Slate's "The End of Barnes and Noble."

The article really is just a couple of paragraphs wondering if there really is a need for so many ebook platforms, and whether B & N's platform will win out.

I wondered this several years ago -- my guess was, that either someone would come along with a superior technology, or someone would come along with similar tech only much cheaper.

Of course, now it seems even clearer to me that ebook dedicated tech is doomed.  That platforms that can do everything a Nook can do but everything else too is probably the future.

So, even outside their crazy suicide business plan of making their bricks and mortars obsolete in favor of a lower return on ebooks, the ebooks readers themselves are going to be a huge struggle for them.

Did they have any choice?

Being stubborn, I wonder if they couldn't have doubled down on books.  But everyone seems to think that wouldn't work.

I was playing with the idea of a full bookstore, but the more books I carry and the more I watch the finicky behavior of the book customers, the more I think I'm better off having an eclectic mix of product.

I sold one out of four of the new J.K. Rowling book I brought in -- which is exactly the reason I stay away from most "best sellers."  They're cheaper and ubiquitous elsewhere.  But if you can't sell best-sellers, it makes it pretty difficult to be dedicated to that one product line, doesn't it?

So my little entry strategy of sticking to quirky, cult, favorite, classic books turns out to be maybe my only strategy.  And having books be about 20% of my business also turns out to be my only strategy.

I know the customers will go where the customers will go.  All the "Buy Local" and "Support Your Local Bookstore" campaigns in the world won't stop the inevitable.  So you take what part of the inevitable you can use, and you mix that with other leftovers and you can still have a viable business.

Pile up enough failures, and it begins to look a lot like success.