Breaking news!!!!! Sony to sell Epub only

[Moejoe]

Originally Posted by EowynCarter

I agree with Moejoe there. E-book are not meant to be fancy. They are meant to be readable and confortable. Css in ePub is enough for fanciness.
Pdf is for printing rendering, not for e-books.

And the great thing about ePub is that it is based upon moving standards, just like the web. With updates to the underlying technologies (CSS (x)html) the IDPF can update ePub spec to be in line so we get all the advances in the future while keeping our already owned ePubs compatible. It's a win for the reader and for the ebook publisher, who can make new and more fancy copies available in the future. So now the publishers have their coveted 'revaluing' of property just like IRL

[ahi]

Originally Posted by EowynCarter

I agree with Moejoe there. E-book are not meant to be fancy. They are meant to be readable and confortable. Css in ePub is enough for fanciness.
Pdf is for printing rendering, not for e-books.

Brilliant. If only I had known.

- Ahi

[griffonwing]

Originally Posted by krischik

But only the single tune but not the album. Which reminds me: Have you heard of Shortcovers - there it is 99ç - per chapter!

very nice! I'll write a book, 20 chapters long.. The first 15 chapters I will sell on shortcovers, and the last 5 chapter will be sold as one unit, in Kindle format!

Muahahahahah!

[ahi]

Originally Posted by lilac_jive

Did you see my post about the cost of ebooks?

Yes, and you made a good point.

I think I need to start to try to withdraw from this thread though... the quality of posts (the back-and-forth on pricing I do not count among them) is steadily decreasing... and as usual, people seem to be deaf and blind to information that displeases them, opting instead to believing that technology is, like magic, a potential solution to all problems as long as you have enough of it.

- Ahi

[Lemurion]

I'm really hoping for an improvement in the ADE renderer for the 505. Justification doesn't bother me - but I would love to turn those page numbers off. Of course I'm also one who would prefer to have page numbers refer to screens, too - but I can see how fixed pagination has its benefits.

[Lemurion]

Originally Posted by ahi

Yes, and you made a good point.

I think I need to start to try to withdraw from this thread though... the quality of posts (the back-and-forth on pricing I do not count among them) is steadily decreasing... and as usual, people seem to be deaf and blind to information that displeases them, opting instead to believing that technology is, like magic, a potential solution to all problems as long as you have enough of it.

- Ahi

Personally, I agree with you that a perfectly hand-tuned PDF designed for the Sony Reader's screen looks better than any other format on the device. However, that's not how I want my ebooks.

Changing font size, and therefore good reflow is vital for me. I wear progressive lenses and when I'm reading in bed I look at my Reader through a different band than when I'm reading in a chair. That means I need a different font size. Normally it's small or sometimes medium during the day - but large when reading in the evening.

I can't hand-tune a single PDF for all three settings - so I settle for a reflowable format knowing it's inferior in optimum conditions, because it's vastly superior in sub-optimal ones. I'll take worse while sitting in my chair if it makes the difference between readable and unreadable in bed.

[Kosst Amojan]

I don't see how this is good news for me.

I have a PRS-500 which I bought the day it came out making it only 3 years old. I love it and it still functions like the day I bought it and I had no plans of upgrading.

I've bought many books from the Sony store and much of the online material I read (mostly fanfiction) I convert to lrf...which means I have several hundred lrf titles on my computer along with Sony's lrx books I bought.

Now I'm hearing that from now on, Sony will only be releasing ebooks in a format that my Sony Reader can't even read??? Why are they basically cutting off their store from god knows how many of their customers???

I'll wait to hear what they have to say in the near future but as of now I have no faith in Sony's future device support which means I won't by any other product from them that would require such support.

[ahi]

Last post... I'll do no more debating in this thread thereafter. If you are keen to ask me questions on the subject, contact me via private messaging.

-----

Originally Posted by Moejoe

No, they won't discard, but they will adapt. HTML 5, Canvas integration with postscript, SVG graphics, are all up to spec now and will be adopted in the coming years. Your 'pdf' vision will possibly be reached, but not with PDF which is an old technology created for a very specific purpose. I've already read in the last few days, in several different places, that "ePub is the mp3 of reading", it has a cartload of momentum, and as with mp3 quality is not the arbitrator of adoption, ease of use and device support is.

Ok. So this is where it becomes pointless for me, Moejoe. Namely where someone makes it clear that they basically assume technology is like magic, in that given enough of it, any problem can be solved.

I've explained a myriad times that typography and bookmaking are not software/hardware automatable problems (and I also explained at length why in several places, one of them linked from my signature).

If you don't believe me, because you believe your ignorance of the issues enables you to have more accurate foresight of the future than my somewhat professional understanding of them does, continuing this discussion is bad for our health and can lead to no progress, never mind agreement.

I apologize, Moejoe, and hope you will hold no grudge against me. I enjoy our conversations elsewhere, and, as you know, we are even ideologically aligned on other issues... but your above paragraph looks like a lot of words, borne primarily of a lack of understanding of the issues (or, since I've been harping on about them, a refusal to acknowledge them).

I should note though... my ranting is never meant to influence people... particularly since I freely acknowledge that good PDF eBooks are precious few at this time. And also because I have not an ounce of doubt in my mind that regardless of what eBook readers want/prefer/buy, a PDF or PDF-like format will eventually take over quite entirely--and it will be to everybody's benefit. Any other option would be philistinism achieving victory over perfectly feasible prospects of genuine progress... which, judging by human history, is not very likely.

Originally Posted by Moejoe

Simply put if I have a choice between buying one product that I can use now and gives me a satisfactory experience across many different scenarios, why would I not chose that option? Why would I want a PDF for my phone and one for my reader and one for a 8" reader and then another that fits my 32" monitor and another that fits my 10" in-car monitor and so on...doesn't make sense to me.

If you had a dedicated eBook reading device, that excelled at its function and was supremely portable, and had professional quality eBooks for it, perhaps you would bloody carry it with you... instead of reading it on your large-screen TV or in your moving car.

- Ahi[/QUOTE]

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by ahi

In the vast majority of instances, the publisher receives 45% of the list price of the book (from the distributor/wholesaler), and it is out of that money that all other costs are paid:

- royalties
- printing (which are indeed minor)
- promotion
- all the preparatory work that went into it (well... not paid, but recovered)

The huge cuts that various middlemen get make up 55% of the cost of most physical books. eBooks, at their most expensive, should still be less than half the cost of the physical book... with everyone borderline productive (i.e.: not just involved in moving boxes and books around the country) still getting the same cut.

Or am I wrong?

- Ahi

I look at it this way...

I won't buy the hardcover edition. It's too expensive. But if I was to buy the eBook at $9.99 then I am paying more then I would for the paperback edition. So by getting a new eBook before it gets to paperback does give the publisher/author more money.

[DaleDe]

Originally Posted by Madam Broshkina

I was checking the specs for the 600 at the Sony site and noticed that ePub is rated at 6800 page turns compared to 7500 for BBeB books. Why the difference?

More compute power needed to render each page.

Dale

[mtravellerh]

Originally Posted by DaleDe

More compute power needed to render each page.

Dale

Well, yes. Again: LRF format is prepaginated, ePub is not!

[Moejoe]

Originally Posted by ahi

Last post... I'll do no more debating in this thread thereafter. If you are keen to ask me questions on the subject, contact me via private messaging.

-----



Ok. So this is where it becomes pointless for me, Moejoe. Namely where someone makes it clear that they basically assume technology is like magic, in that given enough of it, any problem can be solved.

I've explained a myriad times that typography and bookmaking are not software/hardware automatable problems (and I also explained at length why in several places, one of them linked from my signature).

If you don't believe me, because you believe your ignorance of the issues enables you to have more accurate foresight of the future than my somewhat professional understanding of them does, continuing this discussion is bad for our health and can lead to no progress, never mind agreement.

I apologize, Moejoe, and hope you will hold no grudge against me. I enjoy our conversations elsewhere, and, as you know, we are even ideologically aligned on other issues... but your above paragraph looks like a lot of words, borne primarily of a lack of understanding of the issues (or, since I've been harping on about them, a refusal to acknowledge them).

I should note though... my ranting is never meant to influence people... particularly since I freely acknowledge that good PDF eBooks are precious few at this time. And also because I have not an ounce of doubt in my mind that regardless of what eBook readers want/prefer/buy, a PDF or PDF-like format will eventually take over quite entirely--and it will be to everybody's benefit. Any other option would be philistinism achieving victory over perfectly feasible prospects of genuine progress... which, judging by human history, is not very likely.



If you had a dedicated eBook reading device, that excelled at its function and was supremely portable, and had professional quality eBooks for it, perhaps you would bloody carry it with you... instead of reading it on your large-screen TV or in your moving car.

- Ahi

I think it's quite simple, and as Bob Dylan put it you don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind's blowing.

And that's where I stop arguing with you

[vivaldirules]

I have several questions which I don't think could or should be answered here. I'll go mine the threads elsewhere and find them. But just to let you know how stupid I am (and maybe others can see if they are similarly confused), they are:

1. So what is Adobe epub? I thought I knew what epub was and I know there is a DRM'd version of it. Is Adobe epub the DRM'd version? Does Adobe "own" the DRM methodology for it? Are there are other epub DRM schemes? Or do I somehow have this confused with Adobe Digital Editions (which I thought was completely unrelated to epub although both can be read on your PC use ADE)?

2. So who sells epub books right now? I thought I had read someone say that "all the big regional ebook vendors sell epub" but I can hardly find any epub books anywhere except for the free ones via Google. Fictionwise doesn't seem to sell any. Books on Board has some. Are there are other big vendors out there?

3. Conversion from other unsecured formats into epub. I know there's an entire forum devoted to this and I'll just have to plod may way through it.

I have my fingers crossed that a firmware update by Sony for the 505 will significantly improve the rendering of epubs. And I have other fingers crossed that my existing LRF and LRX books will remain readable, for a while at least.

[DaleDe]

Originally Posted by vivaldirules

I have several questions which I don't think could or should be answered here. I'll go mine the threads elsewhere and find them. But just to let you know how stupid I am (and maybe others can see if they are similarly confused), they are:

1. So what is Adobe epub? I thought I knew what epub was and I know there is a DRM'd version of it. Is Adobe epub the DRM'd version? Does Adobe "own" the DRM methodology for it? Are there are other epub DRM schemes? Or do I somehow have this confused with Adobe Digital Editions (which I thought was completely unrelated to epub although both can be read on your PC use ADE)?

2. So who sells epub books right now? I thought I had read someone say that "all the big regional ebook vendors sell epub" but I can hardly find any epub books anywhere except for the free ones via Google. Fictionwise doesn't seem to sell any. Books on Board has some. Are there are other big vendors out there?

3. Conversion from other unsecured formats into epub. I know there's an entire forum devoted to this and I'll just have to plod may way through it.

I have my fingers crossed that a firmware update by Sony for the 505 will significantly improve the rendering of epubs. And I have other fingers crossed that my existing LRF and LRX books will remain readable, for a while at least.

1. Adobe owns the DRM scheme and Adobe Digital Editions is a rendering program that supports this DRM scheme as well as both ePUB and PDF files using this scheme. Of course ADE also supports standard ePUB and PDF files without any DRM. ADE adds some features to ePUB and does not support some others.

2. There are lots of ePUB sources. Fictionwise does offer ePUB in their multiformat books. Check the wiki for eBooks stores. There are lots stores that support ePUB. It is arguably the most popular format in Europe.

3. Calibre can convert to ePUB as can some online services such as feedbooks. See the ePUB article on the wiki for more details.

I suspect Sony will support BBeB books for the foreseeable future.

Dale

[Hellmark]

When they refer to the Adobe ePub, they mean epub with Adobe ADEPT DRM. ADEPT, to the best of my knowledge, is the only DRM available for the epub format currently.

Waterstones, a big UK book chain, sells in epub format. Books on board, I believe also sells in epub. There are quite a few others, but since I buy so few, I've not bothered to look all that much.

Not all epubs are secured.

I dunno about you, but I'm happy with epub rendering in the 505. I really don't see much of a difference between it and lrf.