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

[EowynCarter]

Originally Posted by Moejoe

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

Exactly. ePub can be improved. Fist thing to do being to kick adobe drm out of the way, along with ade .
ePub rendering with ade is prety lame. I have a pdf with some "first-letter" in my css, sigil renders them right, ade don't... What a shame.
Mobi rendering when fine, ade makes a mess.

ahi, do you think publisher can make multiple version of pdf ? They can't edit even one version properly !
And, if you don't see the point of changing font size, you'll change your mind when your eyes gets old and you don't see that well anymore.
And once again, the problem is not ePub itself, but the fact it's used badly.

[dordale]

Originally Posted by Hellmark

LRX has not been cracked. It was fairly well designed

I'm not an expert by any means, but I suspect the reason LRX hasn't been cracked is that there isn't a huge market for LRX books--and most if not all LRX books are available in other formats. I'm sure if someone who knows how to do these things decides to try cracking LRX, it'd get done.

dordale

[EowynCarter]

Originally Posted by dordale

I'm not an expert by any means, but I suspect the reason LRX hasn't been cracked is that there isn't a huge market for LRX books--and most if not all LRX books are available in other formats. I'm sure if someone who knows how to do these things decides to try cracking LRX, it'd get done.

dordale

Yeap.
EVERYTHING get cracked given enough time and energy.

[Who are you?]

The LRX format is significantly better protected than for example epub.

Sony has reasonably effective anti-debugging routines in its software, and it uses multithreading and virtual machines (although the use of VMs isn't at the right place, it doesn't improve protection very much) to make reverse engineering from disassembly and debugging more complicated.

Of course all drm is by definition crackable, but the pool of people who can do it for lrx is significantly smaller than for epub.

[EowynCarter]

Originally Posted by Who are you?

The LRX format is significantly better protected than for example epub.

Yeah, though i see that more as an advantage than a disadvantage there.

It's an e-book, it don't need to be protected, it need to be read !

[radius]

Originally Posted by ahi

Also, while you are not wrong... eBook format makers also don't know what they are doing... which ultimately results in formats (i.e.: all of them) that even with the best of intentions cannot produce professional results.

Hi ahi,

I wonder if you have actually bought any LRX books? Because I have to say that the professionally created LRX's that I have seen are significantly less readable than most of the books posted here.

Were they in ePub format, you could strip the DRM and then edit to suit your own taste. However, since there is no tool to break LRX DRM at the moment, you are stuck with the ugly looks of LRX books.

For that freedom I will gladly "put up" with the page number in the right margin.

[JSWolf]

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

Can eBooks on readers be made better looking? Yes they can. And to make them better looking doesn't really take much. What we need is proper kerning support and hyphenation. With both of those things added in, we would have better looking eBooks. The first company to do this with ePub will have a winner (IMHO).

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by 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.

Sony is moving forward. LRF may have seemed like a good idea in the past, but now it's not. And Sony did give an upgrade path from the 500 to the 505 and it looks like Sony si going to do that again. If you choose not to take the upgrade path, that's fine. But do not blame Sony for your not wanting to upgrade. Sony came out with the 500 and the 500 just doesn't have the ability to handle both LRF/LRX & ePub. The only thing Sony can do it seems is remove LRF/LRX from the 500 in a move to ePub. But then, a lot of people might not be happy with that. So the only real solution is what Sony has done which is allow a trade-in.

The new devices will display LRF/LRX and ePub. Because of the number of devices already with (and forthcoming) ADE/ePub, it makes sense from a financial standpoint to support ePub in the eBookstore. LRF/LRX is a losing battle. This way, Sony can get sales from owners of non-Sony readers.

[igorsk]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

The only thing Sony can do it seems is remove LRF/LRX from the 500 in a move to ePub.

This is just your conjecture. I really doubt it is the case. Check also these news.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Robertb

Dear All:

Astak agrees with Sony's decision to fully support the ADE format in eBooks. ALL Astak devices are ADE. Astak has been quietly gathering information from numerous online eBook sites (such as Powell's Books and Books-On-Board) and composing a list we will post on our www.theEZreader.com website of great ADE booksites.

Diesel eBooks now sells ePub eBooks as well. So the list is growing. And don't forget libraries are starting to take on board ePub as well.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by HarryT

BooksOnBoard also sell ePub books, I believe. And obviously Baen do too.

As well as Diesel eBooks.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by igorsk

This is just your conjecture. I really doubt it is the case. Check also these news.

I am thinking that Sony is going to offer an upgrade from the 500 to the 600 and/or 300. That is what I think will really happen. The other is just wishful thinking.

[HarryT]

Have you seen this, Jon?

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Have you seen this, Jon?

I had seen some of that thread but not the newer bits. Thanks.

I do think this is a very good thing for the 500. I've been converting eBooks to ePub for my 505 and I won't have to also convert to LRF for my mother-in-law's 500 for when she wants to read something I've converted to ePub. I've been keeping Calibre 0.5.14 installed since 0.6.6 does not (currently) do as good a job converting to LRF.

[ahi]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Can eBooks on readers be made better looking? Yes they can. And to make them better looking doesn't really take much. What we need is proper kerning support and hyphenation. With both of those things added in, we would have better looking eBooks. The first company to do this with ePub will have a winner (IMHO).

Repeating ad nauseum that technology will save the day doesn't change the fact that technology isn't magic; and that some problems are not machine-solvable, unless the machine is an artificial human mind that can match or surpass a reasonably highly functioning biological one.

You are wrong, and your assumptions come from having insufficient understanding of the subject matter you are discussing. Knowing one's limitations is a virtue.

If you are not both a programmer and a typographer of some half-decent level of expertise, you are as likely to be correct in your assumptions about these issues as an English major is about the finer details of orbital interactions.

What is it that makes people assume their opinions are necessarily insightful and authoritative on what are essentially computer science and typography expert-issues, just because they like reading books and can throw together HTML documents?

- Ahi