PaperC is working with German crowdfunding site Innovestment to raise funds to launch PaperC.com, a new platform that is based on HTML5, instead of the current PDF-based platform. They've developing their own HTML5 eReader and PDF-to-ePub converter.
Showing posts with label PDF. Show all posts
Showing posts with label PDF. Show all posts
Thursday, July 19, 2012
Germany's PaperC raises money to fund development of HTML5 eReader
GigaOm reports that PaperC, a German eBook retailer, is trying to raise
from €50,000 to €100,000 through a crowdfunding site in order to transition
to a HTML5-based platform. PaperC allows users to purchase eBooks by the
page, chapter or entire title, and plans to offer a monthly subscription
program giving members unlimited access to the company's entire
collection. The company currently has 120,000 registered users and
distributes titles from more than 100 publishers.
PaperC is working with German crowdfunding site Innovestment to raise funds to launch PaperC.com, a new platform that is based on HTML5, instead of the current PDF-based platform. They've developing their own HTML5 eReader and PDF-to-ePub converter.
PaperC is working with German crowdfunding site Innovestment to raise funds to launch PaperC.com, a new platform that is based on HTML5, instead of the current PDF-based platform. They've developing their own HTML5 eReader and PDF-to-ePub converter.
Tuesday, November 22, 2011
PressBooks eBook publishing service opens its doors to the public
PressBooks, a Montreal-based startup, took its eponymous online eBook production service public today. There are lots of services and software for creating eBooks, but PressBooks has some interesting features for self-publishing authors (and even for established publishers--more on that in a minute.) PressBooks is an online service built on top of WordPress. If you're familiar with the WordPress dashboard, you can jump into PressBooks right away. The service creates fully-formatted EPUBs and PDF files, as well as HTML online eBooks and XML documents. It's primarily designed for text-intensive trade-style eBooks; if you're planning to create picture books or heavily-formatted multi-column text titles, there are better tools than PressBooks. However, you can import book covers and images into a built-in media library.
PressBooks uses a simple WYSIWYG editor for creating and editing text; text can also be edited offline and then uploaded. A small variety of templates are available for automatically formatting eBooks; PressBooks is working on more designs. Multiple authors and users can be defined, and the site can be public (anyone can read the eBook) or private (only specified users can access the site). Users can enter metadata in the Book Information section, including title and subtitle, descriptions, names of editors and translators, print and eBook ISBNs, and prices.
PressBooks has already been used for creating two commercially-published eBooks: "Book: A Futurist's Manifesto", which was edited and published by the PressBooks team for O'Reilly Media while the software was under development, and "Nine Things Successful People Do Differently" by Heidi Grant Halvorson, published by the Harvard Business Review Press.
At the present time, PressBooks is a free service, but that's likely to change once it exits beta. Here's a presentation that demonstrates most of the service's features:
PressBooks uses a simple WYSIWYG editor for creating and editing text; text can also be edited offline and then uploaded. A small variety of templates are available for automatically formatting eBooks; PressBooks is working on more designs. Multiple authors and users can be defined, and the site can be public (anyone can read the eBook) or private (only specified users can access the site). Users can enter metadata in the Book Information section, including title and subtitle, descriptions, names of editors and translators, print and eBook ISBNs, and prices.
PressBooks has already been used for creating two commercially-published eBooks: "Book: A Futurist's Manifesto", which was edited and published by the PressBooks team for O'Reilly Media while the software was under development, and "Nine Things Successful People Do Differently" by Heidi Grant Halvorson, published by the Harvard Business Review Press.
At the present time, PressBooks is a free service, but that's likely to change once it exits beta. Here's a presentation that demonstrates most of the service's features:
Monday, June 21, 2010
The problem with PDFs
In my last post, I took KFNB Reading Technology to task for developing its own proprietary format for eBooks, and stated that PDFs can provide the same "page fidelity" experience as KFNB's Blio eBook reader. There's a good reason to create a new format, however, and it lies at the heart of PDF itself.
There are lots of ways to create a PDF file that looks good when viewed in a PDF reader, but the internal structure of a PDF file can vary widely, depending on the tool used to create it and even the order in which it was created. For publishers, Adobe's InDesign and Quark's QuarkXPress are the two most popular tools for laying out books. These tools can then generate PDF and ePUB files, and it's those files that are used to create eBooks. However, there are many other tools that can create PDFs, and Adobe's own print drivers can create PDFs from almost any document. Some publishers have written their own page layout and conversion software, and there are dozens of format conversion services around the world that can accept files in a variety of formats and output PDFs.
The internal structure of a PDF is very important if you want to create notes or highlights, select text or perform text-to-speech. Adobe has what's generally considered to be the best PDF rendering technology in the industry, and they handle the variety of ways that a PDF can be constructed very well. However, if you need to write your own converter or renderer, you have to handle all the myriad PDF variations.
That's one reason why a company like KFNB would decide to create its own format and require publishers to convert their titles into its format rather than PDFs. By enforcing a more consistent internal structure, KFNB could bypass many of the problems faced by PDF renderers. However, it still results in compatibility issues--eBooks in KFNB's format can only be read with KFNB's readers. If KFNB goes out of business, no new readers will be available, and if there's DRM on the KFNB eBooks, it may be impossible to use them in the future.
That's why I would have preferred to see KFNB "bite the bullet" and do the hard work of parsing PDF files in its reader, instead of creating its own format and insisting that publishers use that rather than PDF.
There are lots of ways to create a PDF file that looks good when viewed in a PDF reader, but the internal structure of a PDF file can vary widely, depending on the tool used to create it and even the order in which it was created. For publishers, Adobe's InDesign and Quark's QuarkXPress are the two most popular tools for laying out books. These tools can then generate PDF and ePUB files, and it's those files that are used to create eBooks. However, there are many other tools that can create PDFs, and Adobe's own print drivers can create PDFs from almost any document. Some publishers have written their own page layout and conversion software, and there are dozens of format conversion services around the world that can accept files in a variety of formats and output PDFs.
The internal structure of a PDF is very important if you want to create notes or highlights, select text or perform text-to-speech. Adobe has what's generally considered to be the best PDF rendering technology in the industry, and they handle the variety of ways that a PDF can be constructed very well. However, if you need to write your own converter or renderer, you have to handle all the myriad PDF variations.
That's one reason why a company like KFNB would decide to create its own format and require publishers to convert their titles into its format rather than PDFs. By enforcing a more consistent internal structure, KFNB could bypass many of the problems faced by PDF renderers. However, it still results in compatibility issues--eBooks in KFNB's format can only be read with KFNB's readers. If KFNB goes out of business, no new readers will be available, and if there's DRM on the KFNB eBooks, it may be impossible to use them in the future.
That's why I would have preferred to see KFNB "bite the bullet" and do the hard work of parsing PDF files in its reader, instead of creating its own format and insisting that publishers use that rather than PDF.
Sunday, June 20, 2010
Blio finally coming to market; Ray K babbles about distribution deals
According to The New York Times, the Blio software eBook reader is finally going to start shipping. Blio, from KFNB Reading Technology, maintains page fidelity (eBooks look like, and are paginated like, their print equivalents.) Ray Kurzweil, the founder of KFNB, said that a variety of distribution deals are coming soon, including one with Wal-Mart, which Wal-Mart refused to comment on and was probably unhappy about.
Kurzweil points out that Blio's ability to maintain page fidelity is great for "cookbooks, how-to guides, schoolbooks, travel guides and children’s books" He also is quoted saying “The publishers will not give things with complex formats to these e-reader makers. They destroy the format.” What he doesn't say is that Adobe's PDF also maintains page fidelity, there are PDF readers from Adobe and many other vendors, and by and large, they're also free. He also doesn't mention that Blio uses a proprietary format that only his reader supports. So if you buy eBooks in the Blio format, you can only use them with Blio readers. Using a proprietary format may not be a big problem if your name is Amazon.com, but it's a bigger problem when you effectively have no distribution and are completely dependent on other companies to adopt and sell your product.
He also misspeaks about the reason that publishers haven't made graphically rich titles available in eBook formats. It's not that they don't like the available readers, it's that in many cases, they're simply not yet marketing their children's or specialty titles as eBooks.
I've played with the Blio reader, and it has a lot to recommend it. Its text-to-speech and translation capabilities are particularly good--what you'd expect given Kurzweil's experience with readers for the visually disabled. However, introducing a new, proprietary format is a retrograde move. KFNB could have done everything it wanted to do with PDF, but decided to invent its own format. That's bad for customers, bad for publishers and bad for the eBook industry in general. The eBook industry needs fewer formats, not more.
Kurzweil points out that Blio's ability to maintain page fidelity is great for "cookbooks, how-to guides, schoolbooks, travel guides and children’s books" He also is quoted saying “The publishers will not give things with complex formats to these e-reader makers. They destroy the format.” What he doesn't say is that Adobe's PDF also maintains page fidelity, there are PDF readers from Adobe and many other vendors, and by and large, they're also free. He also doesn't mention that Blio uses a proprietary format that only his reader supports. So if you buy eBooks in the Blio format, you can only use them with Blio readers. Using a proprietary format may not be a big problem if your name is Amazon.com, but it's a bigger problem when you effectively have no distribution and are completely dependent on other companies to adopt and sell your product.
He also misspeaks about the reason that publishers haven't made graphically rich titles available in eBook formats. It's not that they don't like the available readers, it's that in many cases, they're simply not yet marketing their children's or specialty titles as eBooks.
I've played with the Blio reader, and it has a lot to recommend it. Its text-to-speech and translation capabilities are particularly good--what you'd expect given Kurzweil's experience with readers for the visually disabled. However, introducing a new, proprietary format is a retrograde move. KFNB could have done everything it wanted to do with PDF, but decided to invent its own format. That's bad for customers, bad for publishers and bad for the eBook industry in general. The eBook industry needs fewer formats, not more.
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