I have a daily Google News search set up for eBooks and it is a chronicle of extremely rapid and historic change. Libraries around the world are starting to lend eBooks. The format wars continue with incremental differences designed to lock buyers into a relationship with B&N, Amazon and Apple- there are others but I think they will be marginalized by the big three. In any case it hardly matters when you can get compatible reader apps for virtually any device.

In other news Apple released a small upgrade to their iBooks reader that now supports video and audio embedding and zoom touch on photos within eBooks. As publishers we have pretty interesting ideas about ways to expand the capabilities of 24PageBook titles with these additions. Though the books may be brief, the tools and resources you can access via each title mean they are not shallow. I’ll be sharing more about the use of interactivity in our eBooks as we near our launch September launch date.

An entire service industry is sprouting up to do the formatting and distribution so you can publish to all the formats, however they want a piece of the pie, taking us back to the distribution middlemen issues that kept publishers in the red for years- too many hands taking little pieces until not much is left. Our business plan only works if we can keep a fairly big chunk of the revenues.

So we either have more labor associated with the publishing process at our end, pay a service bureau to do it for us or pick one distribution channel and get really good at it. With Apple supposedly selling 200,000 iPads per week and its far more sophisticated capabilities, there is a compelling choice. But Amazon/Kindle is also a huge source that everyone associates with book buying and they’re very cross-platform. B&N and Borders are less interesting.

So this is what we’re trying to think through as we get nearer to having 24PageBooks out there- and I can’t say I know what we’re going to do. The real glaring issue here is that the publishing industry needs a standard for formats and handling price competition (which would probably not be legal). I’m not waiting around for the big companies to figure that out. They can barely tie their own shoes.

Apple will unveil an entirely new electronic book format next week and will provide the development tools free of charge to any publisher. Called iBooks, the software enables publishers to create interactive titles incorporating video, audio, color images and more. Books created in the format will be published exclusively via the iMedia Store which incorporates the application formerly known as iTunes. Viewable on iPhone, iPod Touch and iTab, the books will be stored in the cloud, meaning you can store an unlimited amount of reading and access it via any computer or device that is iMedia compatible including iPhone OS, OS X and Windows.

Existing book files can be converted by simply dragging and dropping content into frames in the software, then resizing and relocating the frames to fit the page style. Frames can be customized for various forms of content. Apple estimates that a book designer can port a typical illustrated book into the format in a few hours, hit Publish and have the book available on iMedia instantly. Details of pricing and revenue share were not available.

(You heard it here first folks…)

The patent also covers the distribution of wireless signals around the house, balancing weak spots with strong. This same wireless capability provides for the distribution of any kind of digital content via the electrical system of the house, meaning you can route movies, TV, music, Internet, etc., from any device or location to any other.

Not only does this save a lot of money, it also centralizes control onto any iPhone, iPod Touch or, dare I say it, tablet. You get a dashboard that tells you how much energy you are consuming and that has a remote control for everything in the house, a remote that can be updated via software updates indefinitely.

There are business implications for this technology that are far-reaching. Managing power usage across devices and machines is a big cost saver but retrofitting existing electrical systems is very costly. As I read it, the proposed Apple system sits on top of the existing wiring and does the management at each device with wireless protocols handling the communications and control. This is a big deal.

First, take a look at all of those dedicated gadgets you can read about daily on blogs like Engadget: GPS units, phones, netbooks, music and DVD players, Kindles and Nooks, digital recording devices, video and still cameras, etc. Now imagine them in wastebasket. iPhone with App store effectively replaces all of them.

Now imagine Apple thinking about adding a device that eventually replaces conventional laptops and desktops. It is a larger form factor that is easier to do work on than an iPhone. It can connect to a monitor and input devices for use at home. It wirelessly connects to home entertainment systems. It runs the iPhone OS so it can take advantage of those 85,000 Apps and their use of touchscreen technology. It slips easily into any backpack or bag, weighs much less than a laptop and sips battery power. It is always connected (yes there is a plan connected with it). You can use it as a phone via wireless earbuds. Etc., etc.

The argument over the years for using Windows was access to more apps than Mac. Now with iPhone OS this argument is completely moot. A larger form factor offers a solution to the only legitimate argument against the use of a smart phone as a tool: size.

Jobs and Company have created a brilliant long term strategy with this entire approach. The only things lacking have been a larger device and the ability to choose providers. While I was skeptical about tablet speculation I’ve come around.