So who posts the most comments in the TeleBlog--well, other than me, the blog's main perp? How many comments have you made? Wanna catch up with your golden oldies? Or get a list of the entire Teleblog's last 50 posts and the same number of comments? Or discover the most-commented-upon posts on the main TeleBlog area? Psst! Without even consulting NSA, you can now get the above information and more via a link in the upper right corner of the TeleBlog--50 newest posts and TeleBlog community info. The secret WordPress 2.0 plug-in is WP-Stats. In addition, you'll see customized Technorati tags...

Here's a hands-on review of the iLiad, mixed in with an essay on e-books. In Trusted Reviews, Sandra Vogel sensibly vents against harsh DRM and proprietary e-book formats. She puts in a word for ASCII-focused Project Gutenberg. Vogel is right--ASCII can be turned into a number of diffrent formats, athough it would be nice for readers not to have to worry about this. So how does she feel about the iLiad, which apparently will now go on sale in April rather than March? Well, she appreciates the glories of the technology but is frustrated that the iLiad isn't more of a...

What's so open about OpenReader. Is it the idea that you should be able to open all of your e-books in every e-reader, not just one? Is it the openness of the standards process OR is or isn't following? I want a bigger meaning of open -- open-ended....

A fascinating look at book-scanning technology appears in the Book Standard. Excerpt: ...there are essentially only two companies that sell the robotic equipment and hardware necessary to quickly scan and digitize large volumes of books: Kirtas Technologies and 4DigitalBooks. Not surprisingly, major players in the digitization game--Google, Amazon--often employ their own proprietary systems; a spokesman for Google, for instance, says the company uses "some really cool stuff we've developed." Detail re another kind of proprierty vs. nonproprietary: Will the same mindset at Google apply to e-book format standards? I can somewhat understand the use of proprietary scanners--Google needs something to distinguish it...

"A standard--and open--file format would be a good start; today there are competing 'standards' from Adobe, Microsoft, Mobipocket (probably the most popular), Palm, and Sony. Whatever format emerges as the winner will have to let me treat an e-book like a print one, making it free and easy to transfer ownership. If the publishers and the hardware and software vendors can get their act together, this market has a chance." - Andrew Kantor, writing in USA Today. The TeleRead take: Well, that's progress. Now for USA Today to explain the need for an up-to-date standard that truly goes beyond the proprietary...

I am posting this solely to show you this picture of a cover that I came across while browsing Many Books. For some reason it resonates with me. BoingBoing might call this Book Cover Zen. But do read more about the book, A House-Boat on the Styx (1895) by John Kendrick Bangs, because it seems to have spawned an interesting lineage (mostly in science fiction). (Note that though the Wikipedia article seems to suggest otherwise, all the related books and films mentioned came well after "House-Boat".) ...

Adobe exec Bill McCoy serves up some some refreshingly candid comments on this issue. His post discusses an IDPF survey which, among other things, reports low use of PDF among frequent e-book buyers who own handhelds. Is Adobe hoping to address the reflowability issue? You bet. People don't want to have to scroll from left to right or otherwise adjust to PDF's limitations on their particular machines....

Here, from Copyfight. Are Google's thumbnail images legal as a way to preview images from sites? Copyfight excerpt: "Either what Google does is fair use and Perfect 10 can go away, or it isn't and we will have to fundamentally rethink Web search and indexing." Related: MPAA sues BitTorrent, newsgroup search tools, via CNet. ...

Oh, it's risible on the surface. A Louisiana man sues Apple, saying that iPods are dangerous to American ears. The dummy. Doesn't he know his way around the click wheel to turn down the volume? But you know what? I'm hearing a bit of a whine in my ears right now, and methinks it may well be tinnitus. I'm pretty sure of the cause. In the short time I've owned an iPod, I've often fallen asleep with it set at a low volume, but, lacking a limiter, the gizmo did not protect me from the louder podcasts. While I'm...

Does the above headline, from Richard Brookhiser's elegant article in the New York Observer, strike you the same way it does me? I'm thinking: So is Project Gutenberg a fantasy? Blackmask? Manybooks.net? Like Jeffrey Young's guest post in a ZDnet blog, the Brookhiser piece reflects the vast gap between us hardcore e-bookers and the rest of the cosmos. We'll know that e-books have turned a corner when people focus less on the basics and more on issues such as the quality of the typography and the extent of interactivity within e-books. Alas, in LISNews, the reader comments on the Brookhiser...

"Libraries Australia, to go live on Monday, will allow some scholars - amateur and serious - to track down texts and buy books without ever having to shuffle up to a circulation desk. But the portal also creates new pathways to the closest library." - The Australian. Related: 'Handhelds on trial in Australian schools'–with Gutenberg books among the content....

"The latest example of Sony's myopia is a soon-to-be-released combination of brain dead technology meeting yesteryear's business model." - Jeffrey Young, who was guest-blogging for Dan Farber....