book’s list price. If S&S, for example, collects $5.00 from the retailer on a $10 book, the author will get 25% of that, or $1.25. a reduction of twenty-five cents per sale from the previous arrangement.

Sound a tad confusing? Take my word, it’s only going to get more confusing.

Actually Sunday newspapers compete with life in today’s world. Most major European newspapers have long given up on their Sunday editions (some because of distribution issues) as the day of rest has become the day of making up for lost time. The same is true here in the U.S. and newspapers have tried gimmicks (like product bundling) and promos (free subscription trials) to curb the steady decrease in Sunday circ, but my Sunday newspaper more resembles the local PennySaver than journalistic comfort food.

Beyond lifestyle changes, the Sunday newspaper has been doomed for a while. Never known for its news oomph (early deadlines, skeletal weekend staffs), the Sunday paper was once the home for big feature stories, special reports and a slick color magazine insert. With staff reductions, competition from other media (read: webzines) and rising costs, those showcase elements are all but disappeared. At this point, the only distinctive feature of a Sunday newspaper is its load of Free Standing Insert ads (which are themselves dwindling) and, if you live on the east coast, the lack of late sports scores.

The right move is to nuke the Sunday paper which will be a tough one to swallow but makes financial sense. Heck, I’d take all the Sunday content and bundle it into a TV show (web and on air) that reads like a local “60 Minutes” or CBS’ “Sunday Morning.” An act of heresy? Perhaps. But the times are a changin’, so it’s about time for newspapers to change with them.

As Yahoo learned with Yahoo Answers, presenting algorithmic search results with those offered by real-life humans is a challenge. That same challenge exists in blending algo results with those from Twitter and Facebook. As more content sources begin to become part of a one-box search experience, presenting them to consumers in a navigationally simple UI, will take the search world 10 blue links to 100 blue links. Lastly, I can see the merits of digging meaningful nuggets out of Twitter but still don’t understand what Facebook updates provide as value-add to search results. When I type in the search query “health clubs” do I really want to know that someone on the other side of the globe is at his health club? As my teenaged daughter would say, that’s TMI.

There’s more: the device will have two screens. A top screen, the reading pain, is an e Ink display and will not come with a web browser (E Ink based-browsers offer a notoriously poor web experience). The bottom TFT screen will be a color display and is powered by the Android O/S which, Barnes and Noble says, allows for optimum navigation and user experience in a small space on a mobile device. . The bottom window will be for shopping but also will support Android apps, however any apps that require web access will have to use WiFi support as 3G service is available only for book-related transactions (which keeps bandwidth costs down for B&N). Barnes and Noble will also facilitate synching of all content between The Nook, smartphone apps and Barnes and Noble’s desktop ereading software.

Anyway you slice Barnes and Noble’s announcement, The Nook is a game changer for the current market and one that will force Amazon’s hand even with Amazon’s recent release of an international Kindle. Regarding loaning ebooks you can lend Nook to Nook, as well as Nook to other Barnes & Noble eReader-enabled devices (such as iPhone, iPod touch, select Motorola and Blackberry smartphones, PC and Mac.) Just as with a physical book, the lender will not have access to the book during the two-week period (or earlier if the person you loaned it to returns it sooner). Banres and Noble plans on fully leveraging its retail presence by offering Nook owners special in-store content such as book previews. By encouraging Nook users to browse and shop with their devices in Barnes and Noble stores, these early adopters become product evangelists (not to mention demonstrators).

By supporting e.pub, the International Digital Publishing Forum’s open ereading format, consumers have a wider range of choices than with Amazon’s Kindle which supports Amazon’s proprietary DRM, .azw. with only the Kindle DX supporting PDF. Consumers also can borrow books from public libraries who offer digital lending programs as the vast majority of libraries support .epub and .pdf with their tittles.

Because of its rich set of features, retail merchandizing possibilities and open format support, The Nook not only impacts ereaders in the market (Kindle, Sony Reader) it takes some of the luster off of such pending ereaders as Plastic Logic’s Que and the new wireless iRex. The next move in the ereader space belongs to Amazon. That sound you heard was the air being let out of the Kindle’s tires. Amazon is now forced with the decision to be pragmatic and support the open .epub format or risk being locked out of the market.

All of this sound interesting? Well, somehow this story lost something in this news as it crossed the continent and made its way stateside. Something like, what about the publishers’ lawsuit that has yet to be resolved? Perhaps this is nothing more than a straw man to encourage publishers to encourage the courts to come to terms with Google. Clearly, the Google Editions plan looks financially tempting to publishers:

With GE, Google would give publishers 63 percent of revenues and keep 37 percent for itself where it sold e-books directly to consumers. Google already partners with publishers to make physical books searchable and available for sale.

In cases where e-books were bought through other online retailers, publishers would get 45 percent and most of the remaining 55 percent would go to the retailer, with a small share for Google

A few things Google has overlooked in its attempt to send a bouquet of Forget-Me-Nots to book publishers: I am not sure about others, but I have never used the browser on my Kindle. My sense is, that if consumers excessively used their device browsers, Amazon and other wireless device companies would begin to charge for 3G access. Sure, Google says you can read the book offline once you have accessed it via your browser, but that’s a choice not a mandate. Putting all these issues aside, this all becomes moot if Apple releases an Apptab and sells books via the iTunes store. Not even Google, with all of its superpowers can compete with the iTunes/iPod/iPhone culture.

Lest we forget, the publishers I have spoken to in the past year loathe doing business with Google. Secretly, or maybe not so secretly, I think to a man they hope Apple comes in and kicks Google’s…eh..tail. Amazon’s too.