Feb 21

Kindle 2 versus iPhone

WOW! This is happening way faster than I imagined. All of it… Amazon’s already being challenged. I’d say “that will teach them” but it won’t. Even eBook prices are starting to drop!

This is the most detailed Kindle 2 review I’ve read so far. Read it here. For good measure, David Berlind of Informationweek.com, throws in a detailed comparison with the upstart eBook-reading  iPhone tricked out with Stanza.

Quite an interesting point in this feature. If you break your $359 Kindle, Amazon will send you a new one for a mere $180. That’s an interesting price. It suggests that their markup on new Kindles is way, way higher than 100%.

If they can ‘give’ you a replacement for $180–and we know they’re still making money on that, then the $359 they charge you for a brand new one is INFORMATION HIGHWAY ROBBERY!!

And they don’t even keep them in stock… Yah!


Feb 20

MANYBOOKS.NET – 23,058 FREE eBOOKS!

Free eBooks!

Free eBooks!

Matthew McClintock creator of Manybooks.net has put together an interesting service for readers and writers that you’ve just got to see. The layout is eye-catching and easy to navigate so check it out.

Offering 23,058 Free eBOOKS  from sources like Gutenberg and Author-direct material is just part of it.

McClintock offers tools and conversion software downloads for readers and writers. You can download the eBooks in a format to suit your reading device, and conversion tools are available to writers for making their work available for digital consumption.

He also lists stats on the most popular eBook formats based on downloads. Click here to view.

I noticed that PDF is commanding top spot in format of choice. I wonder if that means people are reading them as PDF’s or whether they’re easier to convert to format of choice.

Fantastic site, yah!


Feb 19

NEW WORLD – OLD CONTROL

When you’re trying to convince consumers to buy new products, why throw a  hassle into using those new products? It’s been proven that DRM is a drag on new markets when it impeded the growth of the digital music and movie industries, generating more piracy and hostility than sales. Why do they think it will work with eBooks?

New World - Old Control

New World - Old Control

DRM is dying out of the music industry, though it lags and maintains a tenuous hold on DVD publishing. That being the case,  one has to wonder why eBooks are being saddled with the restrictive software.

Amazon.com and Adobe are big proponents of DRM (Digital Rights Management) and continue to offer work that is exclusive to their eBook formats with these digital locks in place. They should know better, yah?

Adobe has loosened up a bit, but still allows their locked eBooks to be read on only a small number of computers or devices with the proper permissions, rather than allowing the buyer a ‘read-anywhere’ purchase agreement.

A story at computerworld.com continues this discussion in depth but here’s the gist: why try to control a fragile marketplace that is barely crawling yet?

Smart publishers will bypass DRM altogether and simply sell a product and as time goes on brave publishers will ditch it too. And it’s in their best interests to do so, with the net offering authors every freedom to bypass publishers and develop their own markets.

They should put their faith in their readers. Most people want to support their favorite artists, while few desire to support uncaring monopolies with outmoded values and mindsets.


Feb 18

Adobe’s Going Mobile

Adobe Mobile

Adobe Mobile

Adobe is promising support for reflowable PDF technology (“The reflowable PDF technology allows text to auto-adjust as per the device screen size for maintaining the layout integrity” – Techtree.com) and XML-based eBook standard with EPUB file format  in its new ADOBE Reader Mobile SDK.

This news came from the on-going GSMA Mobile World Congress 2009 in Barcelona. (Feb. 16-19)

That’s good news for eBooks and eBook readers. God you just know something’s coming that will crack and format any eBook for any device. That’s exciting, yah!

You can read the nitty gritty here.


Feb 17

An Imperfect Reader for an Imperfect World

Here’s a link to a very interesting discussion at Gizmodo.com attempting to explain what is seen as the slow adoption of eBook readers. Their reasons are many and well thought out, but the question remains: Why are the masses not grabbing these things up? Continue reading

Feb 16

Freedom for millions…

Happy President’s Day or Family Day or happy what-have-you…depending where you make your home.

China’s authors and readers are taking full advantage of online and digital publishing. The full story’s here. Let’s hope the follow-up headline isn’t about their fun-free government putting more restrictions on Internet access.

So the net’s opening doors to expression for people in less than liberal places, let’s hope writers and readers in the west maintain their freedoms as the traditional publishing industry adjusts to eBooks and online publishing. Monopolies can be as oppressive as totalitarian regimes, yah?


Feb 15

The Price is Still Too High

kindle_2_ad

Kindle 2 is here. You know I think it’s too expensive. And Stephen King signed on for the pillaging tour with an “original” story of a POSSESSED KINDLE! (Can you imagine a machine with special powers? Honestly, Stephen, can you? This is like the umpteenth time…)

I always say there’s nothing that will capture the imagination of the average Joe like a bajillionaire writer pitching an overpriced eBook Reader during a recession. Go look if you want. New functions, old functions, dreamy new lines… I’m sorry, I just think this is piracy. And worse, it is not priced for the average family. GET REAL!


Feb 13

Stretch your head around this…

So, Kindle 2 is available. The overpricing and specs are here. I wanted to mention the debate that has cropped up since its release. You should know that it is a debate that we could only be having in the FUTURE, in some sort of spacey metropolis with robots. Sorry, I love saying things like that.

It goes like this. Kindle 2 has a text-to-speech function that allows you to sit back and listen to your eBook when  your little eyes are tired from all that reading–but you just can’t put the thing down. Early reports suggest Kindle 2’s text-to-speech is better than the average conversion software, but it is what it is.

authors_guild

Authors Guild

So the  Authors Guild got word of this and leapt into action. (I always imagine them wearing capes and masks because it’s more fun than imagining them in frayed sweaters and coffee-stained blouses…) The Guild argued that the process of turning that text into speech was the same as making an audio book. That got the red lights flashing because Amazon.com has the rights to sell the book, not a recorded version of it. Yah?

Engadget.com has quite a funny back and forth on the argument here.

This should be interesting to watch as it plays out. Text-to-speech is the same as reading an eBook out loud so the converted result isn’t an audio book… or is it?


Feb 12

And here comes Android…

Not sure if I’ll say Google is getting into the act, or getting back into the act, or letting us know exactly where they are in the act, but Google, once a favorite of dead authors for digitizing public-domain books, is now making those works available over the phone.

Like Google Needs a Plug...

Google Print

500,000 of these eBooks are now available on Android and iPhones.

The original program, Google Print, was intended for home PC use and viewing. It involved the scanning of millions of pages of literature, etc. These same tomes have now been painstakingly converted to text for display on hand-held communication devices.

Read the whole story here.

That’s a massive libary of public domain works to have at your fingertips, yah?


Feb 11

Adventure in the Palm of Your Hand

Uclick.com has an app that turns your iPhone into a perfect platform for frame by frame comic book viewing. And offering the comics at .99 per download will assure that this idea is going to make a SPLASH!

uclick

Uclick's comic book app...

With all the digitizing going on, this is one of those moments where anyone can see the perfect fit.

The comic book format, generally telling the narrative panel-by-panel, can now be laid out in the palm of your hand. No eyestrain here, you can move your way through your hero’s adventure–detailed nicely on iPhone’s 3.5″, 480×320 hi-resolution screen.

While I don’t share the view that the advance will make traditional comic book reading obsolete, I do see it as one of those advances that makes a perfect marriage of old and new technologies and art form. Yah!

Considering the popularity of graphic novels one can see that this is one marriage that will last.

Read the complete story here.