The e-book icon would merely make newbies aware of e-books and let them choose apps to go on the desktop—with the option for one of them to be directly accessible from the e-book icon. Further tweaks could be made through general setup.

Now about standards: My approach would get around that issue by letting people choose from different programs with different format capabilities, although obviously I’d hope that ePub would triumph.

As for His Steveness’s statement on books, well, you’ve already already covered that angle nicely.

Thanks,
David

> iPhone buyers can choose among e-mail services
> to which a featured icon steers them. Why not
> e-book programs?

You are confusing programs and protocols.

The icon on the iPhone’s home page is associated with a single program, Apple’s own mail client, which implements the two protocols, POP3 and IMAP, that are used to fetch mail from a server. For ease of use they have provided some pages that simplify the process of configuring the program for some of the more popular mail services, but this does not involve the use of any separate program associated with those services.

There is no industry standard file format for e-books, let alone a protocol for accessing them over the net, so the idea of a “standard” icon on the home page isn’t feasible unless Apple should decide to develop its own e-book reader or to strike a deal with a third party that would generate revenue for Apple.

I seriously doubt that Apple would be interested in developing its own e-book reader unless they decided to get into the publishing business, presumably through the iTunes store. Despite comments from His Steveness that this is not a market in which Apple is interested, it could still happen. Remember, it was just a few years ago that he said Apple wasn’t interested in developing a phone.