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Oh sweet mother of dog, can anyone help me work out how to download and open a goddamn PDF book on my iPad Mini? I bought the book. The default reader is Overdrive, but Overdrive doesn’t support PDFs and won’t download the file. I cannae work out how to download and open the book via another reader. (Adobe PDF Reader for iPad, Kindle, iBooks, etc.) Gah, ebook format wars and incompatibility make Fi very angry.

If the above Facebook post slash cry for help hasn’t already alerted you to this fact, I should probably spell it out for you: This blog post has been typed in anger.

I held off buying an ereader for this precise reason until just a few weeks ago. I wanted the format wars to be over and for the dust from them to be settled. I wanted to be able to purchase and read a book with just a couple of clicks and plenty of ease, with the biggest decision I had to make being which book to purchase. I didn’t want to spend hours researching and troubleshooting downloads and formats and getting increasingly exasperated and incensed.

This is not how I should be spending my Sunday afternoon.

The ultimate irony is that the book I’m trying to download—Beth Kanter and Allison H Fine‘s The Networked Nonprofit—isn’t even a book I want to read for fun. I mean no offence by that—I’m sure it’s a rollicking read. More importantly it’s a book I absolutely must, must, must read and reference for my university study (and it does contain, I’m sure, and by pure virtue of currently being inaccessible to me, the key to my entire thesis).

I should preface the rest of this rant with a note that this is not the fault of Booku, the ebook retail site that complements Boomerang Books. In fact, although Booku doesn’t support PDF files on iPad Minis, it had the clearest, most concise, most communicationally designed (that’s a technical term) help information I was able to find. If it weren’t for Booku, I’d still be googling and randomly attempting to download apps and readers and who knows what else (and no, I’m not just saying that because I technically work for them). I also feel the need to specify that it’s not an Apple product thing. It’s an ebook format war thing. Every ereading device currently available comes with quirks and cons.

The issue is that downloading a book to any device shouldn’t have to be this hard. This format war stuff needs to be sorted the f$%k out.

I can’t recount the steps I took to get my PDF onto my iPad, partly because I don’t want to bore you and mostly because I can’t remember the myriad, seemingly unending, largely fruitless steps I took. I should also admit that although I’ve now got the book open and readable on my Macbook Pro, I still haven’t managed to do it on my iPad Mini (it appears that I can only download the Adobe Digital Editions to the former, because it’s not an app, which kind of defeats the purpose of me specifically purchasing an iPad Mini to be an ereader). If you’ve got any advice on how to do this, I’m all eyes and ears.

Sigh.

Who knows, maybe half of what I’ve typed here today is incorrect. But I don’t apologise for that—this ebook stuff is unnecessarily confusing. Because here’s the rub: I don’t care what format my ebook is in. Nor should I even have to know. As the producers and distributors of this product, the publishers and retailers should be across that. And they should be making it as easy as possibly for me, the enduser, to simply decided on my purchase and download it with ease. That’s how the interwebs work these days.

There’s a reason why iTunes and Amazon’s (particularly with the latter’s oh-so-dangerous, impulse buy-encouraging one-click functionality) are dominating the sales spaces, and it’s not because they’re behemoths. It’s because they’ve made it easy for people to get the things they’re after. I’m actually reasonably tech savvy and interested in ebooks (it is, after all, central to my work and industry). If I can’t work it out, what hope is there for the lay reader who just wants to enjoy some Sunday afternoon Vampire Academy (I’m eagerly awaiting the arriving of my just-released The Indigo Spell)?

To be blunt (not that I haven’t already been), I resent having to have about 17 different ereading apps downloaded to my ereading device and playing which-one-will-work roulette every time I want to read a book. I resent not being able to use the ereader of my choice, instead being dictated to by the format that it may or may not support. I also resent having my ebooks spread across various apps—I imagine there’ll be a time when I lose my s$%t trying to find a book I know I own but can’t remember its format and, subsequently, in which app’s library it will happen to be stored.

I’m sure downloading Kanter’s book didn’t and doesn’t need to be this hard. But I didn’t know the steps and I shouldn’t have had to. They should be intuitive and the process should be seamless. It shouldn’t have involved me having to first find and then type in my stupid Adobe ID multiple times. (As a side note, Adobe also forced me to give the company my birthday, which enraged me no end. The only reason they need such information is to gather marketing data on me is that they will use against me or sell on to a third party. It’s not ok, Adobe. You knowing my age doesn’t affect whether I can get a goddamn PDF downloaded and opened on my device.)

Nor should the process have had to involve me becoming an expert of what kinds of ereading apps are available and which formats they support. For the record none of the ones I looked at—Goodreader, Stanza, Kindle, iBooks, Overdrive, and Bluefire—and especially not the last two, are intuitive titles that people would think to use as search terms. Where is the generically named ‘ebook reader’ app? Where is the ereader that’s easy to find, intuitive to use, and that reads all formats?

More doom and gloom about Barnes & Noble today. It appears that Nook is going to lose more money than expected. I guess if losses had stayed flat, as was expected, the situation would have been better, if not actually good. Even though it sounds as if even then we wouldn't be talking about making money.

I was reminded of an LA Times article I read last month. The author, Michael Hiltzik, said that we ereader users don't actually own the eBooks we purchase. We are "licensees." "Nowhere does Amazon, Apple or any other distributor pledge to support its digital formats in perpetuity. Quite the contrary: They typically warn that they can cancel their service at any time, without warning, in a way that could end your access to a lifetime of e-book purchases."

He doesn't say anything about a "distributor" going out of business. So my question is, if Barnes & Noble goes belly up (to put it indelicately), what happens to Nook users?

Now you must excuse me while I leave to do a final copy edit the Saving the Planet & Stuff copy we have ready to upload to Nook.

Until two weeks ago I had never used an ereader.  It wasn’t that I was afraid of one, or concerned that they would eclipse the humble paper version, I just couldn’t bear another contraption in my bag.  While it may be large and hold a quite a lot, it is no Mary Poppins lamp-containing material marvel.

I think I was just a little afraid of change.  This year alone I’ve bought my first smart phone and moved from PC to Mac but the ereader shift was a change that worried me.  Books have been a constant.  Computers and phones change constantly – in design, in features, in form.  But the printed book have always been the same since the day I was born and for generations before me.

I have been flirting with the idea of buying one for two years.  Twitter murmurings and online research mainly.  I never got close to buying one.  I was circling the shiny toy with no inclination to grab at it.  It wasn’t until I heard Stephanie Laurens speak at the Emerging Writers’ Festival that I decided that I would buy one.  Her books have been available in digital form since 2002 and she was still getting asked the eternal ‘ebook question’ that most authors get hit with in question sessions.

For Laurens, ebooks weren’t an issue.  They had been part of her life for nearly ten years.

So what was I afraid of?

After putting around online, reading ereader reviews that made some sense to me, querying authors and publishing people about their ereaders and general Twitter queries I decided on the Sony Reader PRS T1.  I didn’t want an iPad as I had just bought a new laptop and had an iPhone.  I just wanted something to read my books on.  The Sony reads all the formats, is insanely light (168g) and is easy to use.  Done.

Two weeks later…

• I have bought many books and not just in ePub form.  I won’t ever make the choice between a real book and its electronic version; I will read both.  I have been buying both.  I may be buying more than normal in total as I start building my ebook library but I have also been buying more real books as my reading has increased.
• I am able to read standing up in a jam packed tram.  I can barely stand up straight in that situation anyway, so to be able to hold my ereader in one hand and read successfully is all kinds of wonderful.
• I love being able to see how many pages are left in numerical value.  It calls to my competitive streak.
• No need to dog-ear (I hear relief from librarians everywhere.)

It may have taken a deep breath and a rushed visit to an electronics store but I am pretty happy I made the leap.

Bloomsbury is anticipating W H Smith's link-up with Kobo to sell e-readers will help create "another big Christmas" for e-books, as the Group's e-book sales grew by 564% over the first six months of 2011.

read more

I just received an email from Overdrive, a huge ebook distributor, for an ebook webinar that they're holding. The text in the email says this:

"How do you engage students who spend more time reading from a screen—on their cell phones or computers—than they do from the printed page? With eBook and audiobook downloads.

OverDrive, the leading distributor of eBooks and more for libraries and schools, invites you to learn how to make reading cool with the devices students use every day."

Reading this made me squint pensively at the screen of my laptop. Are ebooks the only way we can "make reading cool"?

My husband and I were just commenting last night to one another about the fact that our kids, who are both teenagers, spend most of their day engaged with their phones. They do everything- literally everything- with their iPhones. They communicate with people, watch TV and movies, listen to music, surf the web, read, and more, all on their phones. Does that mean that doing these things in other ways, like reading from a printed book, is NOT cool?

When did we have to start pandering to kids to get them to read or to get them to start thinking that reading was cool? Is this the message we really want to send to kids? That we want them to engage with their screens even more?

Obviously, Overdrive has an agenda here.  They want to sell ebooks, so they're making it sound like that's the way to go. I don't blame them for that. But, is it what we (teachers, librarians, parents) want? I am not at all convinced that ebooks make reading cool. Reading makes reading cool.  It's just a cool thing to do. I think Overdrive is sending the wrong message, albeit one that is to their advantage, when they say that ebooks are what's going to make reading appealing. Shouldn't the stories be doing that? And do we want to lose our kids to their screens even more?

I'm not signing up for Overdrive's webinars.

Take a peek into the ‘Jersey Shore’ Season 4 digs in Italy… (Yeah, we’re a little jealous, too, though we’re not sure we’d want to live there at the same time as the cast based on what we know goes down in those... Read the rest of this post

I was surprised to notice I've sold many Killer Career ebooks in the Kobo format. I don't even own a Kobo, but I guess I better do a Google and find out what one looks like.  Apparently, they're pretty popular.

For some reason, I thought most people had kindles, like I do. Mine's a kindle 3.

Many years ago, I also owned a Palm. It's in my cabinet somewhere. The screen was too small for me to be comfortable reading from it. I also own an Iphone, but again, the screen is too small for me to enjoy reading on it.

What about you? Do you have an eReader? If so, what kind? If not, why not?

(Oh hey, check out this new Oliver Jeffers’ Heart And The Bottle app!)

Everyone – and I mean, EVERYONE (that’s right, NPR) – is talking about e-books and new media.  While adult e-readers are already a major part of consumer culture, childrens’ apps and e-books are still in their infancy (pun intended).  People seem to have a special concern and defensiveness reserved for the future of kids’ books – after all, who wants their kids’ future reduced to bedtime stories curled up with an IPad?

Most industry professionals and consumers alike agree that traditional children’s books aren’t going anywhere.  For one, buying a two-year-old a Color Nook is a lot less cost-efficient than a $4.99 board book, if all the toddler’s going to do is chew on the corners.  For another, people like the visceral experience of buying a hardcover book and turning its pages, reading aloud themselves instead of pressing a button.

Instead, we’re heading towards more and more options for kids books, and while we adults will have to nervously or excitedly adapt, kids will grow up expecting content on myriad forms of media.

So I commend SCBWI’s Illustrators’ Intensive for making the focus of their annual NYC event “Beyond Books: Picture Books and the New Media“.  Hey, if we don’t know about it, let’s invite some panelists to tell us about it!

As excited as I was about hearing the “Online Presence: A Panel Review of Websites, Blogs and Social Media”, it wasn’t my focus of the day.  Mostly, I was there to hear about the latest digital development shrouded in mystery: apps.  It’s something we all know is the future (SO much cooler than e-books), but we don’t REALLY know how they’re created.  First off, we sat in on the “Development of Apps from Classics” discussion, with panelists Virginia Duncan of Greenwillow Books (HarperCollins) and Colin Hosten of Hyperion/Disney Digital Books.

Ms. Duncan explained the making of Greenwillow’s first app, Freight Train by Donald Crews.  With bold shapes and different views from its companion book, Inside Freight Train, this was a perfect way to get an introduction to all that can be done with an app. Take a simple story, then add movement, games, songs… the sky’s the limit!  Check out storyboards and other making-of tidbits from Freight Train here.

Now, say what you want about Disney’s creepy corpo

The Illustrated Section:

Illustrator Dani Jones wanted to fill the void of a central marketplace for digital books and comics, so she created The Illustrated Section. All items are available as a downloadable pdf format making it as simple as possible for readers to enjoy the content. Completely independent from any bookseller, Dani simply wanted to have a place where artists can sell their comics and books without any hassles trying to find such content. She’s always looking for more stuff, so please contact her if you’ve got something to sell.

Now it's getting interesting.

More than a decade ago at writer's conferences and other venues I talked about the future of publishing progressing more towards electronic delivery and print-on-demand. I was treated like a person from Mars.

Well, guess what! Here we are.

With the launch of the Google Ebook Store there is now strong competition for all things EBook.

See the attached link for the PW article:

http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/digital/retailing/article/45429-look-out-amazon-google-ebooks-has-arrived.html?utm_source=Publishers+Weekly%27s+PW+Daily&utm_campaign=531f432bb4-UA-15906914-1&utm_medium=email

Truth be told, I also commented on how it would take younger generations who embrace all the new techonologies and the cost of doing business to swing publishing towards Ebooks and print-on-demand; and indeed, that's what has happened.

My questions now concern how this impacts on small presses who actually embraced the Ebook and print-on-demand format very early on and often were criticized by the larger publishers as being less-than-professional for doing so.

Self-publishing is going to be another interesting arena. I hope someone is collecting data on this because it will be quite revealing.

And if you're curious about all the different EReaders out there go to the following link:

http://www.chicagotribune.com/entertainment/books/chi-books-ereader-pg,0,3208287.photogallery

To cut to the chase: a Kindle has come into my possession, and I’m surprised to find I adore it. That’s right, Mac-fangirl, iPad-coveting me.

After a mere four days of Kindle use, I find myself eyeing the stacks of books in the TBR pile and wishing I had their digital versions instead.

This feels passing strange, considering how much I love the tactile aspects of a book-book. The intriguing or unsuitable cover, the shush of pages rustling, the crisp words springing up from the page. Font, margin, endpapers: these things I cherish.

But: the Kindle—it’s so slim and smooth in the hand, and one hand is enough. Tap, tap, tap, a single thumb—either thumb, a detail I appreciate—advances the pages. Three chapters into a book about Sudan, I find myself wanting some background; I nudge the little square button and make my way, lightning-quick, to Google or Wikipedia. (How much saner I’d have been had I read the recent Byatt book this way instead.) Dickens makes me laugh, and I want to share the passage with Scott: chk chk, I’ve highlighted the quote and added a note of my own.

The Dickens was free, of course, and easy to find.

Unlike my iPod Touch, I can’t read the Kindle in the dark. But any book I download to the Kindle can be sent to the Touch as well, and there’s a sync function to make sure my bookmark is always in the right spot.

When I first turned the Kindle on, I was disappointed. The contrast is not terrific; the background of the page is gray, not white, not the creamy color my Touch can produce. Oh dear, I thought, this is going to be a bust. My eyes require good contrast. I drive Scott crazy by wearing down my laptop battery with the screen turned always to maximum bright.

But I wasn’t sitting in good light during that first encounter. I upped the font size and moved to a sunny corner, and I could read just fine. Under a lamp or reading light, it’s the same as reading a real book.

(I will always call them real books, you know.)

When I read on my iPod, the device seldom ceases calling attention to itself. I’ve written before about feeling curiously distant from the text of a book-on-iPod. Is it the small screen? The backlighting? Whatever the cause,  I have to concentrate harder. That isn’t happening with the Kindle. The Kindle disappears. There’s just the unfolding story. I’d heard people say that, but I was skeptical. It’s true. It disappears—until the moment I desire its presence. I really love that note-and-highlight function.

The iPod Touch is a brilliant multitasker. You know I love its versatility: mail, web, games, books, language lessons, social networks, videos, good grief is there anything it can’t do? Well, it seems it can’t stop nibbling at my attention, that’s what. I’m reading a book but I know I can do a quick mail check with two taps. Temptations. Distractions.

The Kindle’s web browser is boring black-and-white, not at all tempting. It’s a unitasker, and that’s what this fidgety brain of mine needs in order to focus on a book. A real book is a single-purpose tool. (Unless you count serving as the dominant element of my home’s interior design.)

These are just notes on the honeymoon phase of the Kindle experience. The novelty may wear off quickly; we’ll see. I have all these lovely realbooks here waiting to be read. Real books with no DRM attached—that’s a major strike against the Kindle, when it comes to newer publications, the kind you actually pay for. And of course with a great many children’s books (picture books go without saying), you want to turn real pages, pages your four-year-old can point at and and pore over.

For cla

Again from the Consumer Electronics Show in Vegas.  Intel has proposed a reader designed for the visually impaired.  With this devise you can take a photo of any text (menus, letters, magazines) and have the gadget read the text aloud to you or change the font size digitally.  Users can also download e-books to be read or listened to.

From the Guardian

Tracy Counts, the Intel Reader’s marketing manager, told the Guardian that the product’s developer is dyslexic and knows how hard it is “to get printed text in a format he could listen to and understand. He went to the general manager of our group and pitched the idea, and Intel Health got behind it because it fits with the whole idea of digital health, which is helping people to be independent.”

The $1,500 price tag is a deterrent, but the Guardian suggests that schools and libraries might find it a worthwhile tool. Over at Engadget, there is an informative video explaining all of the Intel Reader’s functions.

It will also be interesting to see if Intel runs into any legal flak, as Amazon did when it was forced to remove the text-to-speech feature on a number of Kindle titles after several publishers cried foul over claims of audio book rights not being respected.  I hope they don't as this could be a great tool for the visually impaired, and even those with gradually worsening eyesight.

With the Kindle staying securely put in North America British readers have been complaining about a relative lack of good alternatives to the Sony ereader, with the iLiad device being one of the few other good choices but a hefty price tag to boot.

However I now see in yesterdays Times a review for the new Borders ebook reader, which so far sounds like a good option.

The screen size is the same as that of the Amazon Kindle, but overall the device isn’t as wide. It makes it possible to fit into a large jacket pocket and is easier to hold. Finally, it is a tiny bit cheaper - costing £189, compared with the Sony Reader at £199.

But there’s no love at first sight with the Borders reader. The feel is more matted and plastic than metallic and shiny.

To see and touch the Sony Reader or the Amazon Kindle, is to be attracted to smart and seductive looking devices. You will never desire the Border’s device in the same way. To my mind that is a good thing.

It is just not that special but it doesn’t try to be. It is what is on the inside that counts.

It feels sturdier than its rivals and looks like it can deal with the rough and tumble of travel. It will need to be able to as it does not come in a case.

Since we're book lovers, and gadget nerds, we have put together a little page on BookFinder.com to try and keep you guys up to date on all of the new ereaders, ebook stores, ebook formats, etc.  The technology is still in infancy and there are a lot of different formats and readers out there so hopefully this will at least go part of the way to help you figure out which ereader is the one for you.

And for thoes of you who would rather have your hadcover pried from your cold dead hands than read off a screen, never fear our database of over 150 million new, used, rare, and out of print books isnt going anywhere.

I have another post up at ForeWord Magazine: eBooks, PDFs, and Audiobooks, Oh My.

Here's the sneak peek:

I admit that I have techno-lust for an e-reader: they are so sleek! So shiny! So small! Think of how uncluttered my house would be if the books were all in this one small reader!

© Elizabeth Burns of A Chair, A Fireplace & A Tea Cozy