Peter Knowles, who graciously donated time to create the booklistgen program, is looking for Librie users to verify the Windows compatibility of his software. I hope to help out, but I know he could benefit from others' participation. Email me, and I'll forward the correspondence to Peter. Bookgen helps you transfer books from your desktop or laptop to your MemoryStick for your Librie.

This is a noble cause. Because Sony won't do decent translations of software manuals--even after the Librie has been out for a year--it's importance to reduce our reliance on the company's puzzleware. Me, I'm looking forward to the day when Matt McClintock perfects the Librie format for pubic domain books on Manybooks.net, and then we can use booklistgen for the transfer.

posted by David Rothman at 9:58 AM | permanent link

TeleRead's page for the blind and visually impaired--done in a large font and with minimum layout distractions for voice synthesizers--is working again. Sorry for the glitch. The cause was iWebz's move to a new server.
posted by David Rothman at 3:41 AM | permanent link

John Edwards, who refused to take a stand against poverty-promoting laws such as the DMCA and the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act, is going into the poverty-fighting business at the University of North Carolina.

An email to Edwards supporters--and, yes, I held my nose and voted for Kerry-Edwards--said the ex-Democratic VP candidate will be "joining UNC to launch its new Center on Poverty, Work and Opportunity, which will examine innovative and practical ideas for moving more Americans out of poverty and into the middle class."

Yes, I'll cut the new UNC professor some slack. Maybe without Hollywood campaign contributions to distract him, Edwards will do more good on the copyright front than he did on the IP-related Senate Judiciary Committee. Guess what can help fight poverty? Well-stocked public libraries and good schools. But thanks to Hollywood-bought copyright laws, they'll be paying many more millions over the years, and freedom of expression will suffer as well.

Related: Copyright and K-12: Who pays in the Network Era?, my Clinton-era paper for the U.S. Department of Education.
posted by David Rothman at 3:00 AM | permanent link

Having bullied a 12-year-old honor student living in a public housing project, the RIAA is moving on to a more lucrative activity--suits against the dead. Yep, it happened unwittingly. Still, I suspect that ghosts and corpses outnumber kids. Maybe the RIAA will end up accidentally suing Neanderthals. Time for a more reasonable approach to copyright law? (Via the Register.)

Related: Why I prefer CDs to downloads, on edbott.com. (Via Mike Cane.)
posted by David Rothman at 2:45 AM | permanent link

Has anyone ever compared e-book use among owners of large houses to use among other people--such as townhouse dwellers and those in apartments? Just curious.

From Paper vs. Trons, in Writing on Your Palm: "These days, I very rarely buy paper books anymore." The poster already owns thousands of books, "and they take up a lot of space. I live in a small house (1600 sf) and don't plan on moving anytime soon. I just don't have space for more books."

The not-so-clueful part of the post: "...is there really any reason to be concerened with the durability of ebook formats?" Um, just ask Microsoft Reader users who were denied access to already-purchased books unless they upgraded.
posted by David Rothman at 4:47 AM | permanent link

As a liberal Dem I'm not the biggest fan of the editorial stands of the Washington Examiner, a new daily for DC and suburbs. But oh how I agree with the paper's replacement of a PDF edition with a HTMLish Web site. As the opinion section says, the Examiner is now "much easier to use." Needless to say, OpenReader could offer the benefits of an encapsulated newspaper without all the nasty scrolling that PDF editions require, especially on small screens.
posted by David Rothman at 4:12 AM | permanent link

"The Association of American University Presses recently reported overall sales in the textbook industry decreasing by 1.5 percent in 2003, after of a 0.3 percent drop in 2002 and a 2.6 percent drop in 2001.' - Campus Technology, via eBookAd.

The TeleRead take: And, yes, the article goes on to say that e-books and related technology are starting to fill the gap.
posted by David Rothman at 3:57 AM | permanent link

Nope, I'm not pushing for civil disobedience against the loathsome Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act--but others are urging such action in a nasty copyright-related matter that the Bono Act aggravated. The immediate issue: the copyright gouges that led to the withdrawal of Eyes on the Prize, the classic civil rights documentary. So what will my fellow Dem liberals do? Yo, Gov. Blogger? This could be a good litmus test to see if you really want to reinvent The Party.
posted by David Rothman at 4:29 PM | permanent link

With the Military Channel in the background, with Japanese Zeros zooming over Hawaii, I was waging a battle of my own last night--another bout with the Rothman Librie.

Even American-bought Libries, not just mine shipped directly from Japan, lack decent documentation in English. Could Sony-sponsored Wikis help out? That's a point I'll make here, beside supplying a few how-to tips for my fellow Librie newbies. But first a few words on The Battle of the Memory stick and Sony's contempt for American early-adopters.

Not for Japanese consumer only--regardless of the Sony line

Why won't Sony show more respect for English-speaking customers and other nonJapanese people? Just why isn't there any official documentation other than the Japanese-language variety? Sony officially depicts the Librie as only for the Japanese market. But is the company really silly enough to think it can limit the Librie to the Japan? I'd hope not. After all, Sony promoted the machine to Western media. A much-circulated Associated Press story was actually far too forgiving of the Librie's slow refresh rate and lack of true paper-level contrast (nope, the screen is not just "slightly gray instead of white"). Without question, the Librie is hardy a secret in America and Europe.

In fact, probably with Sony's cooperation, the Librie is going for $599 in New York. So why can't Sony favor us Yanks with at least a try at English-language documentation? Better would be the full manual and true multilingual software from the start; but please, at least give us something. Granted, Sony could be testing the Librie on Japanese consumers, in the classic fashion, before releasing an improved machine to us Americans. But couldn't Americans, too, participate in the testing? And Germans and French users? Gasp, we all live in the era of the Net and FedEx, and I'd hope this wouldn't be A National Pride Thing. What's more, is the Librie really a Japanese military secret to be hidden from the menacing West? The bleepin' machine has been out for a year. Surely translators can't be that slow or expensive.

The memory stick battle

I thought of all this when I was attempting to transfer Anna Karenina and War & Peace to the 256MB Sony MemoryStickPro I had bought for the Librie. Pretty essential stuff, no? I'd turned to the memory card in part because Sony's Internet Explorer toolbar, for direct transfers, was not an easy option without more consideration for English speakers.

The card should have been--forgive the pun--a snap. Just use the hacker-created booklistgen program to generate a list of the appropriate subdirectories--and then copy in the appropriate books. No such luck. My solution in the end was another Sony-supplied program that I unraveled, by sheer brute force--trying oodles of options.

Meanwhile I'd love to hear from Japanese readers and companies interested in seeing American consumers included in tests of products like the Librie. Everyone, not just Americans, would come out ahead with more feedback available. If Sony were really clueful about the most promising products, it could even do Japanese and English instruction manuals as Wikis--and other languages, too. The right legalese could protect Sony from product liability.

Reconciling differences

Tech-hip translators, moreover, could help reconcile differences between, say, a Japanese Wiki and those in English and Spanish--keeping users up with the most interesting and factual information. An expense? Sure, but an easier-to-use product would be the result--not just through better documentation but also through accelerated product development in an era when small production runs are easier than before. Those Wikis would be a great source of feedback. While competitors would see it, insiders would be far more likely to be able to take full advantage of it.

Oh, and what's good for the Japanese should be good for the Americans as well. If U.S. companies want global markets for their new products, then they should be quick and early to create Wikis in many languages to refine manuals for international markets. Improved documentation should be just as important as other aspects of product development.

For an appreciation of the possibilities of Wiki-ized manuals

I'd highly recommend that Sony's top Librie people study the unofficial Wiki for the Librie--from the public-spirited Sven Neuhaus.

To answer one question, I see a continued role for independent Wikis and email lists, not just the corporately supported variety. Sony should not expect to buy off the Open Source community. Yes, Sony is most control-minded, so, in terms of a real-life Wickis for the company's computer manuals, I'll keep my expectations low--but thankfully Sven and the like-minded are around. Besides, if Sony doesn't latch on to the Wiki concept for manual development, other companies may eventually do so, starting with the highest-tech ones with the more complicated products. They won't just benefit from clear documentation and resultant product refinements--they'll see more brand loyalty from consumers and B2B customers.

Besides a continued role for independent Wikis, I'll also suggest that the corporately sponsored kind won't make independent computer books obsolete. The more information is out there, the handier can be the right guide to sort it out.

Kudos for others besides Sven

Thanks not just to Sven Neuhaus for his Wiki but also the pseudonymous Scythic for his makelrf program to let us see our own books on the Librie; to Peter for booklistgen; to Rodney Tamblyn for the LibrieTextAssistant to process Gutenberg-style text for makelrf; and to Matthew McClintock for experimenting with the Librie format on ManyBooks.net. You can find all the programs in the file area of the Yahoo-based email list for the Librie. As for ManyBooks.net, Matthew has the Librie format feature disabled while he perfects it, but he hopes to have it back shortly.

Thanks, also, to Reinoud for Librie reference and to Edward Betts, Lukasz Kotaski, Sven and others for work on the Librie reference in the Wikipedia. If you know Japanese, you can get official information from Sony. Time for an English version? And other languages as well?

The How-tos

Here is an overview of the sequence to get Gutenberg-style books into the Librie if you're using a Windows machine.

(1) Check out the above resources since I can't mention all the nuances here.

(2) Install the Librie for Windows program that comes with the machine, or at least did in my case.

(3) Create a subdirectory for makelrf and the LibrieTextAssistant.

(4) Download a .txt file of the desired book from Gutenberg or elsewhere.

(5) Straighten out the linebreaks with LibrieTextAssistant and also add .xml-related information at the top--stuff that you can then copy and adapt other books you process.

(6) After a preview with Librie for Windows, use the Librie Windows program to get the books into the Librie. Click on the Librie book names or images in Windows to fire up the program and to go the related reader.

You can also use a printer driver to transfer files of various kinds to the Librie, but the results this way are much more satisfying.

I have not yet coaxed Sony's Internet Explorer toolbar-related solutions into working--my IE won't recognize the Sonyware. What am I doing wrong? Suggestions welcomed from the true experts.

And finally a tip in the memory-stick war...

As for the how-tos of memory stick, I used the 256MB Sony MemoryStickPro with a $20 Lexar reader picked up at CompUSA. I don't know how much luck you'll have with a plain MemoryStick or other brands, but I believe that other people on the Librie list have been successful.

Use the booklistgen program to carve out the right subdirectories and create necessary files in the MemoryStick. Otherwise the Librie won't see the new books on the card. From the e-book reader associated with Librie for Windows, you can write to the card.

Here's a screenshot of what the LfW looked like in action, and you can take it from there.

Once the books are on the card--look for a blinking light on the card reader and verify with Windows Explorer--plug it into your Librie. If the memory stick gods are on your side, you'll be all set.

Reader beware

These are just hasty observations, and I'll welcome corrections. Also, I'd love for someone to do something in Sven's Librie Wiki with greater detail.
posted by David Rothman at 9:59 AM | permanent link

This is actually a footnote for the Librie-related post above--perhaps overlapping with an earlier post to this blog. A Japanese blogger wrote in some months ago to complain of DRM and other copyright-related hassles on the Librie. He reminded me that smart Netfolks over there hate these consumer abuses as much as clueful Americans do. Let's all--Japanese and American activists alike--fight hard as we can for against Draconian copyright laws and Librie-stupid DRM.

Significantly, part of the global copyright battle is also over the length of terms. And there is an interesting Japanese-related angle. I'm tired of Pearl Harbor showing up again and again on the Military Channel, regardless of my respect for the Americans who died there. By showing Pearl Harber repeatedly, might not the Channel be making us less sensitive to all the sacrifies? Let's remember PH, of course--but not so often.

Perhaps a more robust public domain, with TV producers less dependent on old military films, could eventually help rescue us all--not just Americans, but also Japanese. Presumably the latter would prefer that the Military Channel and other Discovery outlets not fixate so much on World War II.
posted by David Rothman at 1:22 AM | permanent link

First off, this is just speculation. But imagine the possibilities. Activists in Brazil want the country to declare its independence of high-priced proprietary software, and OpenReader certainly could help. No more DRM/format fees of more than 15 percent in some cases! OpenReader should be a natural for developing countries, especially in the wake of a move for $100 computers.

Speaking at a recent gathering in Brazil was none other than John Perry Barlow, former Grateful Dead lyricist, who, in addition to his distinction as an EFF cofounder and writer of memorable words, is among the early endorsers of OpenReader. As for samba--well, it's not just Brazilian music, but also the name of a famous open source file-server system for which one of the main ringleaders has been John Terpstra, another OpenReader supporter.

Details: To learn about the work already in progress and volunteer to help create an open standard for e-books, contact Jon Noring.

(Thanks to Alev for the Brazil-related story--and for the just-made typo catches!)
posted by David Rothman at 6:46 AM | permanent link

Here's A Short Short Story for you, in Conversational Reading. (Via Robert Nagle.)
posted by David Rothman at 3:27 AM | permanent link

"The U.S. Copyright Office published in the Jan. 26 Federal Register a notice asking for comment whether a solution is needed to deal with 'orphan works,' works for which the copyright owner cannot be located." - Linuxelectrons.

posted by David Rothman at 3:08 AM | permanent link

If you're still puzzled about "Folksonomies"--no, MDs don't perform them--check out the Wired News, especially if you're a cat-lover.

posted by David Rothman at 2:00 AM | permanent link

A puzzle known as a Librie showed up in a small brown package yestesday, courtesy of a kindly acquaintance who bought one for me in Tokyo.

Following a bout with Japanese software--I won with some English-language documentation on my side--I saw New Grub Street on the much-talked-about screen. This was through a primitive approach. I "printed" a PDF to the proprietary BBeB format, then sent the book from my desktop PC--through a USB cable to the Librie.

Alas, Sony's use of E-Ink technology is far short of my expectations based on press writeups. But in an important way, the screen is the ultimate rebuke to Luddites. Just as touted, the characters are almost as smoothly formed as a newspaper's, and of course you're reading with reflected light, just as you do off paper.

Like a very good LCD without a backlight

The general appearance of the screen is of an excellent LCD without a backlight on. Contrast could be better, the screen is grayer than I'd like, but using the Librie in sunlight or with a fluorescent will help. The screen's biggest downside is that it takes too long to refresh, even if I set this value for "fast." Anyone else out there agree? Email me.

Here's one viewing tip. Use the makelrf program rather than the "printer" program if you want the zoom feature to be able to adjust the letters to the right size. Worked fine on a Gutenberg ASCII file of Victor Hugo's autobiography.

Biggest problem at this point

Unfortunately, however, the Librie's built-in reading software is horrid. It lacks the normal navigational ease of something like Mobipocket. I remain baffled, baffled how Sony could test the marketability of the Librie, in Japan or anywhere, without building in decent e-reading software.

Perhaps a program on one of the CDs will address this issue. I'll look and if need be update this post. Whatever the case, DRM clearly isn't this machine's only problem. The right software should be on the Librie from the start. Do consumers really need these hassles?

Impression so far: Flashy tech, but not for the average user

For leisurely recreational reading and for demonstrating the promise of E Ink--yes, future versions will have much faster response times--this machine is worth the trouble. But at this point, I'm wondering, "Even at a lower price, just how fit would an out-of-the-box Librie be for the typical user who doesn't want to bother with the intricacies of the device?" My gripe at this point isn't against the technology so much as it is against Sony's interface, which, even in English, would be too Rube Goldbergish for my tastes. Perhaps my opinions will change as I get to know the Librie better first-hand and check out those CDs.

E-book ranch credit: That's Tom Peters' phrase. He fell in love with the Gemstar series of machines and picked up enough of them to say he had an "e-book ranch."
posted by David Rothman at 7:28 AM | permanent link

"The founder and chairman of the MIT Media Lab wants to create a $100 portable computer for the developing world. Nicholas Negroponte, author of Being Digital and the Wiesner Professor of Media Technology at MIT, says he has obtained promises of support from a number of major companies, including Advanced Micro Devices, Google, Motorola, Samsung, and News Corp." - The hundred-buck PC, in Red Herring (links added to quote).

The TeleRead take: That's good news not just for the Third World and Silicon Valley but also for the e-book industry and consumers. The Red Herring article says: "Mr. Negroponte's idea is to develop educational software and have the portable personal computer replace textbooks in schools in much the same way that France's Minitel videotext terminal, which was developed by France Telecom in the 1980s, became a substitute for phone books." The greater the e-book market, significantly, the lower should be consumer costs since publishers can charge lower prices and still profit. Here's to volume! I suspect that the first versions of the $100 machine might use CRTs, but if so, let's hope that e-book-optimized devicds with LCDs or even E Ink will follow. Given the power situation in rural villages, let's hope that LCD is standard from the start--and that people remember that tech is not a panacea.

The OpenReader angle: The econo PC is one more reason to come up with a standard e-book format and an open source e-book reader, given the need to slash costs. If Negroponte cares about literacy without a Tower of eBabel, he should give OpenReader a good look.

Related: The TeleRead plan as originally published in Computerworld in 1992, as well as The Electronic Peace Corps: Take a look, candidates. Also see, natch, the requisite discussion at Slashdot.
posted by David Rothman at 9:46 AM | permanent link

OK. Jon Noring and I have made it clear. We'll have DRM in OpenReader for interested publishers--and let the marketplace sort out the issue. Many smaller publishers actually hate it. But if Random House loves DRM, we'll allow it and do our best with the implementation--just so book-buyers can vote in the end. We've got a top network security expert ready to work on this.

In this blog today, guest contributor Scott Redford, owner of Diesel eBooks, eloquently passes on a retailer's perspective on the complexities here, and we want to be responsive.

At the same time, it's important to remember the anti-consumer potential of the technology--the subject of lawyer Michael Geist's column in the Toronto Star. The title is "'TPMs': A perfect storm for consumers," with TPM standing for "Technological Protection." But whose protection?

HP among the hoods

Especially scary is Hewlett Packard's use of DRMish tech to regionalize printer cartridges so they work only on printers sold in the States but not elsewhere--or perhaps vice versa. A little "divide and conquer" to gouge consumers with? Perhaps one more way for CEO Carly Fiorina to make up for the botched Compaq merger?

John Edwards, for all his pro-consumer, pro-populist rhetoric, never would take a stand on the the DRM-linked DMCA even though he sat on just the right Senate committees. Did campaign contributions shut him up? Anti-competitive DRM could cost the U.S. public billions.

Coming: A Canadian DMCA?

Oh, and then there's the possibility of a Canadian version of the DMCA. Meanwhile the usual nasty free speech issues arise from DRM. CBS, for example, as part of Rathergate, released a DRMed document that would not let Net users electronically copy and paste sentences.
posted by David Rothman at 9:12 AM | permanent link

David Faucheux, a TeleRead volunteer, normally reviews books and other forms of cultural from the perspective of a blind MLIS. But today's post in his Blind Chance blog is on different and especially urgent topic: The blind-hostile DMV: Blind pedestrian safety questions scarce on drivers tests. Check it out. Any journalists out there care to write on this? Its importance will grow as America ages and the number of the blind increases--along with elderly drivers in need of training to cope with less-than-youthful coordination and vision.
posted by David Rothman at 9:03 AM | permanent link

I can't help expressing my joy that AT&T will vanish into the maw of SBC.

What a loathsome outfit. AT&T's VoIP service, contrary to the advertising, didn't offer three-way capability when I used it. I cancelled and went through billing hell, with AT&T at one point unable to tote up the exact amount owed--but still threatening my credit rating when I refused to pay without a trustworthy figure. I was hardly the first victim of AT&T's mix of sleaze and incompetence. Believe me, the smile on that lady in the ad is most misleading, at least as applied to my experiences.

I feel for the AT&T shareholders who over the years saw a widows-and-orphans stock shrink to a fraction of its value, and even more I feel for the employees who'll lose their jobs. I rejoice, however, over the fate of the inept and arrogant management. This is creative destruction at its best. Changing technologies and lasting stupidity doomed the deserving.

No time for nostalgia

Meanwhile I would urge readers of this blog to have as little as possible to do with AT&T in personal or professional dealings, until the SBC deal goes through. Forget about nostalgia, regardless of AT&T's past greatness, regardless of the well-deserved acclaim for the old Bell Labs. Normally I'd worry about lessened competition, but AT&T's was so anti-consumer that I'm still happy to see this dino roll over.

The e-book angle: If even AT&T can fade away, what about Microsoft? No corporation survives forever--a point that even Bill Gates has made in another context. That is why we need a universal e-book standard if e-books are to be a durable, respected medium.
posted by David Rothman at 1:59 AM | permanent link

The Last Time I Saw Paris, the 1954 Liz Taylor-Van Johnson movie, based on Babylon Revisisted, the classic short story by F. Scott Fitzgerald, is online for free via the Internet Archive. Did MGM slip up with the copyright? Whatever the explanation, the Archive lists the movie as being in the public domain. Enjoy. That's what I intend to do. Comcast has just increased its download speed in my area from 3 to 4 mbps, and since QuickTime streaming from the Archive isn't working on my system, I'll download this as an MPEG4.
posted by David Rothman at 1:54 PM | permanent link

The Toronto public library now offers 5,000 titles, directly or indirectly, and even lends out Rocket eBooks. (Via Anidada's Live Journal.)
posted by David Rothman at 7:40 AM | permanent link

Project Gutenberg has bombed in the library world--for two reasons beyond the usual fears of e-books.

First, Gutenberg in the past has not bothered with the requisite cataloging rituals. Second, while the texts are catnip for recreational readers who love the classics, many are worse than useless for scholars. They're nuke-level career risks for academics. How can you cite e-texts when you don't know which paper editions were used as sources? And what about the typos that mar scads of Gutenberg books not processed by the quality-minded folks at Distributed Proofreaders, the heart and soul of Gutenberg these days?

Well, to Gutenberg's credit, founder Michael Hart is now addressing the cataloging issue at least. He has begun a MARC record-testing program to determine the level of library-related interest in suitably cataloged PG books. Best of luck to Gutenberg on this, and let's hope that Michael will now think about redoing all the deficient texts, especially popular classics, to bring them up to academic standards.
posted by David Rothman at 5:33 AM | permanent link

"Spotted in Japan: vending machines that sell software, ebooks, and games for Palms and Pocket PCs. You just pick the one you want, select your preferred memory card format (CompactFlash, SD, or Memory Stick), and out pops a card with your software loaded up on it. It seems they’re actually offering some compelling content, too--graphic novels, games and music that you may have actually heard of. These aren’t just random games and content, they’re Lupin, Appleseed, and Dominion, all big names in the manga world." - Multi-format content vending machines get all growed up in Engadget.

The TeleRead take: In the era of the Internet, novels sold by vending machines might seem a primitive practice. But then consider the horrors of ActiveSync for e-book newbies. This could be A Good Thing to try in the States. Coming to CompUSA?

Meanwhile, a commenter tells Engadget: "Wake up Barnes and Noble! I hardly ever buy books on paper anymore and I don't want to subscribe to another crappy eBook web site. This machine would get my attention, so long as it's not DRM protected in a way that forces me to carry multiple cards around. I like to read and listen to music at the same time."
posted by David Rothman at 3:50 AM | permanent link