TeleRead: Bring the E-Books Home

Archive for the ‘conferences’ Category

By David Rothman

E-Book tech, back-list digitization, copyright and social media, DRM lessons from the music industry—those were a few of the dozens of topics at O’Reilly’s recent Tools of Change conference. Didn’t go? Well, now you can at least check out the Web-posted presentations.

An entertainment media expert’s PDF, on music and DRM from an e-book perspective, serves up a snappy reply to a quote from the RIAA’s lawsuit against the Diamond Rio.

“We filed this lawsuit because unchecked piracy on the Internet threatens the development of a legitimate marketplace that consumers want,” said the RIAA. And then, on the next page, comes a pithy observation from the author of the PDF, Medialoper contributor Kirk Biglione, a consultant with Oxford Media Works: “Actually consumers wanted portable MP3.”

The Kindle and the music biz

Applicable to e-books? You bet—in fact, even more so. People don’t want to read e-books just on their Kindles, however portable the tablets are. Readers also would like to be able to display the same Amazon e-books on cellphones and PDAs and desktops. Biglione noted that fifty percent of Fictionwise’s gross revenue comes from non-DRMed books. And his presentation also took a jab at eBabel, a blight that DRM of course worsens since the DMCA prevents you from converting books from one encrypted format to another (that’s my opinion and wording: I wasn’t at the Biglione talk).

Warning to Amazon worshippers

Publishers dreaming of a nice, orderly Amazon-centric industry, meanwhile, might ponder a quote Biglione dug up from Douglas Morris, CEO of Universal Music Group: “We were just grateful that someone was selling online. The problem is, he [Steve Jobs] became the gatekeeper. We make a lot of money from him, and suddenly you’re wearing golden handcuffs.” Why would Amazon’s Jeff Bezos be any different?

The bottom line according to Biglione: Consumers value “reasonable pricing,” “wide selection” and “interoperability, preferably DRM free.”

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By Robert Nagle

While David and Paul are busy at O’Reilly’s Tool of Change, it’s still possible to keep up with the conference online.

• Little Brown director George Walkley is liveblogging many of the presentations. See Monday AM, Monday PM and Tuesday morning. Hopefully, more will come.
• Here’s the conference blog would should be giving reports from the blogosphere.
• Monday’s conversation with Kathy Sierra and Tim O’Reilly is already online. Also, if you click the TOC archive hyperlink, you can find not only TOC 2008 clips, but also many clips from last summer’s TOC 2007.

Still to come: David Rothman reports from his ebook panel at that conference, along with observations and analysis.

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By Branko Collin

The organisation of (UNESCO’s) Amsterdam World Book Capital will hold a symposium called “The Book in the Internet Era: Copyright and the Future for Authors, Publishers and Libraries” on the 21st and 22nd of April 2008 at the new central Public Library of Amsterdam, The Netherlands. The language of the symposium will be English. The entrance fee will be 350 euro, though some authors, and some citizens from economically disadvantaged countries are eligible for a discount.

Among the invited speakers are Dr. Ernst Hirsch Ballin (Dutch Minister of Justice), Paul Goldstein (Professor of Law at Stanford University), Richard Charkin (thief), and James Boyle (Professor of Law at Duke University).

Of these I find Hirsch Ballin and James Boyle the most remarkable. The Dutch Department of Justice rarely concerns itself with copyright (mostly only with the Windows-CDs-from-car-boots stuff); what is a cop doing in a kindergarten? James Boyle is one of those rare copyright scholars who believe that there must be actual reasons for having a copyright law, and that the effects of copyright should be measured where possible. I know—what a nutter!

Moderator’s note: Fascinating post. But the above reference to Richard Charkin is Branko’s personal opinion and might even be even libelous if presented as a fact without the full background. Richard Charkin is a reputable publishing executive who “stole” Google laptops to make a point about copyright. See my comment. - David Rothman

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By Quinn Anya Carey

Librarians and book-lovers have a community going on Second Life, and real-world library science programs are taking notice. The Library Science program at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign will be offering a course on Second Life librarianship, with class meetings held in Second Life.

Meetings on-line are held for two hours on Friday mornings (May 25 - July 13) with further discussion and assignments taking place through forums. More info and registration are available on the course webpage.

Disclaimer: As of this summer, I will be a UIUC library science student through their on-line program.

Book-loving avatar image by Travelin’ Librarian, as seen on Flickr.

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By David Rothman

DRM is a little like the military-industrial complex against which Dwight Eisenhower warned America. It means buckets of money for the right people, whether or not a war’s going on—and more money if one is.

In the case of e-books, a war is in fact happening, against DRM-hating consumers, who, judging from experiences at stores such as Fictionwise, vastly prefer books without this “feature.” One of the issues for e-publishers is whether they should follow the lead of certain recording studios and phase out DRM or at least reduce its use, especially among people willing to pay extra to avoid “protection.”

Steve Potash among the generals

But what happens if Steve Potash, the president of the IDPF, the leading e-book trade organization, is himself a major provider of DRM services in his other role as president and CEO of OverDrive? Would he be open to a phasing out of major source of OverDrive’s revenue? For now, Steve is part of the DRM-entertainment complex, and, via a news release, here is a preview of some remarks he’ll make to the LexisNexis Digital Rights Management (DRM) Conference held April 23-24 in Beverly Hills with outfits such as MPAA and the RIAA participating:

“‘Our company encourages owners and distributors of premium digital content to expand the reach of their music, movies, and books by utilizing practical solutions for digital rights management,’ Mr. Potash said. ‘At the Digital Rights Management conference, we will assure members of the entertainment industry that they can confidently continue to provide their content online while protecting it from piracy.’

It’ll be interesting to see what Steve has to say in Hollywood and at the IDPF’s Digital Book 2007 conference in New York on May 9. If he and other e-bookers want DRM, it will be time for the IDPF to get hopping on an effort to standardize the technology or at least make it interoperable, lest the Tower of eBabel keep looming over e-bookdom. My own choice is, “No ‘protection,’” especially given the ease of pirating paper books via scanning. But if DRM is to exist, then let it be much easier on consumers.

Destroy the book village to save it?

Some publishers might say, “Who cares—just so we sell paper books.” But future readers will be more and more insistent on E, and I believe that they’ll resist either Draconian DRM or efforts to make E-Book Museums the only alternative. So in the end another military-related comparison comes to mind for the global book industry. Do we want “to destroy this village in order to save it”? (more…)

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By Robert Nagle

O’Reilly having a Tools of Change for Publishing conference in June. Here are the tutorials and (sketchy) list of sessions and a speaker list. The price is about $1000 although there are discounts.

Kassia Kroszer wonders why more publishing types didn’t flock to South by Southwest Interactive (cost: $200-300) where one recurring theme is (coincidentally) digital storytelling:

What we don’t have is a coterie of publishing house representatives. This is bad, dear publishers, very bad. What is happening on the ground in this fair city in Texas is what you will pay consultants big bucks to execute in two years. You, dear publishers, will be reacting to a menu of buzzwords and must-do action items that, we suspect, will make little to no sense, but you will be leaping into action regardless. Because you are told you must.

Though we certainly hope it is already happening — given that the trend is well into its fourth year — you will hold meetings about community and building community and retaining community and the future of publishing and how you can really differentiate yourself in a fragmented world. These topics have been part of the SXSW conversation for some time…to the point where the more complex questions of identity management are not abstracts but areas for debate.

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By David Rothman

Telecom Italia, Sony, Adobe and iRex Technologies will offer perspectives on “New Mobile Devices & eReading Software”—at the IDPF-organized Digital Book 2007: Digital Publishing in Consumer, Education & Library Markets to be held May 9 in New York City. I’ll be especially interested to learn what Telecom Italia and Polymar Vision will be doing with devices similar to the one shown.

Other panels will be on formats, digital warehouses, textbooks, digital libraries and e-periodicals. The format panel will feature eBook Technologies, OverDrive and OSoft. I think this would be a great chance for OSoft CEO Mark Carey—if he’s inclined—to make the case of the IPDF’s adoption or integration of OpenReader, which, technically, is superior to the existing IDPF standard. (more…)

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By David Rothman

Below are the TeleBlog’s highlights from the past week. Graphic is from Reading Wowio’s free books (and other PDFs) on a PDA.

Schools and libraries
Google vs. libraries

Writing and publishing
Blogs and creativity: F. Scott Fitzgerald as a WordPress guy
Ambulance worker’s book offered free on Net
Freeload Press makes New York Times column
‘Publishers Fight Back against Google with New Book Search Service’
Tools for creating e-books

Reading and listening
‘The New Yorker magazine: Coming to a portable hard drive near you’
Test-drive of the HarperCollins Reader
Public Domain Books, Ready for Your iPod’
Mystery: Who killed my Palm TX’s access to Wowio’s free books?
Reading Wowio’s free books (and other PDFs) on a PDA
Recent English sci-fi at Project Gutenberg
Digital textual studies
Harlequin’s 99-cent e-story offerings
‘Where reading paper books is like having sex’

Hardware
Women, purses and PDAs (redux)
$100 laptop is now the CM1, aka ‘the Children’s Machine’: Score one for Aljazeera
OLPC/CMI in the U.S.
Dear Ja(y)ne: So can purses save the PDA market?
Hello, Palm? You need jog-wheel dials on all your PDAs
Behind $100 laptop’s high-res display
Next-gen Palm Treo

E-book formats
Did accessibility issue hurt OpenOffice?
JEP article and OpenReader

Copyright and DRM
Michael Geist’s ‘30 Days of DRM’
Poll on DRMed books: Give up resale rights, etc., if the price is right?
Yes, Virginia, there are e-book pirates

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By Robert Nagle

Amy Earhart from the Texas A&M English department forwarded this announcement.

Digital Textual Studies: Past, Present and Future

Texas A&M University, College Station, TX, October 19-21, 2006 (Thursday through Saturday)

Digital Textual Studies: Past, Present and Future, will assess the current state and future prospects of digital textual studies, with an underlying emphasis on how digital media might change our ways of knowing or experiencing textuality. The symposium will feature an opening address by Jerome McGann, and presentations by Morris Eaves, Julia Flanders, Matthew Kirschenbaum, Kenneth Price, Peter Robinson, Peter Shillingsburg and Martha Nell Smith.

The speaker list consists of a lot English professors, academic librarians and new media gurus. This is close to where I live (Houston), so I’ll definitely be attending. If you happen to attend, please look for me. I’ll probably be liveblogging the event for teleread as well.

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