Sony ePub spacing

[Harryplopper]

I just bought my first few ebooks from the Reader Store, and the ePubs all have spaces between the paragraphs and first line indents. Why do they have both? I thought ebooks usually had one or the other. I find it a little annoying. Since they have DRM, am I stuck with the formatting or is there a fix to remove the blank lines between paragraphs?

I'm a noob here so I hope I posted this in the right spot. Thanks.

[Harryplopper]

I just had a live web chat with Reader Store support. The tech said I should remove the ebook from my Reader and the Library, then download the ebook again. He said that would remove the spaces. Is this true or is that just a standard response for many issues with ebooks? I guess I will find out soon.


Edit: That was a waste of time, just as I thought.

[Jan J]

Some of mine are what you describe..spaces and indents, others are just indents with no extra spaces. Doesn't bother me one way or the other. I get so wrapped up in the content that I don't pay a lot of attention to the formatting. Guess I'm not all that particular - I just enjoy the reading.

(my usual pose)

[charleski]

It's an unfortunate fact that many of the technicians employed to convert books to digital format know very little about typographic conventions and will just do whatever's easiest. I routinely remove the DRM from ePubs simply to correct the formatting.

[omk3]

Originally Posted by Harryplopper

I just had a live web chat with Reader Store support. The tech said I should remove the ebook from my Reader and the Library, then download the ebook again. He said that would remove the spaces. Is this true or is that just a standard response for many issues with ebooks? I guess I will find out soon.


Edit: That was a waste of time, just as I thought.

They told you to download the ebook again to fix the formatting??? I knew tech support usually know less than the actual users, but that was maybe too much...

The only way to change formatting you don't like is to remove the drm and edit the ebook to your liking. You can be happy your book is only typographically awkward. Other books have serious errors in them, OCR mistakes, typos, question marks in place of letters, you name it. The book I'm reading now has some headers with the name of the book and the page number left here and there, right in the middle of the text, obviously forgotten from scanning. It is very annoying, to say the least.

[kennyc]

Not to be rude, but different strokes for different folks.

There is no standard for layout. Different books are going to be different just as they are in the print world.

[Harryplopper]

Wow. I don't have anything as bad as title and page number in the middle of text, but i have seen some other errors besides spacing in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Words runtogether, mis ing letters, and left out lettrs frequently. It is a shame that they aren't better quality. I guess it's something I'll have to live with. This is my first pay ebook and was hoping for at least pbook quality with only occasional errors. C'est la vie.

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by Harryplopper

Wow. I don't have anything as bad as title and page number in the middle of text, but i have seen some other errors besides spacing in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Words runtogether, mis ing letters, and left out lettrs frequently. It is a shame that they aren't better quality. I guess it's something I'll have to live with. This is my first pay ebook and was hoping for at least pbook quality with only occasional errors. C'est la vie.

Complain to the publisher. Complain to the retailer. If you don't complain the quality of ebooks is unlikely to improve.

[cmdahler]

Originally Posted by Harryplopper

I guess it's something I'll have to live with. This is my first pay ebook and was hoping for at least pbook quality with only occasional errors. C'est la vie.

No, you don't have to live with it! Call or email the bookstore you bought the book from, demand a refund for the poor quality of the book. If they refuse, dispute the charge on your credit card. If everyone started doing this right now, the quality of ebooks being sold would dramatically improve in about a month. People are too quick to accept such terrible reading quality because they spent so much money on those fancy ereaders and don't want to do anything that might imply they made a mistake by buying that gadget. It ought to be the other way around: if you spent that kind of money, you ought to demand a high quality reading experience.

[Harryplopper]

Well, I complained to the Reader Store and here's their reply:

Thank you for contacting Sony Support.

I'm sorry that the purchased book from the Reader Store appears to be corrupted. If you transfer an eBook to your Reader and the text formatting appears to be corrupted, please try the following:

1. Open the eBook using the Reader Library Software by selecting the title and double-clicking on it to make sure the source file is not corrupt. If the eBook does not open correctly in the Reader Library Software, delete it and go to the Reader Store to download it again. Click below for instructions on how to re-download an eBook you previously purchased.

I wrote them back that i'd already tried that(knowing it wouldn't help) and told them to check out a certain page that had 4 errors, 3 in one sentence! I also wrote Random House and haven't heard back from them yet.

I am enjoying my Reader though. I have plenty of free better quality ebooks.

[DoctorOhh]

Originally Posted by Harryplopper

I just bought my first few ebooks from the Reader Store, and the ePubs all have spaces between the paragraphs and first line indents. Why do they have both? I thought ebooks usually had one or the other. I find it a little annoying. Since they have DRM, am I stuck with the formatting or is there a fix to remove the blank lines between paragraphs?

I personally prefer my ebooks exactly like you describe, but I stopped buying from Sony because they were DRM'd and I couldn't increase the font size enough for my liking.

Now Sony has moved to epub and removing the DRM is relatively easy so I no longer hold a grudge and I format the books to my liking. Additionally DRM is easy to remove on AZW (I'm not willing to do Topaz yet) books from Amazon and I can now buy from pert near anyone I choose.

I'll be interested in the reply you get from Random House after all it is their book, Sony is just a retailer and by this point they have convinced you that you do not have a corrupt book.