ReadWriteWeb

Watch out Amazon and move over Apple, because Google is about to launch its e-book store and it's likely to change everything. Dubbed "Google Editions," the store is said to have more than a half million titles that will be readable on nearly any device that can access the Web... and it will be up and running before the end of the month.

Google is getting ready to launch its own e-book store and challenge Apple and Amazon. According to The Wall Street Journal, Chris Palma, Google's manager for strategic partner development, announced the timetable for the launch of the company's e-book store during an event at Random House's Manhattan offices earlier today. Google Editions, as the new store will be called, will launch in late June or July.

At the Frankfurt Book Fair, Google announced more details about their upcoming online ebook service known as "Google Editions." Originally revealed earlier this year, Editions will be a hosted electronic bookstore for a selection of in-print books which would be provided by Google's publishing partners. And unlike some other ebook formats, like those designed for Amazon's Kindle for instance, the so-called "Google editions" will be readable on any device whether that's a laptop, phone or dedicated eReader.

According to news coming out of the Book Fair event, the new digital books program will launch in the first half of 2010 and will offer 400,000 to 600,000 ebooks at that time.