I've just "upgraded" my audio and video software from RealNetworks. And guess what. For some reason, I can't get NPR audio now on my Dell Optiplex. Not exactly an advertisement here for Rob Glaser and friends--or net.audio in general. But, look, RealAudio's profits count more than my time, right? Gotta keep folks upgrading.

Ideally some publishers of e-book software can suffer similar experiences with RealAudio, show a little more empathy toward consumers, and take a Universal Consumer Format seriously.

A patron-friendly cause for librarians

Librarians can help. Think of your patrons, and if you go to the OeBF library conference on March 12, say "No" to proprietary formats. Put up with 'em now, but tell the vendors you'll recall be much better off with a Universal Consumer Format.

Your opinions will count. As a Wall Street Journal story has pointed out, the e-book business increasingly sees libraries as an important market. The e-book software companies need you more than you need them.

So don't wimp out. Tell software people and distributors that if they don't fully back the development of a UCF, they may lose your business in the future to rivals more interested in "real books"--books that aren't vulnerable to the format-related whims of techies and marketers.

Related reminder: Try out different formats on PDAs

Librarians should try out different e-book formats not just on desktops but also on cheapie PDAs. As Tom Peters points out in the Handheld Librarian, PDAs are "a major platform for reading e-books." While many PDAs do come now with e-book software, it may not be the same program that a library vendor favors. Or it just may be a real hassle to run. The best solution so far, based on functionality, features and aesthetics, continues to be Mobipocket, which is much nicer than Adobe on inexpensive handhelds and which runs on a bunch of different platforms.

Until vendors raze the Tower of eBabel, however, you'll ideally able to serve up books in different formats. This mess is great for format converters and other techies, but not so wonderful for readers, libraries, bookstores, publishers and writers.
posted by David Rothman at 6:07 AM | permanent link

"A national group of librarians meeting in San Diego voted yesterday to express support for librarians jailed in Cuba but stopped short of calling for their release. The vote ended months of debate on an issue that has divided the American Library Association and drawn national attention. It came on the last day of the association's six-day convention, which attracted about 13,000 people to San Diego." - San Diego Union-Tribune, Jan. 15., via LISNews.

posted by David Rothman at 3:55 PM | permanent link

You can join voice-chat discussions of The Great Gatsby, a Louise Erdrich novel, a Theodore Roosevelt bio and other works. It's through Audio Avenue, sponsored by the Illinois Talking Book Centers and Maine State Library Outreach. Gatsby Day is Feb. 19. More details via the Handheld Librarian.

Idea: Perhaps some public domain sites can experiment with similar activities, and meanwhile it'll be great if PD books can serve as fodder for some future Audio Avenue discussions. Bet that'll happen. Tom Peters and Lori Bell, who run the discussion programs, which are for the vision impaired but open to anyone, are extremely hip on public domain issues, judging from Tom's questions from his TeleRead interview yesterday.

Detail: If you lack a mike or soundcard, you can still participate with old-fashioned typing.
posted by David Rothman at 11:20 AM | permanent link

"Deep, resonant like coming thunder is the voice of Bob Ledbetter as he remembers his life as a slave--singing to pass the time, learning to read and write, joining the church and getting married." - Washington Post story on the latest gem from the American Memory Web at the Library of Congress site.

Details from LOC: "These interviews, conducted between 1932 and 1975, capture the recollections of twenty-three identifiable people born between 1823 and the early 1860s and known to have been former slaves. Several of the people interviewed were centenarians, the oldest being 130 at the time of the interview. The almost seven hours of recordings were made in nine Southern states and provide an important glimpse of what life was like for slaves and freedmen. The former slaves discuss how they felt about slavery, slaveholders, how slaves were coerced, their families, and, of course, freedom. It is important to keep in mind, however, that all of those interviewed spoke sixty or more years after the end of their enslavement, and it is their full lives, rather than their lives during slavery, that are reflected in their words. They have much to say about living as African Americans from the 1870s to the 1930s, and beyond. As part of their testimony, several of the ex-slaves sing songs, many of which were learned during the time of their enslavement."
posted by David Rothman at 10:43 AM | permanent link

What's more, let's see this idea extended beyond pre-school to cover all of K-12. (For kids old enough to write, libraries and schools could set up local, librarian-and-teacher-moderated bulletin boards and chat rooms where the children could share their discoveries with each other.)

If libraries in states beyond Illinois, can try this and if all library users of all ages can enjoy POD one way or another, then so much the better. At the neighborhood library level, no one's talking about megabuck expenditures of tax money, especially if patrons can pay modest fees if need be.

Help the kids build their own libraries--while they and parents maintain contact with the real ones. Certainly this is in line with TeleRead's permanent checkout concept.

Needless to say, by cultiviating an appetite for a wide variety of books, print-in-demand could hasten the mass popularization of e-books. But advocacy of specific formats shouldn't be the real goal here. Rather it should be to help books--old and new--find appreciative readers.
posted by David Rothman at 9:09 AM | permanent link

Yahoo's e-book customers are now being redirected to the eBook Express site owned by OverDrive, as reported in Blackmask. See related item below about OD's changing business model. Would be nice if EBook Express would prominently display some books available in the Mobipocket format and advertise this--one way of showing that OverDrive is serious about promoting Mobi, whose interface and features leave Adobe, Microsoft and Palm Digital Media in the dust.

Also of interest: Forget about the tabs at the top of Amazon's pages. Now I can't even find e-books mentioned on Amazon's drop-down menu. Funny. E-books are supposed to be on the cusp of getting hot again. I think that will happen--but sharper screens and more titles won't be the answer by themselves. Less onerous DRM and an end to the Tower of eBabel could help, too, as could more interest in the school and library markets--a great way to acquaint nontechies with e-books. TeleRead, anyone?
posted by David Rothman at 10:15 PM | permanent link

Over at Blackmask, one of my favorite e-stores and public domain sites, David Moynihan has correctly raised the issue of OverDrive now doing retail, as opposed to just software and the "back-end" routine. It'll compete with publisher partners and the e-bookstores it works with.

In this case, however, I'd say, "Cut OverDrive some slack right now." The more heavily Steve Potash goes into retail, the more his business interests will be aligned with those of publishers and stores rather than Adobe, Microsoft and Palm Digital Media. Does this mean that the industry shouldn't watch OverDriver very carefully? Of course not. Bolt if there's abuse! If, however, Steve's new business model can encourage him as president of the Open eBook Forum to take a Universal Consumer Format more seriously, then for the moment I'll keep an open mind. Please--stores and publishers ahead of software companies!
posted by David Rothman at 9:43 PM | permanent link

A blog is a public performance. Updates happen. Perhaps I was unfair to someone in the first verson or I need to fix a typo (outrageously common, given my problems with Blogger's interface and the fact I'm a better writer than proofer). The TeleBlog is a stone tablet not.

Trouble is, RSS technology isn't as good as it should be, and recipients of RSS feeds may suffer multiple versions of a post. But then again, I want to be free to make tweaks--in the intererst of accuracy, fairness or other fixations of mine.

So here's a question for readers getting the TeleBlog via RSS. Are the updates bugging you (as they do at least one reader, who's just written me)? Let me know, and tell me which RSS aggregator you're using.

One partial soution could be the use of the Bloomba e-mail program, which combines mail and RSS feeds and collapses redundant items into threads. Not only that, it lets you quickly search all your messages at once rather than having to set up different mailboxes. Via the "view" feature, you can save searches.
posted by David Rothman at 9:26 PM | permanent link

The world of p-book conglomerates looks all the more dismal when you read about a great independent publisher named Morgan Entrekin, head of Grove Atlantic--who has this bizarre notion that writers and editors can still be friends. That's scary. It takes us back to the days of Scribners editor Maxwell Perkins and the likes of Fitzgerald, Wolfe and Hemingway. Perhaps not so coincidentally, Entrekin's people have discovered works as varied as Cold Mountain and Sex and the City. He wants to make money, of course, but has the quixotic belief that books are worthwhile in themselves. No huge sales quotas to meet because Q2 is around the bend and Q1 was not so good. Could this little miracle have happened not just because of Entrekin personally, but also because his investors are friends and family?

Yes, the above relates to e-books. Corporately owned publishing houses have made their share of contributions to literature, but it would be a shame for the Entrekins to be killed off--either by the big guys or by junky smaller houses. Ideally someday the e-book world can see an Entrekin and hopefully a Perkins, too. For that to happen, though, quality must thrive and the need for cash and technological expertise should not get in the way. It's no small reason why I'm among those fighting for a Universal Consumer Format; let books find their buyers based on prose, plot and character, not the use of Format X or business arrangements with Software Conglomerate Y. The more distractions publishers suffer from the Tower of eBabel, the harder it will be to market literature, which, alas, does not always sell as well as Cold Mountain has. Format, not content, should be the commodity taken for granted.

Meanwhile I'm looking forward to Cold Mountain to see if it's as good as the critics say. I'll belatedly read it an old-fashioned way--after getting on a wait list at a local library. As far as I know, Cold Mountain has yet to exist in an electronic edition. What does that say about the industry? E-publishers can carp all they want about Luddites and the piracy fears of p-publishers, but mightn't something else being going on as well? Until e-books can appear in a standard consumer format and take off in a major way in schools and libraries, many old-fashioned publishing people may have trouble seeing them as "real" books.

Speaking of quality, perhaps an opportunity can arise here for librarians to fill a vacuum and seek out the Cold Mountains among books published only in electronic format. TeleRead, of course, would encourage librarians to make and publicize their own discoveries.

What's more, by driving down the cost of good books, TeleRead would foster more reading by young writers along with the rest of us. Entrekin apparently has his own concerns about education and literature. According to the Christian Science Monitor, he "feels that the important books come mainly from people of his generation and older. 'And what's going to be interesting to see is, can it sustain itself over the next 15, 25 years with a generation that has never been educated in the old-fashioned way." Paradoxically, by increasing access to the classics, not just the best contemporary writing, new-fangled books in electronic form could help.

(Christian Science Monitor, via LISNews.)
posted by David Rothman at 10:37 AM | permanent link

More on New Zealand's database consortium. And get this: "The Ministry of Education agreed to fund all school libraries access to the e-resources for the first year." The consortium isn't TeleRead, but it's definitely progress. (Scoop item found via eBookAd.)

posted by David Rothman at 5:12 AM | permanent link

The TeleRead plan for a well-stocked national digital library system, the public domain and related topics will be discussed on the eBookWorm netcast tomorrow between 4 and 5 p.m. EST. Questions welcomed! How about the permanent checkout concept? Or the idea of avoiding the "rationing" of e-books, so that many patrons can check out the same titles at once? I'm confident that Tom Peters, the eBookWorm host, will be asking his usual excellent questions, but people in Netcast Land can follow up with their own.

Yes, TeleRead is for the future. But what about ways public libraries can experiment now with free e-books--even amid budget crunches? In fact, Project Gutenberg-style books, either pointers to them or copies on your library's own server, could be one way to stretch scarce resources.

In case you're curious, the best-known public domain works tend to have been written before 1923. Why not a later year? You can thank Congress for that. Even with the damage from the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act, however, the public domain is rich in popular-level treasures--from the Bobbsey Twins books to the easy-to-read classics of Jules Verne. The vision-impaired will benefit especially. Public domain e-books, unlike many commercial ones, aren't protected with DRM, which can interfere with screen readers--a real shame, considering all the advances in speech synthesis from AT&T and competitors. Check out TeleRead done Valley Girl style.

Promoting the classics

How can you encourage the reading of public domain books, whether authored by the ancient Greeks or early 20th century writers? Let schools--public and private--do some of the work. Team up with school administrators and professional groups to spread the word among teachers of English, history and other subjects, via newsletters, mailing lists and Web sites. Also post on the Net locally developed study guides that you find of merit (and think about tie-ins with relevant movies and TV programs).

For the Net, too, perhaps librarians, educators and others can write personal appreciations of public domain authors and books, which TeleRead, maybe LISNews and other sites could pick up. Mail 'em in! The essays ideally would be insightful but casual--in plain language and in the vein of, "What this author means to me today, and why I'm a fan." I've got dubs on George Gissing. Perhaps libraries could also invite patrons to submit their own efforts, with due recognition for the essays' authors and the library systems. Lit experts could pick out the best essays.

Library posters--with tear-off sheets with URLs

I'm also keen on libraries' use of posters of public domain books--with little tear-off sheets, so patrons needn't bother to write down URLs. Needless to say, too, libraries could give away CDs and DVDs of the Project Gutenberg collection (there's a downloading area for readers with high-speed connections, and other librarians can reach Gutenberg for actual disks). They could do the same with print-on-demand books; many classics from the Internet Archive servers are rather elaborately illustrated in old editions. No need for the state government of Illinois to be the source of all give-away books in the state! Just recently, a Utah official did some links to print-on-demand resources.

Of course, a related issue would be how to educate policymakers who control budgets. Circulation figures in the old sense should no longer count as much in an era when libraries ideally can giving away e-books--and print-on-demand ones, too, within budgetary limits. I'll welcome thoughts from librarians, both on the show and for the TeleRead blog, on how to address those questions.

Volunteers: One way to help patrons befriend the tech

But is the technology ready for e-books? Well, not for everyone, but in the TeleRead blog and in LISNews, I've published more than a few thoughts on the use of handhelds for people who'd enjoy reading e-books on them. I do! Perhaps at least some local libraries can arrange for members of local computer groups to help with support tasks and give other assistance to library patrons. That would also help create a built-in constituency for e-books--both commercial and public domain. Meanwhile, one excellent source of info on handhelds for librarians is the Handheld Librarian blog written by Tom Peters, eBookWorm colleague Lori Bell and others.

Talk to you Thursday, Jan. 15! And if you try out any of the above suggestions, let me know the results; in fact, feel free to ask questions along the way. If I can't help, maybe I know someone who can.

Tip: Go to the eBookWorm site early so you can install the necessary audio software, which is easy to download and use. Also, check the site in the future for more programs in the eBookWorm series. The TeleRead blog, too, will carry eBookWorm notices.

Helpful public domain sites: Among the most interesting sites are Project Gutenberg (the father of them all), Manybooks.net (popular formats available--with almost all PG titles included), Black Mask (a commercial site with a huge collection of free books in different formats, including my favorite proprietary one, Mobipocket). Memoware (Palm oriented), the Internet Public Library, the English Text Server, the University of Virginia e-text archive (including Microsoft and Palm e-book formats, not just ASCII and HTML), the Internet Archive (thousands of books blended with multimedia), the Internet Public Library of the United States ("over 27,000 HTML eBooks" from Gutenberg and other sources, via the World eBook Library), and, last but far from least, the International Children's Digital Library. Plus others too numerous to mention. In addition, you might want to read and distribute Project Gutenberg's suggestions on reading e-books in the formats used on handhelds. One reason why I like Mobipocket is that it's so handy with HTML imports, which means that you can read this common format without a need to mess with a less reader-friendly alternatives such as Adobe (the latter format is better suited for printing than on-screen viewing).
posted by David Rothman at 2:14 PM | permanent link

"I'm always in the middle of a half dozen books. Often I finish none of them. This doesn't bother me--it's part of how I like conducting my reading and writing life, dammit." - Michael Whateverhislastnameis, writing in 2Blowhards.com.

The TeleRead take: Worth pondering! Michael wasn't alluding to e-books in particular, but his thoughts would apply. Ebraries as much as possible should avoid limits on the number of books simultaneously checked out. Alas, not all do--especially when popular books are involved, rather than reference volumes. Time to pay more attention to Jugglers, as I'll call such readers.

Wooing Book Jugglers

Many of the most avid readers don't want to gamble on just a few books based on summaries or even sample chapters. They'd rather juggle around a bunch and let the authors slug it out in the most Darwinian way to see who is most worthy of attention.

It's no crime for a Juggler to stop reading a book and go on to one deemed better. I'm a juggler myself. It's one reason why these days I'm so keen on public domain works without any checkouts involved.

How libraries and publishers can together grow e-bookdom

Libraries and publishers accommodate us Jugglers--publishers shouldn't fixate so much on the possibility of lost sales. At this point the issue isn't bookstore books vs. library books so much as it is getting people to read e-books, period. Ideally the e-lending models in public libraries can reflect this. E-publishers should cut librarians some slack if the multitudes are to acquire the e-book habit. Take advantage of the economies of the technology and show flexibility toward lending models that encourage readers to explore.

Under a TeleRead approach, publishers would receive compensation based on access counts (with payment caps in place to avoid budget-busting--while at the same time allowing publishers to invest money up front and along the way to raise the compensation limits on individual titles).

Needed: A business model to help reconcile two different cultures

I know. Most librarians by nature aren't risk-takers. But many publishers are. The challenge is to find a business model that bridges the gap between the two cultures, so that zillions of library patrons can access best-sellers immediately without depriving writers and publishers of a chance to make a living.

Small-scale experiments, limited to geographical areas or the works of nonbest-selling writers, could help refine the business model. And, yes, firms exist that specialize in risk analysis for business optimization. The same concepts could be used in a library context.

The bigger picture

Of course, many in the library field would say, "What business is it of mine, being an e-book advocate?" Plenty. Readers will go for convenience and saved time--not to mention their growing interest in Net-related information sources. The idea should be to encourage people to read books in any format, paper or electronic. Either public libraries will adjust or, very gradually but very inevitably, be Googled and Amazonned away.

(2Blowhards.com item found via LISNews.)
posted by David Rothman at 8:35 AM | permanent link

Sure, we're big e-book boosters--given all the great public domain titles out there, waiting for quick browses before you commit to a full reading. Not to mention the nonDRMed titles from clueful e-bookstores.

But for libraries and p-bookstores alike, print on demand remains an interesting option as well. In his RSS in Government blog, Ray Matthews passes on information on the machinery and includes relevant links, including one to an NPR story, Book-Binding Techniques Could Revive Rare Texts.

Warning to the e-book industry: Conventional p-books aren't your only competition. Now you've got this to worry about. Time for a little action on a Universal Consumer Format and more consumer-friendly DRM for publishers insisting on copy-protection?

Another viewpoint: From eBookAd, John Zarakol writes in: "About the POD comment, we actually don't see that as a competitor, more like an extension of ebooks, since the source is always an e-book." May he be right!
posted by David Rothman at 2:07 AM | permanent link

Don't you hate it when RSS feeds contain teasers, not full articles? Jenny Levine has a great rant on this. (OK, so I'm giving a one-sentence summary, but you get the idea.) Meanwhile Steve Cohen comments on the new Yahoo RSS service. Let's hope that library organizations heed his suggestion that they do the RSS act. Built-in RSS feeds are among the reasons why I like the Bloomba e-mail client, which, with its database capabilities, lets me hunt for keywords in e-mail messages and RSS items at the same time.
posted by David Rothman at 1:30 AM | permanent link

"Sales of mobile phone ring tones, those tinny song recordings programmed into millions of handsets around the world, jumped 40 percent in the past year to $3.5 billion, according to a study released on Tuesday." - Reuters.

The TeleRead take: Imagine if just a fraction of the $3.5 billion went for e-books read on phones. And yet so far Microsoft hasn't even bothered to do a Reader update for its own Smartphone OS. Time for a nonproprietary format, so people aren't so much at the mercy of vendors? Maybe then, annual e-book sales would actually exceed the present $10 million or whatever.
posted by David Rothman at 5:17 PM | permanent link

Could regional DRM coding be used for censorship overseas--and also boomerang against Hollywood and U.S. e-book publishers? Of course! Check out The Importance Of, a blog by Ernest Miller, a LawMeme contributor.

Related: New Boss At Patent And Trademark Office Helped With DMCA.
posted by David Rothman at 3:43 PM | permanent link

How to exercise your body and, via an electronic book, your mind at the same time?

I've already told how to read an e-book in the bathtub, perhaps in defiance of Arthur C. Clarke's predictions. But how about treading while reading an e-book? Sure.

Mobipocket and Palm Reader and others offer auto-scrolling, which I suppose is a form of treading for the eyes, except that e-books are more fun.

Blow up the characters enough, and get the right stand to attach your PDA to your treadmill, and then you can do a book-treadmill act. Better to use the stand for safety reasons, of course.

No, I haven't tried this yet, but I suspect someone is already doing it. In fact, check this out.

Anyone out there with advice on stands?

Yo, publishers! Who says exercise videos are only way to receive health information while exercising? Maybe this is something Oprah can get into.

Update, 7:10 a.m. EST, Jan. 12: Yes, a reader has already written in to tell of his excellent adventures with his REB1200 and treadmill. Other comments welcomed.
posted by David Rothman at 12:25 PM | permanent link

Lithium ion batteries, common in the PDAs and dedicated, Gemstar-style devices used to read e-books, typically last just two or three years even if not used regularly. That tidbit comes from the Washington Post today.

True? Not sure. May well depend on which battery guru you quote. I myself have indeed noticed declining performance in my used Dell PDA's auxiliary battery, which now will take only a 70 percent charge (of course maybe there's some weird software-related glitch that may be the culprit, not the battery itself).

At any rate, battery age might be something to consider next time you see bargain batteries on sale on eBay. You may want to see if they come with an expiration date.

A few more details: Here's the lowdown from Battery University sponsored by Cadex Electronics: "Lithium-ion benefits from a controlled life cycle test because the aspect of aging plays a less significant role. The service life of lithium-ion in real life is a combination of cycle count and aging. All batteries are affected by aging in various degrees."

The good news: Remember, OLEDs are on the way and will consume less power and presumably will lower battery costs, one way or another. Also don't forget the the Cholesteric Liquid Crystal Display technology that Kent Displays is refining. Even without power, existing images can remain on the screen. So instead of $75 batteries, you presumably need worry only about penlight cells.
posted by David Rothman at 10:37 AM | permanent link