Analysts and book lovers alike are predicting a new wave of book-related technology will have much more success and staying power than previous attempts, such as the e-book.

At Collective Intellect, we recently uncovered a blog post which revealed Microsoft has created a beta version of a book search service, which allows you to read or download the complete text of many out-of-copyright books. Google set up their own book search in August. Despite having to read on a screen, or to print out the pages, this is a dream come true for many book lovers.

The biggest book news making the rounds on the blogosphere is the introduction of the Espresso machine from On Demand books. The Espresso can best be described as an ATM for books. It’s a whole printing press in one machine– you select a book and get a custom-printed version in about five minutes. It will debut in 10-25 libraries and bookstores beginning in early 2007. Most of the buzz and speculation CI finds in the blogosphere is quite excited and positive.

Endgadget said, “Is there a way to upgrade paper books, to somehow make them easier to get in this technological age? Not the books themselves, but the way they’re made and distributed? Totally, dude… With prices supposed to be hovering around a penny a page, this seems like a pretty sweet setup.”

And for a more thoughtful, bookworm-ish perspective, we can turn to the Mike Et Cetera blog. “Of course, eco-friendliness is only one of the advantages of the machine. The machine is extremely versatile, able to publish in any language and can even print the book for right-to-left and back-to-front reading cultures. The potential to publish any book no longer under copyright restrictions allows unfettered access to a multitude of books–and it costs under a penny per page. This initiative has a correlation to the e-books movement, where the publishing industry is not hampered by traditional production methods–but it also trumps the movement, where the machine central to the product is not owned individually, rather collectively.”

So, is it time for books to join the digital age? While the online book searches might merely push up Google or Microsoft’s market share a little, and make a small segment of the book reading population happy, the Espresso machine has the potential to fundamentally change and even personalize the entire process of book publishing, printing and retail.

Tags: Analyzing Consumer Generated Media, On Our Radar, Public Relations //