Quote:
Originally Posted by ahi
So humanity will discard the vast bulk of the centuries old art of typography and bookmaking in the transition to electronic books (arts which are, by the way, totally and completely about making reading a more pleasant experience), for the sake of people being able to change font-sizes arbitrarily and for the sake of publishers not having to make multiple files for different sized devices?
And, short of the eBook market eventually growing up sufficiently that it starts using PDF or something just like it, custom-created for the standard screen-sizes, all other possibilities basically tend toward such discarding.
- Ahi
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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.
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.