Diamonds in the Sky: anthology of astronomy SF Stories

[starrigger]

Originally Posted by Nate the great

Brotherton will need to post the copyright info. It's not on his site.

It's there as a blanket notice. He says he'd prefer to have individual notices at the end of each story, to include afterwords. I suggested that he add them to the web pages, also, and I think he'll probably do that. Part of the shaking-out thing I was talking about.

A couple of other things to think about, if you hadn't already included them in your thinking:

• Incorporating the story descriptors that are currently on the website's TOC.
• Incorporating the blurbs about each author that are currently on the Contributors page.
• Formatting the .prc version so that the end user can choose font, justified or nonjustified, etc.

I'm asking the other person to hold off a bit, since I explicitly posted a call for volunteers here, and you were the first to respond.

Oh, I've asked Mike to rework the image into a cover format.

[Timoleon]

A "quick and dirty" production, for those who just can't wait to read all the stories on their portable readers (like me!). No TOC (you will have to place bookmarks), and a truly amateur cover (by me!).

The stories are great, though!!!

P.S.: Can't wait for the pros to have a go at this one...

[Nate the great]

Everything is done except for the cover and the copyright info. Once I have them, I'll post a ZIP file so anyone can do a preferred format.

[starrigger]

Um, you guys did hear me say, please wait until we're sure all the kinks are out of the files, right?

[Donnageddon]

Sounds fantastic, Jeffrey! Can't wait for the final versions to come out.

[cerement]

I think enough of us are perfectly comfortable viewing what is (and becomes) available as nothing more than ARCs until Brotherton mentions otherwise ...

[starrigger]

Originally Posted by Timoleon

A "quick and dirty" production, for those who just can't wait to read all the stories on their portable readers (like me!). No TOC (you will have to place bookmarks), and a truly amateur cover (by me!).

The stories are great, though!!!

P.S.: Can't wait for the pros to have a go at this one...

Um...Timoleon, I hate to say this, but I don't feel comfortable with those being up for public download. I'm fine with you having them to read on your devices, but once they're up, people are going to start downloading them and perhaps passing them around.

Here's the thing: this is a copyrighted book. I have the blessing of the editor to enlist help in converting them to ebook for eventual free download. But I think what he means is, once we have clean, professional-quality versions, then they'll be posted on the site. And perhaps to other sites, such as Baen Free Library. Maybe here. But I don't have the standing to offer carte-blanche permission to put these up anywhere, any time.

So would you mind taking them down for now, please? (And would you like to oversee conversion to .lit, once we have the completed source?)

Thanks.

And to Nate and others, could you please run your efforts past me privately before posting anything in a public place? Mea culpa--I should have said that first.

Thanks, everyone.

[GeoffC]

Originally Posted by starrigger

Whoever does this, copyright notices need to be included. The website just says individual stories are copyright by their authors. But for an ebook, I think there should be individual notices, either after each story or compiled into a page at the top.

As for when individual formats like LRF will be ready, I can only speculate. But imagine this won't take too long.

Copyright SHOULD always be added.....and respected....

[Nate the great]

Originally Posted by starrigger

Um...Timoleon, I hate to say this, but I don't feel comfortable with those being up for public download. I'm fine with you having them to read on your devices, but once they're up, people are going to start downloading them and perhaps passing them around.

Files are down.

[Timoleon]

Originally Posted by starrigger

Um...Timoleon, I hate to say this, but I don't feel comfortable with those being up for public download. I'm fine with you having them to read on your devices, but once they're up, people are going to start downloading them and perhaps passing them around.

Here's the thing: this is a copyrighted book. I have the blessing of the editor to enlist help in converting them to ebook for eventual free download. But I think what he means is, once we have clean, professional-quality versions, then they'll be posted on the site. And perhaps to other sites, such as Baen Free Library. Maybe here. But I don't have the standing to offer carte-blanche permission to put these up anywhere, any time.

So would you mind taking them down for now, please? (And would you like to oversee conversion to .lit, once we have the completed source?)

Thanks.

And to Nate and others, could you please run your efforts past me privately before posting anything in a public place? Mea culpa--I should have said that first.

Thanks, everyone.

Sorry Jeff! I see that they've already been taken down...
Glad to help with the lit creation...

Just so excited by the stories that I couldn't resist...
I hope I didn't stir up a hornet's nest for you --- no harm intended! And Nate, I can't wait to see your polished product --- "the real thing."

[mtravellerh]

I'd be happy to do some formats as soon as we are getting the go from you, Jeff! Just PM me for Mobi and Epub.

[Hadrien]

I'd love to add it on Feedbooks though, where it could reach all of our users, but so far, the copyright information is still missing.

I'll wait for your zip file Nate, I suppose.

[starrigger]

Originally Posted by Hadrien

I'd love to add it on Feedbooks though, where it could reach all of our users, but so far, the copyright information is still missing.

I'll wait for your zip file Nate, I suppose.

See, that's what I'm talking about. The book's editor might want it up on Feedbooks and similar sites, or he might not. I'll suggest it, but it's his call. It shouldn't be distributed anywhere until everything has been sorted out and checked over. I really appreciate all the help--and thanks for taking the files down--but sometimes a little too much enthusiasm isn't necessarily a good thing. (To badly paraphrase Captain Kirk.)

No, seriously, I appreciate the offers. Right now, Nate will be doing the mobi (and shall we say the html?), Timoleon is doing the lit. It's possible that a simple conversion in Calibre will produce good LRF and epub, but how about if someone takes on responsibility for checking and troubleshooting that? (Someone who can not just read but make fixes if needed.)

Someone want to do the eReader version?

We need a PDF. Someone interested in taking that on?

But please don't post files publicly without a go-ahead from Mike Brotherton.

I'll let you know when it appears that everything is sorted out with the online version and the formatting can go ahead.

Files and questions for checking, etc., should come to me by email or PM.

Thanks, everyone.

[starrigger]

Just an update. Mike is going to try to get the specific copyright notices added to the stories this weekend. He's finding his html software problematic, which makes even simple fixes a pain.

And Nate--I did a quick conversion of my own story to Mobi format in Calibre, and noticed that the partial horizontal rules that serve to mark scenebreaks go to full width in the Mobi display, which looks weird. So you might want to plan on working around that. (Maybe just do a global replace with * * *.) But not yet, because Mike might do something about that himself.

No takers for eReader or PDF production?

[Nate the great]

Originally Posted by starrigger

Just an update. Mike is going to try to get the specific copyright notices added to the stories this weekend. He's finding his html software problematic, which makes even simple fixes a pain.

And Nate--I did a quick conversion of my own story to Mobi format in Calibre, and noticed that the partial horizontal rules that serve to mark scenebreaks go to full width in the Mobi display, which looks weird. So you might want to plan on working around that. (Maybe just do a global replace with * * *.) But not yet, because Mike might do something about that himself.

No takers for eReader or PDF production?

I like how the scene break lines look on the Kindle. I can replace them, though, if desired.

Still waiting on the cover.