TeleRead: Bring the E-Books Home

Archive for July, 2005

By David Rothman

Mike Cane, source of many a tip for the TeleBlog, has a Nokia 770 blog continuing his work elsewhere–check it out.

Correction: That “Light a Candle” recommendation came from Roger Sperberg. What happened is that I thought Roger was passing on Mike’s rec. Adding to the injury, I confused Citzen Cane and Citizen Kane. Mea culpa. Sorry, Mike. I encourage others to follow Mike’s example and give our knuckles a good rapping when we sin. – David Rothman

By Roger Sperberg

If a real market exists for a non-PDA handheld — see “A computer you can use standing up” and “The non-PDA handheld future” — it may be time to assess the reality of e-books coming into our lives.

The e-book market still has three uncertainties. The first is suitable devices. The second is publishers releasing books, and the third is library lending. Before e-books can take off, these issues need resolution.

Devices: Carry-around devices are beginning to appear that meet several key criteria. Their screens are large enough to display video and large-enough chunks of text (say, 10 words a line and 300 words a screen), they run a full, mainstream, desktop OS (which would mean Linux or Windows or MacOS, but not WInCE), and they are “affordable.” I don’t know what that last really means, by the way. It could mean $300-$400, it could mean half that. So maybe we’re only approaching this criterion. (more…)

By David Rothman

LibraryCity, which we described last week, made the LibraryJournal.com site over the weekend. Like OurMedia, with which we’ll be working, we’re voluntary at this point.

We’re especially keen on volunteers with collection development skills, reference skills, Web-related skills of all kinds (including familiarity with PHP, MySQL and Drupal), and an appreciation of interactivity. But don’t hesitate to contact us even if your talents are in other areas. Send us your resume or an equivalent, along with any relevant Web addresses. (more…)

By David Rothman

Our Tip of the Day is surely from Bill Christie, who pointed to a BBC item headlined Kenya pilots Pocket PC education.

Dubbed “e-slates,” Pocket PCs are serving as textbook-substitutes in an experiment in Kenya, the work of a nonprofit called Eduvision. The photo on the left vividly reminds us of the textbook shortage in that country. And now the details:

“The e-slates contain all the sorts of information you’d find in a textbook and a lot more,” said Eduvision co-founder Maciej Sudra. (more…)

By David Rothman

Roger Sperberg and other bylined names–we’re always looking for good contributors–aren’t the only people pitching in on the TeleBlog.

Some of the best information comes from readers with tips. The item above this one, based on reader Bill Christie’s pointer to a BBC article on Pocket PCs in Kenya, is a great example. I’m especially grateful to Mike Cane for all the tips he’s sent in. Not to mention all the comments fron Branko Collin and Dan Jackson. Yep, the commenters do their share as well. (more…)

By David Rothman

Details from ars technia and the Zodiac Web site and the Inquirer. Related: Zodiac 1: $199 for new 480X320 handheld. Too bad. From afar, the Zodiac struck me as one hellva e-book machine. With the Palm OS, you very likely could have used Mobipocket, not just PalmReader. Could have? Wait. If you’re willing to risk possible support problems with an orphaned machine, you can shop for a Zodiac on eBay.

By David Rothman

“We should try to waste very little time on fiction, or entertainment, or television.” – Sir John Marks Templeton, as quoted in the New York Times.

Let’s hope that Sir John will amend his remarks. If spirituality can be a life-enricher as he asserts, can’t fiction as well? In both p- and e-incarnations, libraries mustn’t slight fiction. Besides, fiction has its value in communicating facts and emotions. Where would the legal profession be without judges quoting Shakespeare? And how about writers who reflect spiritual influences? I’d have felt better if Sir John at least had said “trashy fction.” But even then, who’s the definer of “trashy”? (more…)

By David Rothman

Details via New York Times. Oh, the glories of the U.S. patent system for terrorizing smaller competitors and funneling money from innovators to lawyers!

By David Rothman

An e-book-biz insider maintains that librarians are among the biggest fans of strict DRM for e-books–because they don’t want their libraries used for illegal copying. The liability and morality issues are obvious. So what’s the lowdown here? I’d welcome thoughts from librarians and lawyers, which we’ll consider in the development of OpenReader.

Coincidentally, in the Shifted Librarian blog, Jenny Levine got a little into this territory a few months ago.

Among other things, while mentioning the audiobook/DRM/format controversy and wondering about a possible DMCA exception for libraries, she said: (more…)

By David Rothman

Details from DigiTimes via Alex at MobileRead. This is a great overview of e-paper technology.

By David Rothman

“You might be interested in writing a blog entry about a controversial new advertising campaign by Apple computers,” Neologize emails me. “Some Apple computer stores have a large display showing several book cases filled with books and a half-dozen Apple computers. The message of the display is encapsulated in a motto that refers to the computers and says: ‘The Only Books You’ll Need.” Way to go, Steve J! Just a fraction all books have ever been digitized, and yet the hype artists are suggesting that we ignore the rest. OK. Hyperbole alert! I know. Trouble is, more than a few bozos will take this bilge seriously. Related links here and–from Virginia Postel’s Weblog–here. And guess what. Those aren’t actual books you see above, just photos of them.

By Roger Sperberg

What’s wrong with PDA’s?

They’re too small. They’re too business-oriented. The good, light, powerful ones are too expensive. The cheap ones don’t have WiFi or good speakers. They don’t use a desktop OS.

We e-book readers need a computer we can use standing up. There’s just too much wrong with PDA’s.

Too small. A PDA screen is too small to display the full width of a web-page, too small to enjoy video, too small to show enough words on a page. The Nokia 770 has a screen width of 800 pixels, compared to 320 for a Palm. It has 384,000 pixels, the Palm a mere 153,600. We just need more screen real estate than a PDA has.
(more…)

By David Rothman

Details from BBC via Globalization Institute. Related: Economics of used books, from Cory Doctorow.

By David Rothman

“Gotta love how TechWeb can publish two stories about the Tablet PC with completely conflicting headlines within hours of each other.” – Engadget. Related: Tablet PC Faces Uncertain Future, Analyst Says and Tablet PCs Headed For Broader Use, Study Says. (more…)

By David Rothman

Check out a spiffy PowerPoint presentation explaining LibraryCity, introduced here a few days ago. You can reach Executive Director Lori Watrous-deVersterre at info@librarycity.org. She’s the author of the presentation. Feedback cherished–especially from librarians! The presentation is from the Let’s Go Library Expo

Meanwhile Jon Noring has just given a wonderful explanation of the ABCs of OpenReader. Here’s a file of his talk in WMA format. The talk also covers hardcore techie stuff, but the basic are there.

Another interesting presentation has come from Juliet Sutherland, executive director of Distributed Proofreaders. I’ve just uploaded the audio file. Meanwhile you can see a screen from DP’s proofreading process. Here’s another view. I’m especially pleased to see DP caring so much about the origins and accurate reproduction of the public domain works it offers. Hey, wanna volunteer for DP? You can devote just a few minutes at a time to DP if you want. As others have observed, what a great model for an open source approach! Finally, here’s a DP-reproduced copy of a periodical directed at schoolchildren–a great way to understand the mindset at the turn of the century.

By David Rothman

Details from Mobile Magazine, via eBook Community List.

By Roger Sperberg

Will Nokia with its Internet Tablet 2005 succeed in creating a non-PDA handheld market?

How about all the failed Linux and Windows (CE and XP) efforts?

Challenges abound. “You don’t have the benefits of the larger devices or the portability of the smaller devices,” the Guardian Unlimited has quoted Gartner analyst Ken Delaney. He says it’s a “1 kg wasteland,” neither standard notebook nor PDA/smartphone.

Within the last four years, we’ve seen announcements for a lot of computers with what I call e-book-compatible design goals. Some of them haven’t gone into production or been brought to the U.S.; and some of them, like the OQO and Motion Computing LS800, are so fantastically priced that they’ll never have a big market.

Still, Bill Gates, for one, thinks the future lies this way. Earlier this year he described the Ultra-Mobile 2007, a tablet he hopes will be under 2 pounds and under $1,000, as the “hottest” in the spectrum of carry-around devices.
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