Sony, Panasonic, others to launch cross-platform e-book service, later this year

Don’t look now, but there’s some major synergy occurring in Japan’s e-book market, now that Sony , Panasonic , Rakuten and Kinokuniya have all joined forces on a brand new digital quest. Today, the quartet of businesses announced they’re engaged on a system that could allow users to buy and browse content across their respective e-readers , injecting the e-cosmos with a heavy dose of free love and good vibes. Under the recent service, customers will be capable of manage their downloads and skim bestsellers within a centralized web-based marketplace, whatever the device they visit bed with every night. Because within this new universe, there will be no “mine,” “yours,” or “theirs” — all would be one and one may be all. The chieftains have already held powows with a handful of digital publishers, though they expect to have more friends round the campfire by the point the project launches later this year.