12:49 PM by Bob Russell in E-Book Readers | Alternative Devices

The Palm Foleo is going to be announced today, maybe even as I write this. In fact, some details seem to have slipped out accidentally(?) in the Palm RSS feed already. The whole discussion will be shaped quite a bit by the rest of the details, but already it has caused me to consider e-book ramifications.

For those that haven't seen, the Foleo is rumored to run PalmOS on Linux, and has a size between a laptop and smartphone. It will communicate and sync with a smartphone, and allows email or document editng with a full keyboard and decent sized screen. Battery life around 5hrs.

Once we hear about a decent sized screen, we certainly thing about e-books. Will we be able to read comfortably on it, even outside? Is it good resolution? Will eReader or MobiPocket or other e-book reading software work on it?

But my interest is in another idea... synching your location in an e-book no matter what you read on. Imagine buying an eReader book and reading it on a larger screen. Then when you leave the house with just your Treo, you can continue reading, and you automatically continue where you left off, with no fiddling. Then you pick up your Foleo at home and continue before you fall asleep at night.

Sure, this could be done across many devices. It's really more of a software issue than hardware, but the Foleo gives a natural platform for it to be implemented. Let's hope that we see it, and then it catches on across other platforms.

09:36 AM by TadW in E-Book General | News

Put two great ingredients together and what you'll get is a yummy feast. Fujitsu demonstrated the Fab PC, the concept of an eye candy notebook with a case made of fabric and a flexible e-paper screen that can be stretched right down to the keyboard. Engadget reports:

Dubbed the "Fab PC", the laptop apparently uses fabric for much of its construction (hence the name), which is intended to make the device more reminiscent of a traditional folio -- and no doubt prevent the dreaded problem of slippage as well. Of course, there's no indication of specs (or even any evidence that it actually works), although at the rate e-ink production is ramping up, it may not be as far off as it might seem.

03:56 PM by Bob Russell in E-Book General | News

"Off the record, most executives--on the technology side at least--will tell you that DRM is a dinosaur that's waiting for the asteroid to hit. It's just a matter of when the music industry will stop assuming its customers are all criminals."

That's what Time Magazine has to say about the less talked about side of DRM.

According to Defective By Design, "The article is also a good short primer on what DRM is and why there is a controversy around it, in layman's terms. If you need to explain DRM why you don't like it to a parent, or non geeky friend, this is a good article to send them."

You can read the Time article here.

Via Defective By Design.

02:10 PM by Alexander Turcic in E-Book General | News

Slim and light enough to fit into a tuxedo without messing your lines, the Intel Metro notebook has drawn some huge attention these days. Gizmodo has a link to a video clip (via AeroXP) showing the ultra-think device and its external E Ink display in action. It doesn't look like much yet, but I am sure they'll do more impressive stuff with it in near future.

Thanks to Scotty for the tip!

Related: Intel Metro Notebook: a new use for e-ink, Hands-on with the E Ink-equipped Intel Metro Notebook, PVI develops color E Ink display for Intel Metro Notebook

01:14 PM by Bob Russell in Miscellaneous | Lounge

In Japan, it's especially hard to negotiate approval to upload content, because it is also partially owned by the actors. So a government panel in Japan is suggesting that rather than prevent video uploads of content, it simply be regulated and royalties taken.

Personally, I'm not a fan of yet more regulation, nor putting much of anything in the hands of a government organization. But the general idea of a royalty system has even been proposed by Mark Cuban for the United States. For a very nominal fee and wide participation, content owners could increase their revenues while giving the public widespread access to all the content they want.

So maybe the idea is to take down video uploaders like the government took down Al Capone - not on traditional criminal charges, but on income tax charges.

Via Download Squad.

10:54 AM by Bob Russell in Miscellaneous | Lounge

For fans of Charles Dickens who can't get enough of his fictional works despite his prolific writing output, there's a new delight in London - Dickens World.

"Dickens World is a brand new, innovative and exciting indoor visitor complex themed around the life, books and times of one of Britain’s best loved authors, Charles Dickens. It will take visitors on a fascinating journey through Dickens’ lifetime as they step back into Dickensian England and are immersed in the urban streets, sounds and smells of the 19th century.
With a host of captivating attractions, Dickens World features one of Europe’s largest dark boat rides, the Haunted house of Ebenezer Scrooge, a state-of-the art animatronic show, Victorian School Room, 4D high definition show and Fagin’s Den. Offering a unique showcase for one of the world’s best loved storytellers, Dickens World will truly offer visitors the ‘day out of a lifetime’.
Dickens World is based on a credible and factual account of Charles Dickens works and the world in which he lived. Working with The Dickens Fellowship great attention has been paid to the authenticity of the time, characters and story lines. It offers a new and entertaining way to enjoy Dickens and his characters as well as gaining an understanding of the times and conditions people experienced living in England in the early 19th century."

I know it sounds corny, but I'd really love to go. Doors were scheduled to open to the public on May 25, 2007. If you are in the London area, you'll have to check it out and share it with us!

From Gadling via Digg.

08:14 AM by Bob Russell in E-Book Readers | Alternative Devices

PDFzone has an article with information on reading PDFs on various mobile devices, including Palm, PPC, Blackberry and Symbian. Read the full story here.

Also, see our previous thread, Overview of .PDF reading options for PDAs.

08:56 AM by Bob Russell in E-Book General | News

It looks like a lot of 100 year old U.S. newspapers are being digitized and made available free of cost as a part of the National Digital Newspaper Program.

"The National Digital Newspaper Program (NDNP) is a partnership between the NEH and the Library of Congress to provide enhanced access to United States newspapers. Ultimately, over a period of approximately 20 years, NDNP will create a national, digital resource of historically significant newspapers from all the states and U.S. territories published between 1836 and 1922. This searchable database will be permanently maintained at the Library of Congress (LC) and be freely accessible via the Internet."

This Chronicaling America prototype was launched in March, 2007 with newspaper pages from 1900 to 1910 from the following states: California, District of Columbia, Florida, Kentucky, New York, Utah, and Virginia.

By the way, you might find some really interesting serious political news stories like this one about how the Washington Times reports on how "William Howard Taft, the secretary of war who would go on to win the presidency the following year, is 'not so large as rumored.'”

The pages are available both in flash and html formats. A great resource. It's too bad we couldn't expand it to all major papers through the year 2000. And don't try to convince me that copyright protection of newpapers farther back than 2000 is necessary and good for consumers - that's going to be a very hard sell!

From the Library of Congress blog via Improbable Research.