08:03 PM by Nate the great in E-Book General | News and Commentary

One of MR's more observant members noticed that JCPenney is selling an ebook reader on its website. It's not listed as being in stock, and I spent some time Googling it.

We don't have much detail yet because so far as I can tell this device hasn't been announced yet. I found the company's website, but it's not up yet. I found it in the Google cache.

This is the detail we have so far:

• 5" backlit color screen
• Adobe DE support
• 1GB memory
• SD card slot
• discount coupon for BooksonBoard
• product description says it can "read books, play music and videos"

and it's showing a sale price of $129.99. If that price is for real then I might get one.

P.S. I'm attaching the JCPenney product page just in case it's taken down.

Update:
I believe the company behind the Simplicit is SPI Inc, a small tech company based in Dallas, Texas. It's not completely clear whether this company develops its products independently or re brands the products it licenses.

Second Update:[/b] I just heard back from Books on Board. Yes, that is their coupon. They were a little puzzled about why the product page was up. The last they had heard was that the device wasn't ready yet.The release had been pushed back until Spring.

07:00 AM by Alexander Turcic in Miscellaneous | Week in Review

Feast your eyes on some of the discussions from this week at MobileRead...

E-Book General - News and Commentary

• Firmware update for PRS-500 available - EPUB!
• eReader for Android just announced
• Bookeen releases new model of CyBook: CyBook Gold

E-Book General - Deals, Freebies, and Resources

• University of Chicago Announces free Monthly ebook

E-Book Software - Calibre

• Calibre + Dropbox = unclouded happiness

E-Book Devices - Sony Portable Reader PRS-500/505

• PRS-500 owners: Will you take advantage of Sony's upgrade/trade-up offer?

E-Book Devices - Amazon Kindle

• Kindle finally released in Canada

05:22 AM by HarryT in E-Book General | News and Commentary

Our good friend Kurt, from BooksOnBoard, informs us that Bookeen appear to have snuck out a new model of the CyBook, apparently without telling anybody!

The new model, the CyBook Gold, has 1GB storage space (up from 512MB on the previous model), an 8 greyscale eInk screen (previous models supported only 4), and supports ePub and PDF with Adobe ADE. The package includes the CyBook itself, a black cover, earphones, a USB cable, and a European AC adaptor (which will not be supplied to US customers).

The package is priced at US$349; there appears to be no mention of this device as yet on Bookeen's site.

For more information, please see the BooksOnBoard site here.

07:51 PM by arshield in E-Book General | Deals, Freebies, and Resources

The first book in the program is below. epub format

Link http://www.press.uchicago.edu/ebooks/free_ebook.html

The Birthday Book
Edited and Translated by Holt N. Parker
120 pages, 9 line drawings 5 x 7 © 2007
E-book Free! See form below (about e-books)
ISBN: 9780226099774
Cloth $25.00
ISBN: 9780226099743 Published February 2007
“[Roman grammarian and writer] Censorinus distills the wisdom of several strains of philosophy, extracting whatever seems to have any bearing on births, days and birthdays: theories of the origin of the human species, the formation of the individual foetus, the principles of astrology, the ages of man, the nature of time, eons, centuries, years, months, days and hours.”—London Review of Books

11:26 AM by dpierron in E-Book Software | Calibre

I'm pretty sure a lot of people here know Dropbox, the (free at first) file sharing and synchronization service...

I use it to sync the files on my two Macs, and my work PC ; it's a very easy to use and efficient service.

Recently, I began syncing my Calibre library, so the books I edit/add/remove on either machine would be available on all the others ; Calibre is a multi-platform marvel, so this syncing makes a lot of sense.

And I thought of something : if I generate the stanza.xml file from the Calibre database (using the calibre-db command), maybe it could be automatically accessible from my iPhone, now that the whole Calibre library is synchronized and available on my Dropbox account ?

Guess what ? It works ! Unfortunately, it's still a manual process, but I'm pretty sure it could be possible for our generous Kovid to change it into something automatic...

Here are the steps needed to make this happen :

1. Publish your Calibre library in a directory of the Public part in your Dropbox account

   The library must be in a public part of your Dropbox account, because you will need the URL to the stanza.xml file in the last step. If you do not want to make it public, you will still be able to browse your (private) dropbox account website from inside Stanza, but it's another story...
   To get the URL to your Calibre library, simply right-click on a file in the folder and select "Copy public link" from the "Dropbox" menu. Mine is http://dl.dropbox.com/u/788541/calib...ary/stanza.xml (fake number, of course).

2. export the Calibre database into a stanza.xml file

   Using the following command in the Calibre library folder, generate the stanza.xml file :
   calibredb list --output-format stanza --prefix http://dl.getdropbox.com/u/788541/calibre_library > stanza.xml
   (replace the URL with the one you got at step 1, this one is mine)

3. correct the stanza.xml file

   Some characters are encoded in a way that make Stanza frown : simply replace them using a plain text editor ; replace '%28' with '(' and '%29' with ')' (skip the quotes, obviously).

4. configure your Stanza program to make it access your new online library

   In Stanza (on your iPhone for example), create a new online stanza catalog and enter the URL to your stanza.xml file (mine is http://dl.dropbox.com/u/788541/calib...ary/stanza.xml).

That's all !

Of course, if the stanza.xml file could be generated automatically with every modification of the database, it would be even better, but even now it's very convenient...

Thanks again Kovid for Calibre, the Lexycle people for Stanza and Dropbox for being free...

PS : if I made a mistake in my explanation, or if something was not clear enough, ask questions and I'll be happy to try and explain better...

06:46 PM by Nate the great in E-Book General | News and Commentary

I just got this email from Fictionwise:

> ANDROID EREADER NOW AVAILABLE!

Do you have a Motorola Droid, T-Mobile myTouch 3G, Motorola CLIQ
or T-Mobile G1? The wait is over! eReader for Android is now
available. eReader for Android is an award-winning application
used to read eReader eBooks on Android-based devices. eReader Pro
has more features than ever before, including free eBooks, the
ability to read dictionaries and more! To celebrate this exciting
event, use coupon 'android15' and save 15% off any purchase. see
below:
http://www.fictionwise.com/Z425328TB...androidfaq.htm

Shiny.

04:58 PM by FligMupple in E-Book Devices | Amazon Kindle

A friend just sent me this link:

http://technology.canoe.ca/2009/11/17/11774336-qmi.html

12:51 PM by Bob Russell in E-Book Devices | Sony Portable Reader PRS-500/505

Sony has made PRS-500 owners a great offer (MR News and Sony Offer):
* A free firmware upgrade to support ePub, including free shipping, or
* A trade-in discount on a new device ($50 or $75 depending on the model)

What will you do? (Please participate in the poll, and share your thoughts in the thread.)

So now the reality sets in - I don't want to part with my PRS-500, even if I buy another device and the 500 goes into storage in "museum mode"! Am I willing to part with it for a "measly" $75??? And am I willing to part with the custom navigation hacks just to get e-pub support? Do I want to upgrade - the new devices are a significant upgrade in usability. Or, heaven forbid, after such a nice offer do I want to consider a Daily Reader or even a non-Sony device like the Daily new Plastic Logic large screen device? These are some serious questions!

Can't wait to hear what others are going to do. Share your thoughts!

10:05 AM by igorsk in E-Book General | News and Commentary

Alas, it's not updateable by user and the device must be sent in.

Update your Reader firmware, compliments of Sony.

Sony has created a firmware update for your Reader, allowing it to remain compatible with the new eBook Store format. This update will allow your PRS-500 to support the ePub and Adobe DRM format and add the ability to re-flow PDF documents. Due to the nature of the work required, you will need to send your PRS-500 Reader to the Sony Service Centers for updating.

All you need to do is complete the request for firmware update through the link below, or call 866-962-7669. We will provide you with a pre-paid UPS label for sending in your Reader. You should have your PRS-500 back within 14 days, with the firmware update installed.

Alternatively, you can trade it for a newer model.

Trade in for a new Reader Pocket Edition or Reader Touch Edition:
Trade in your PRS-500 when purchasing a new Reader Pocket Edition or Reader Touch Edition. You will receive $50 off of the Reader Pocket Edition or $75 off the Reader Touch Edition.

Linky.

07:00 AM by Alexander Turcic in Miscellaneous | Week in Review

Another week, another steady stream of e-book goodness here on MobileRead. Our authentic roundup of what's been going on:

E-Book General - News and Commentary

• Kindle For PC is now available.

E-Book Devices - PocketBook

• PocketBook 360° review