iPhone looks more and more like a Kindle competitor

In the race for the digital book market, the iPhone just took a big step forward. ScrollMotion, an iPhone application development company, has launched Iceberg, an e-book reader for the iPhone.

Iceberg is now offering titles from major publishing houses including Random House, Hachette, Penguin, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, and Simon & Schuster.

Iceberg claims that its software comes closer to the experience of reading a book.

“What makes the software different,” ScrollMotion’s chief literary officer Calvin Baker told Publishers Weekly, “is that each book is a self-contained app. You download the book, not a piece of software.”

According to Publishers Weekly, "Iceberg mimics the natural reading experience, allowing the user to 'flip' the page with a swipe of the finger and uses the iPhone and iTouch’s interface to allow for scrolling, shrinking and expanding text, bookmarking and note taking."

Iceberg will also be offering a wealth of attractive titles. Among the first two dozen or so immediately available are "Twilight" by Stephenie Meyer, "Extras" by Scott Westerfeld, "Brisingr" by Christopher Paolini, "Shadow Country" by Peter Matthiessen, and "When We Were Romans" by Matthew Kneale.

Within a couple of weeks, the company says, about 200 titles will be available.

But Kindle maintains a few advantages nonetheless.

Among them: Kindle users buy books using Sprint's wireless network – no Wi-Fi needed.

Also, on Kindle most titles sell for $9.99 or less, compared with standard retail prices for Iceberg-formatted books.

However, according to Wired, ScrollMotion's deal with such big name publishers is "a big step forward" for the iPhone in "becoming a legitimate competitor to products like the Kindle and Sony E-Reader."