I think Dvorak has it right about e-books

[Ocean]

And if you follow technology, you'd know that the next time Dvorak is right about something it will probably be the first time.

A big publisher was lamenting the lame quality of electronic books, or e-books. He couldn't figure out why people would want to read a book on an e-book reader as though it were a printed book. I asked him about this after the speech.

Essentially, he said that if you had a new platform for books, you'd think the book itself would change to take advantage of the platform. By this, he meant that the definition of a book should be updated for these devices. Why couldn't pictures be animated? Why couldn't you listen to the speeches in a history book—the actual speeches? Why couldn't an index be hot, so when you looked something up, you could jump to it with a simple touch?

I think this is what the wonderfully misnamed Vook is aiming for...and I also think the release of the iTunes LP format is a preliminary look at a container for such data.

I chuckle every-time I think about what Jobs must have done the first time he used a Kindle -- hurled into into a wall with a stream of obscenities.

The idea of a touchscreen, full-color e-book reader combined with a device that can run those 80,000 iPhone apps as well as easily browse the Internet does have appeal.

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2353802,00.asp

[Ocean]

On the shiny exterior, the new iTunes LP may seem like some sort of fancy proprietary format. In actuality it's an image-heavy, JavaScript-driven webpage that only renders correctly in iTunes or, with a bit of hackery, WebKit-based browsers such as Safari, Omniweb, or Google's Chrome.
--
there's an extraordinary number of images—in fact, the majority of the text is made up of images! Some users have complained that they can't scrape for the lyrics in each song because they are handled this way.

The last bit of interesting information is the inclusion of a font .svg file. Not every browser supports this feature, and WebKit only added the compatibility recently. SVG is the future--accept it, or be consumed.

The iTunes LP format can be as complicated or as simple as one wishes. The Dave Matthew's Band LP that we used was quite complicated, but the Door's LP looks much simpler by comparison. While the format is no doubt aimed at the big guys, I have very little question that someone could easily make his or her own LP and distribute it.

http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/20...es-lp-file.ars

[ahi]

No worries! I'm sure we'll have animated, flashing, muzak-playing eBooks with unhyphenated MS Word quality typesetting and layout in no time!

- Ahi

[delphidb96]

Originally Posted by Ocean

And if you follow technology, you'd know that the next time Dvorak is right about something it will probably be the first time.



I think this is what the wonderfully misnamed Vook is aiming for...and I also think the release of the iTunes LP format is a preliminary look at a container for such data.

I chuckle every-time I think about what Jobs must have done the first time he used a Kindle -- hurled into into a wall with a stream of obscenities.



http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2353802,00.asp

Oh. Ye. Gods. NO!

A book is meant to be READ - not to "entertain" mindless idjits with movin' pitchers!

Derek

[Lemurion]

Originally Posted by ahi

No worries! I'm sure we'll have animated, flashing, muzak-playing eBooks with unhyphenated MS Word quality typesetting and layout in no time!

- Ahi

I expect worse quality and more annoyance than you're describing.

Simply horrible idea.

This is the problem with letting non-readers come up with ideas for new ebooks and ebook devices: they immediately start to throw in all the crap we read books to avoid.

The lack of audio-visual idiocy in a book isn't a bug, it's a feature. Hell, it's the entire point.

[Jack Tingle]

IIRC, that's called a "Tablet PC", and the data set described is called "hypertext with multimedia". My ancient copy of MS Bookshelf did all of that. So does MS Encarta, Wikipedia, and a whole cartload of websites; some of them are even well designed.

How this relates to an ebook reader, I'm not exactly clear on. I'm resisting asking the question, "Is everyone in publishing a stupid, ignorant fool, who's been living under a rock for the last two decades?" That would be wrong of me.

Regards,
Jack Tingle

[zerospinboson]

Originally Posted by Jack Tingle

IIRC, that's called a "Tablet PC", and the data set described is called "hypertext with multimedia". My ancient copy of MS Bookshelf did all of that. So does MS Encarta, Wikipedia, and a whole cartload of websites; some of them are even well designed.

How this relates to an ebook reader, I'm not exactly clear on. I'm resisting asking the question, "Is everyone in publishing a stupid, ignorant fool, who's been living under a rock for the last two decades?" That would be wrong of me.

Regards,
Jack Tingle

Actually, the problem is that they haven't been reading books these last two decades, per Steve Jobs's orders. Still, if you ignore the fact that this will do nothing for book readers, it might get TV/gaming addicts to read more... perhaps?
Anyway, I haven't the faintest what the point is, or how Video-books (the abbreviation sounds rather like a marketing term, and I prefer not to utter those things) relate to books, nor which demographic they're hoping to reach with this. I'm still waiting for them to reinvent proof-reading.

[Jack Tingle]

Originally Posted by zerospinboson

Actually, the problem is that they haven't been reading books these last two decades, per Steve Jobs's orders. Still, if you ignore the fact that this will do nothing for book readers, it might get TV/gaming addicts to read more... perhaps?

But, but, but ... Dvorak was quoting someone from the _publishing_ industry, ignorantly lamenting that his own industry hasn't invented a technology that already exists. Not only hasn't he been reading books, magazines, and sundry other things, but he apparently never looked on his secretary's desk to see how she handled his email and shops for his nieces' Bat Mitzvah gifts!

Was a cheap, cheesy black and white display with a few control buttons, powered by an obsolete processor, running a decades old OS and with a low speed wireless data connection a shock to his system? Amazon's genius wasn't in inventing any _thing_; it was putting them together in a novel arrangement, and finding a way to make it easy for their customers to demand to give Bezos money.

It's like Obama's Blackberry. The US government was almost brought to it's knees by the _head_ of the government wanting to keep a communications device that's as common as dirt.

Boggledly,
Jack Tingle

[Shaggy]

Originally Posted by Jack Tingle

"Is everyone in publishing a stupid, ignorant fool, who's been living under a rock for the last two decades?"

Absolutely not! Some of them have been under there for three decades.

[Ocean]

Originally Posted by Lemurion

This is the problem with letting non-readers come up with ideas for new ebooks and ebook devices

Why are we building classes and then waging class warfare against them?

I'm rather sure that any platform as described in the first post would come with the ability to tone things down to "just text".

[Ocean]

Originally Posted by Jack Tingle

IIRC, that's called a "Tablet PC", and the data set described is called "hypertext with multimedia". My ancient copy of MS Bookshelf did all of that. So does MS Encarta, Wikipedia, and a whole cartload of websites; some of them are even well designed.

Agreed...and expensive.

[fugazied]

I like Dvorak, he's usually right in his predictions, but when he is wrong he is gloriously wrong (Blogs will never take off, Twitter will never take off).

The possibilities of the Apple tablet are so very very obvious. I think the main limitation we have is technological (battery life on large touch screen) and that's why Apple has taken so long.

[ahi]

Originally Posted by Lemurion

I expect worse quality and more annoyance than you're describing.

Simply horrible idea.

This is the problem with letting non-readers come up with ideas for new ebooks and ebook devices: they immediately start to throw in all the crap we read books to avoid.

The lack of audio-visual idiocy in a book isn't a bug, it's a feature. Hell, it's the entire point.

Replace it with non-bookmakers/non-typographers and I'll agree with you.

- Ahi

[HansTWN]

The whole idea is not really about reading, it is about getting the non-reading masses interested in a new type of gadget. So while actual readers will stay away from such devices, it might actually sell quite well. Remember Jobs said "nobody reads anymore". he obviously wants to go after the big market of non-readers with his tablet. They want the gimmicks. And if a few prolific readers actually buy one for reading, that is just an unexpected side benefit.

[Solicitous]

Nice idea, unfortunately as seen by history during this digital age, as soon as a product becomes interactive suddenly there is a new market for advertising. Start producing interactive book with speeches and colour, and you'll start seeing public domain and free books plastered in advertising in an attempt stated by the author to "help keep the content free for the user".