[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

Maybe... but if publishers don't want the extra work of multiple formats, multiple downloads, etc--which they don't--they just won't.

What extra work? The effort is up front. Once the infrastructure is in place, things happen automatically.

The publisher must do the markup and get the manuscript into ePub format. Once done, a conversion routine sucks up ePub files and spits out conversions to Mobi, LRF, what have you. The converted files get uploaded to the server that handles distribution. The user orders a book from the website, pays for it, and downloads it. The website is likely keeping an account file for the user in any case with things like CC info. The format the user requires is something that can be kept in the account record, and only needs to be updated if the user changes devices.

Most of the infrastructure will already be in place if the publisher sells ebooks, as the books must be put into electronic format and made available for sale over the web site. The main differences will be use of ePub as the master format, and the conversion routines to create the files provided to the customers. But once that's in place, no additional work is required, because it happens automatically as part of the production process.

Scale matters. Making this happen may be a major undertaking for a one man shop like you, and probably more effort than would be justified by the returns. It's not a major effort for a major publisher who already does electronic publishing.

Yes, my scenario requires every device maker to create the appropriate software for compatibility with standardized formats... but that's not unheard-of in the HW/SW business. Just look at all the e-book devices that have PDF readers.

First you need agreement on and adoption of said standardized formats. Lack of an ebook standard is one of the problems we're talking about.

And the first devices to achieve auto-convert, and can tell publishers to just create one format, the pubs will love it.

Like I said: why auto-convert? Just support the standard format in the first place.

So: My scenario isn't ready today; and yours isn't being used today. I guess we'll see which one kicks off first!

Agreed. I made a proposal that could be implemented as a work around for the fact that there isn't a standard format everyone supports. The issue isn't on the publisher's end, so much as the user's. ePub is all well and good, but who issues books in that format, and more important, what user software reads it?

Very true... why convert, when you can just read e-pub? Though that's logical, there will always be a reader maker that will feel their reader does something special with content (like cue-ing up theme music or mood lighting with certain passages, or something silly like that), so it requires a proprietary format to do it, and thereby must be converted.

Good luck to them, but extensions like that are outside the scope of ePub and not standard. Supporting it is their problem, and if conversion is required, they'll have to do it.

I'd guess there will eventually be native ePub readers, and the uber-special Mood-Lighting, John Williams Orchestral Sampler Readers that must convert.

The question is when there will be native ePub readers. I'm not holding my breath, and I suggest you don't either.
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Dennis