This year 2007 has been tremendous for Bookeen. Against all odds, we have released our Cybook Gen3 almost on time and the device has met a smashing success. As already announced several times before, we have been overwhelmed by the demand and we all thank you for this success. The first reactions of our customers and professionals have been great obtaining a 9 out of 10 from TrustedReviews with a nice "Of all the dedicated eBook readers I've seen this is definitely the best".
We have also noted all the remarks of our first customers : folder support, delete key, better sound interface and our dev team is already working on them. Please note that, even if we are not very responsive, we always read all your emails and take in account your feedback.
Since our creation in 2003, Bookeen has always tried to keep in touch with its customers and to offer a reactive and efficient customer support. Concerning this part of our job, we clearly have not met our quality imperatives for the Cybook Gen3 release. We are now making all the necessary decisions to have a customer support department running properly.
In parrallel of our online store, a reseller network has grown much faster than expected and right now almost 11 stores (both web and brick and mortar) are selling the Cybook Gen3. This network is increasing every week and we invite everyone interested by selling the Cybook to get in touch with us.
We have also been part of several great initiatives like the NAEB buyer's club and the Cluster21 publisher pack. I will describe these two initiatives in future posts.
We will definitely be more active on this blog and give you fresh news about Bookeen and Cybook Gen3 in the next few days.
Thanks again.
Regards,
Michael
PS: The Cybook is currently in stock. Shipments have restarted, the current average delay between order and shipment is 5 business days
30 comments:
Hello Michael.
I am a French writer, and more than excited with the CyBook. This is a very great tool for authors who publish their books in PRC format...
Whatever we can do to help and participate, we'll do !
FredV
I received my Cybook Gen3 early in November and loved it. Unfortunately about a week ago, the bottom left portion of screen stopped operating, and I also have additional horizontal and vertical lines that don't update.
I tried emailing support@bookeen.com and contact@bookeen.com but to date have received no response, not so much as an automated "we have received your service query".'
So I have to say that the warranty and/or customer service is non-existant on this device. Buyer beware
Well said Michael,
We appreciate the good news, especially the last sentence.
The Babel authors team will participate actively to help you and your team.
Regards Jean-Pierre Julhes
Unfortunately, NAEB initiative is currently being actively suppressed by Paypal, and some other big companies, as you can read here:
http://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=19539
http://www.mobileread.com/forums/
showthread.php?t=19539
Will bookeen also work on the quality of the 'next page' button ? There seem to be some issues around that one (hard to press, paint coming off ...)
The 'next page' button gets easier to use with time. I read about 30 books and it works fine now. There is no paint comming of
Hey, Guys,
Have ordered CyBook a week ago.
I can understand, that it is out of stock. Ok.
But why the heck aren't You answering the requests for order status?
Have tried o contact You 4 times already. No answer. Sorry for using this channel (blog), but have no alternate way.
Will You eventually tell me, what happens with my 416.55 EUR order?
Regards,
Tom
Hi again,
Finally got my status info :).
Thank You.
Regards,
Tom
---
NAEB is back on track:
http://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=19690
or
http://tinyurl.com/35f7xl
Well, I am relieved to be hearing something from Bookeen. I thought we had lost them...
Isn't it design, test, redesign, setup support, launch? Instead of design, launch, working on it?
Hi there,
Got my CyBook today :).
Extremely quick delivery by FedEx - yesterday afternoon departured from France, today morning reveived in Poland. Impressive.
CyBook is working great. Several books preloaded and a lot of DEMOs.
Screen: very good.
Ergonomy: there is a room form improvement (especially the control button - would be much better to have just 4 or 5 separate, comfortable buttons) BUT works ok and is not a big problem.
Speed: not an issue. Pretty satisfying.
Cover: ok, but don't You think the black one would look better?
To sum up: good job. Little pricey, but will probably get cheaper. This is the beginning.
Thanks, guys. I am happy customer so far :). Got my 30 books downloaded from mobipocket.com - gonna read, read, read, read this weekend :).
This is future. In 3 - 5 years everyone will have such a device.
Regards,
Tomasz
---
and yet you still insist on using an external blogging system as your sole means of communication ... amazing
I also have order a Cybook last week, and have not gotten any order status/response to my repeated emails. Is this typical? I am getting close to cancelling the order unless I hear something.
Regarding the software update.
Folders would be good, but you would need to be able to ensure that they were compatible with mobipocket since that is your synch platform -- at least for windows. Don't know about currently, but mobipocket didn't used to support folders. Some alternatives that would be useful include 1) real filters (show all books with "daytime" in their titles); 2) Go to an alphabet letter A-Z; 3) Mobipocket reading lists (I guess those on non-windows platforms would need some way of creating the lists).
Also, you need some better way to navigate within a book. There are two times the next page button does not cut it. 1) Periodically, (once a book?) the unit looses my place when I turn it on. This means I must page through to find my place. 2) When I re-read old books I often want to skip sections, and its a problem with the slow next page button. The only thing I can think of is some sort of automated binary search. I "start search" by choosing a search range such as page 1-500. The book takes me to the middle page (250) where I read until I know if its before or after where I want to be. I can use the up/down to turn pages if necessary. When I decide, I use the left button to return me to pg125 or the right button to skip to 375. I can keep using the right/left buttons to skip forward/back half the remaining pages until I hit the correct spot. This is what I do know, but I have to calculate the landing pages by hand, and then manually use the go to page menu. Its all quite a pain.
Michael
Just got the bookeen. Great tool, but is there any future plan to develop Acrobat digital editions compatibility ? If that happends, will you let us patch our hardware ?
Thanks,
I've just received my CyBook, and I think I have a problem : my wife wants to use it, and I don't want to let anyone touch it.
OK, I think I'll purchase a second one... ;)
Let me just tell you this. Can't wait for Gen 4 !!!!
I have been using CyBook for a week now and I am extremely pleased with it. It offers a great reading experience.
Two suggestions: Folder support and more ways of navigating through the contents (filters and indexing by letter) would be great.
I had to send the cybook for repairs more than a month ago, three weeks ago they told me that they'd forward me details for payments and to send it back repaired the next week.
Then I waited...
... and waited...
... and waited...
I have since emailed them twice, asking (VERY POLITELY) for an update. I have stressed the point that I am not rushing them in any way, I just want an update even if it is "we won't be able to return the item to you for another month". Anything really! Nope, they just don't answer. I visited this site today to make sure that the company hasn't closed down because they won't even aknowledge receipt of emails automatically.
I can't believe that they have such little common sense that they won't implement even a basic level of customer support - where emails get answered by a person or a machine so that you don't face complete silence on their part. It's going to hurt their business in the long run, especially with other e-readers on the market, because who's going to feel like recommending the Cybook to a friend, with this type of abysmal service? I don't get it. It's as if they've never done any type of business before and they don't have the faintest clue on how to run things. To shame, because the Cybook is very nice and sleek.
It's now Feb 20, 2008. For the past 6 weeks I have tried emailing Bookeen from 4 different email accounts about my screen problem (over 75% of the screen doesn't update and is unusable) and not one reply or response, I remained very polite in every email inspite of the lack of response. Others seem to have at least received some type of response from Bookeen but near as I can tell they don't exist in real life. I hope anyone else buying this device has no problems as it's very unlikely you'll get it fixed. See the forum's on www.mobileread.com for all the problems and how common it is for Bookeen to completely ignore their customers (other than taking their money of course)
I want everyone to know that Bookeen has completely ignored three letters telling them that my brand new $350 product doesn't work correctly, and they have completely ignored 2 letters asking for an explanation of a second, unauthorized charge made to me. This company is absolutely unresponsive. Buying their product is 100% a gamble.
The idea is good, and in theory this is the best book reader available today (in my opinion) - which is a sad commentary on the current state of ebook readers because the product has several issues. I look forward to the day when book readers are well made and reasonably priced.
I will never buy another Bookeen product because of the non-existent customer service, and I warn you all to think twice.
Hello all,
I have been using my Cybook Gen3 since the end of January. Great product. I’m currently reading my 6th book on the device. However, many shortcomings could be corrected through software updates:
1. Save the last read page on every page turn. It is very frustrating to have to find by hand the page I was when the battery is out of power.
2. Add a simple text search when reading a book
3. Display the battery meter at all time
4. Add a page/number of pages indicator beside the progress bar
5. Display/navigate eBooks folders
6. Make circular menus (pressing up on the first menu item makes the cursor go on the last menu item and vice versa)
7. Display more information/book properties in the library
8. Add zoom-in/zoom-out while viewing a picture (very useful for maps)
9. Have a better HTML reader, read MHT or compressed HTML
It would be very nice to make the source code available (open source?) or at least have access to a SDK. You could target the whole developer community and make thousands of plug-ins available.
I’m a software developer myself. If you need any help, let me know!
Cheers,
Eric
(bookeen.askec@neverbox.com)
Bonjour à tous,
J’utilise mon Cybook Gen3 depuis la fin du mois de janvier. Très bon produit. Je suis rendu à mon 6e livre déjà… Cependant, l’appareil a plusieurs défauts qui seraient corrigibles par des mises à jour logicielles :
1. Sauvegarder la dernière page lue à chaque changement de page. Il est très frustrant de perdre l’endroit où on se trouve lorsque la pile est épuisée par exemple.
2. Ajouter une recherche de texte simple à l’intérieur d’un livre
3. Afficher l’indicateur de niveau de la pile partout
4. Ajouter la page/nombre de pages à côté de la barre de progression
5. Montrer et naviguer par répertoire
6. Faire des menus circulaires. En appuyant sur la touche d’en haut tout en étant sur le premier menu amène le curseur sur le dernier menu (et vice-versa)
7. Montrer plus d’information ou de propriétés sur le livre dans la bibliothèque
8. Ajouter des fonctions de zoumage lors du visionnement d’une image
9. Avoir un meilleur lecteur HTML qui peut lire du MHT ou du HTML (incluant les images) compressé
Il serait aussi très intéressant de rendre le code source ouvert ou disponible d’une façon quelconque. Vous pourriez vous accaparer d’un marché complet de « hacker » (dans le bon sens du terme) et développer toute une communauté de développeur et de plugiciels.
Sans vouloir être arrogant, si vous avez besoin d’aide, étant un développeur moi-même, faites-moi signe!
Bonne journée,
Eric
(bookeen.askec@neverbox.com)
cc: support@bookeen.com, contact@bookeen.com
I have read the comments in this blog, those with a working device rave about it (as I did) those with a faulty device are frustrated with the poor service. My ebook has developed a similar fault to other posters here, the top half of the screen has gone black and wont refresh. I emailed Bookeen support on the 10th of February and did get a response over a week later (with several more interim emails). The reply was a two line email asking for a picture. I sent it that day, and have not heard from them since. I am rapidly loosing confidence that Bookeen will honor their warranty. As an earlier poster said, BUYER BEWARE.
Firmware update status anyone?
I bought a $30 electronic dictionary to use with the Cybook. It frequently does not give me the definition of a word I try to look up when reading. It either says "no result" or sometimes I get the wrong word. I thought it was the dictionary that sucked.
I have just discovered that using the mobipocket Desktop Reader, the same exact dictionary file, and the same exact ebook file, I can look up the word and get the correct definition. So that the dictionary is working better on the Desktop Reader than it is on the Cybook. And the word is in there, it's just not being found.
This seems to be yet another problem with the Cybook. Add it to the list of things that should have been working correctly before anyone spent a fortune for this device. Also on the list of things that should be addressed with a software upgrade - if there ever is one.
As I understand it the dictionary bug is in the initial firmware release, but Bookeen has released firmware version 538 since then. Unfortunately you can only obtain the update by emailing Bookeen support. Another firmware release for other issues would certainly be welcome, but in the meantime try contacting support about that bug so they can send you the most recent release.
Jered:
Thank you for the information.
It's nice to know that there is a firmware release that Bookeen hasn't felt the need to share with the majority of their customers.
I do have version 1, build 538. Mobipocket reader version 6, build 60. They came on my Cybook. So it appears the "dictionary bug" is alive and well.
So many unhappy people, but I guess if your Cybook is working well then you don't feel the need to say anything as opposed to those having problems.
In my case it's working great, I haven't run into the dictionary bug. So far all of my questions have been easily answered on http://www.mobileread.com/forums/ of course that doesn't excuse the poor customer service of Bookeen but I get the feeling they are a very small operation and it's not easy to run a business in France of all places.
Hopefully all the new orders will translate into more customer support staff.
I have had Bookeen for about ten days and I am satisfied as well, not a glitch so far. (I was a little bit worried about the guarantee, but since Bookeen has an official Czech distributor now, I don't have to worry about sending it to France, if anything happens.) However, don't sleep on your laurels, you good people from Bookeen: normal PDFs aren't still legible (zooming would be very much appreciated) and for people like me with hundreds of e-books some kind of filing system (directories) would come in handy too.
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