Microsoft Corp.

Tablet sales showed their first sequential decline ever in the second quarter of this year, according to research firm IDC. Apple sold fewer iPads than expected in its most recent quarter. Barnes & Noble's Nook e-reader sales fell 20% in the fiscal first quarter ended August 20, two months after the company announced it will no longer make color versions of Nook, only black and white ones. And analysts are worrying about whether smartphone profit margins can hold up as buyer fatigue sets in.

RALEIGH, NC--(Marketwired - September 11, 2013) - Millions of authors come to Lulu.com every month to discover and use the tools they need to get their stories out into the world. Long a one-stop shop for independent publishing, Lulu has introduced a simplified home page, new book templates and new eBook solutions that are all designed to move authors more quickly to their ultimate goal -- publishing and selling their books -- while providing a distinctive author experience at Lulu.com.

For centuries, biographers have relied on letters to bring historical figures to life, whether Gandhi or Catherine the Great. But as people switch from writing on paper to documenting their lives electronically, biographers are encountering new benefits - and new challenges.

Walter Isaacson's authorized biography of Apple co-founder Steve Jobs is based on dozens of interviews. But one of the book's juiciest episodes comes from a string of emails from 2003. That's when Apple launched the iTunes music store. Right away, the company's rivals at Microsoft understood this could be a game changer.

Videogame critics Brendan Keogh and Dan Golding have formally launched Press Select, an independent publishing label that aims to produce extensive, long-form videogame criticism. The two critics boast a unique pricing model that promises a 50 percent royalty to the author per copy and a platform that embraces the current publishing market's demand forDRM-free digital books in a variety of formats. "It's been really exciting to see the changes that videogame criticism has seen over the last few years," says Golding, whose game-centric journalism earned him a Microsoft IT Journalism Award in 2012.

(Reuters) - Barnes & Noble Inc's founder on Tuesday pulled the plug on his plan to buy the company's bookstores and the chain posted a deeper quarterly loss, sending its shares down as much as 16 percent in early trading.

The quarterly results came in slightly ahead of Wall Street expectations, but sales of B&N's Nook device and e-books plunged, and business at its stores slumped.

Leonard Riggio, the company's chairman, founder and top shareholder, said he has suspended his efforts to make an offer for B&N's retail business but reserves the right to pursue an offer in the future.

The shift to digital technology is affecting nearly all the industries across the board. Few would have thought that even the book-selling business could become a culprit of the advances in technology. Nonetheless, this is what is happening to Barnes & Noble (NYSE: BKS).

The company has been trying to position itself for the future with its investment in Nook Media and in partnership with Microsoft and Pearson, a London-based bookseller.

Of all segments of publishing, the college textbook business has seemed for some time now to be the most likely to be disrupted.  There are many reasons for this, but the principal one is the spiraling cost of many texts, which has elicited a strong and angry reaction, including legislative action and the creation of rival materials that draw on many of the precepts of the Open Access movement (usually called OER for open educational resources).

I have been assembling BEA take-aways from the lively and informative reports of seasoned observers and trade professionals, without having attended in person. These provided me a lot to chew on, along with vivid memories of sitting through panel presentations, hiking through the aisles and corridors, and schmoozing at the booths at the Javits Center. They have added more substance to what I otherwise learn working with new business development and online publication services each day.

After gaining 24% last Thursday, Barnes & Noble (NYSE: BKS  ) shares were down as much as 13% today after a new report seemed to kill the rumor that sent the stock soaring, which was that Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT  ) was aiming to buy the entire Nook e-reader division.

So what: The blog TechCrunch had said last week that Microsoft was gearing up to buy the e-reader for $1.7 billion, but today business news site Insider Monkey said, "Nothing imminent is happening," quoting "a highly placed source." Shares of the bookseller bounced off their session low, but still finished

Microsoft is reportedly interested in buying the digital assets of Barnes & Noble's Nook Media for $1 billion. But analysts are divided over whether the deal makes sense.

Microsoft already has a 16.8% equity stake in the Barnes & Noble subsidiary, which includes the bookseller's digital book and college book businesses. Microsoft invested $300 million in Nook Media in April 2012, valuing the new company at $1.7 billion at the time. Microsoft and Barnes & Noble completed their strategic partnership last October. Education and news publisher Pearson  subsequently took a 5% stake