02:49 PM by Colin Dunstan in E-Book General | News

Brad is spilling out his thoughts on the literary quality of e-books. Under his impression, most e-books currently published can be only compared to 25cent novels from the 1950s and 60s.

I think ebooks right now are in that same market ghetto as direct to video movies are and direct to paperback books used to be not so long ago. In fact the entire paperback publishing industry got it's start publishing erotica (for travelers, heh) and lurid subculture pulps, as well as pulp science fiction, crime and mystery novels (neither of those genres were considered as respectable as they are today).

Au contraire. If you look at eReader's Bestsellers, you find that most e-books published are either from mainstream hardcover or paperback editions. Then again, Brad, what do you expect to find when you are browsing for one hour the p*rn section of an e-book retailer?

12:53 PM by Bob Russell in Archive | Handhelds and Smartphones

Did you know that the Microsoft Windows Mobile Team has a blog? Granted, it looks like it's really aimed at developers, but you might find something interesting there anyway.

One very interesting post is a nice list of mobile friendly sites.

[Edit: And you can search for some cool stuff here also!]

10:30 AM by Alexander Turcic in Miscellaneous | Announcements

A Happy Birthday to our long-term editor and good friend zire71man! I am sure to speak for everyone at MobileRead when I say that we have greatly enjoyed your company ever since you became a member in 2003.

Thanks for being with us and all the best for your future!

07:33 AM by Alexander Turcic in Archive | Handhelds and Smartphones

PalmAddicts has some interesting facts on the forthcoming mini-Tablet PC (we reported) by Microsoft:

"As laptop PCs, especially tablet PCs, get smaller and PDAs get bigger where will they meet. The "Ruby" prototype presented at the IDF Japan 2005 provides one answer. Running Windows XP Tablet PC Edition it packs a 600mhz Pentium M and a 5" LCD into a 450g (about 1 pound) package. Those who read Japanese can find out more at Nottes.com.

07:26 AM by Alexander Turcic in Archive | Handhelds and Smartphones

PocketGamer (via PocketGaming.de) reports that the Ukrainian developer n0p managed to port WarCraft Stratagus and Wargus to the Windows Mobile platform. The port runs both on QVGA and VGA devices.

To actually play WarCraft II on your Pocket PC, you also need to have (legal) access to the original WarCraft II (DOS edition) graphic and sound files.

07:17 AM by Alexander Turcic in Miscellaneous | Lounge

The BlackBerry thumb is what orthopedists refer to the increasing amount of carpal tunnel syndrome and tendinitis caused by the overuse of mobile devices (especially those with tiny keyboards). First the area between your thumb and wrist begin to throb, and in more severe cases you are forced by chronic pain to put your device down.

The Washington Post writes:

Workplace injuries in white-collar jobs have grown with the widespread use of mobile communications technology. It used to be that worker's compensation was reserved mostly for blue-collar workers who smashed fingers in heavy machinery or fell off ladders. Factory workers complained for years of what were then mysterious ailments -- carpal tunnel, tendinitis and "trigger finger." Today, those injuries have spread across cubicle-land.

To avoid from this kind of injury, you should try to hold your device properly (keep your wrists in a more upright position), take more breaks, and write fewer and shorter notes and messages.

12:55 PM by Colin Dunstan in Archive | Portable Audio/Video

Here's a very cool development from Apple. Think Secret reports that iTunes Mobile 1.0, the first version of iTunes for mobile devices, is on track for release by June 2005. iTunes Mobile is a joint-venture product of Apple and Motorola. The required Motorola phone (yes you need one of these to take advantage of iTunes) is scheduled for release in the second-half of the year. The main problem until now was finding a mobile carrier who would be willing or capable of providing the iTunes service:

Cell phone companies, including Verizon, Cingular, and Sprint, are planning on rolling out music download services later this year, according to a recent BusinessWeek story, and want to charge $2 to $3 a song, justifying the premium over Apple's normal 99-cent price by the convenience of grabbing a tune whenever one pleases. Apple instead wants customers to copy purchased songs from their computer to the phone for playback, and does not favor direct purchases over a cell phone provider's network.

12:23 PM by Colin Dunstan in Miscellaneous | Lounge

This one is really neat: The Annotated New York Times tracks blog postings that cite articles published by The New York Times. These blog fragments are grouped by author or by topic to form virtual, distributed conversations that span multiple sites and that center around the coverage of news events as reported by the Times.

And this is not all. They offer over 6,000 feeds tracking NY Times topics, authors and blog commentary. The list makes me almost feel dizzy.