"When there's a lull in my creativity, I honestly pick up who I think is the queen of romance novels---Jane Austen. I know that sounds strange coming from an African-American writer, but I was raised by the classics, and before I even read Richard Wright, my mother made us read Shakespeare and Tolkien. I'm inspired by everything, though." - Sylvia Hubbard, whose Web sites you can find listed here. Story blog here. Info on Stone's Revenge novel here. The TeleRead take: So what book---fiction or nonfiction, classic or not---is your lull-killer?...

We are making progress on the BookX Project (pronounced “books”), previously known as “SimpleBook.” The purpose and goals of BookX are outlined in the last TeleRead update from last November. But to briefly summarize, the BookX system is envisioned to enable “almost push button” conversion of a single and fairly simple master XML document into most, if not all, e-book formats in use today and tomorrow. It is the goal to build a simple system (most, if not all, of which will be open source) to master simpler types of books, such as fiction. We believe BookX will be able to master...

This year, Wiley & Sons celebrates 200 years of publishing. The company is responsible for the wildly popular but oft-criticized "For Dummies" books for which, like Hallmark cards, there is a book for every occasion. Wiley & Sons doesn't stay in business because it practices old-school publishing tactics. When technology forges ahead, Wiley & Sons strives to adapt. Recently it has begun experimenting with releasing a free e-content version prior to a book's print debut. That's not the only good news from Wiley. Joe Wikert (photo), a vice president and executive publisher in Wiley's Professional/Trade division,...

Some of the most honest and useful commentary on e-books, including serious thoughts on DRM and e-formats, comes from the Dear Author site devoted mainly to romance novels. No stereotypes. We're even in Geek Girl territory since Jane Litte, one of the Dear Author blog's two mainstays, does a little PHP. More importantly, Jane loves and cares about e-books, and while never hesitant to give a consumer perspective, she seeks out publishing insiders to get their side. Recently, for example, Jane interviewed Claire Israel of Simon & Schuster and Ann Allessi of HarperCollins. So in our new incarnation, we're especially pleased to...

Recently, I've become a big fan of a French music sharing site called Jamendo. All the music is Creative Commons, free for streaming. But if you like an album, you can download it for free via BitTorrent or eMule. So far, the site has 2300+ albums uploaded. For those who thought YouTube's revenue sharing announcement was a big deal, I say, let's look instead at Jamendo's business model: On every album and artist page there is a link to a tip jar. The artist receives 100% of the donation, minus a small transaction fee. The Web site receives the...

The TeleBlog's daily readership often surpasses that of LibraryJournal.com and normally exceeds the audience of The Book Industry Standard if you go by Alexa.com. Would you believe, the TeleBlog even beats Publishers Weekly on rare occasions. Check out the numbers yourself. We may well be the most popular Web blog dedicated to e-book industry news and views, as opposed to, say, mobile news in general. Whether the topic is DRM or Iraq, we'll generally cover it from an e-book angle, and this focus has helped put us on the map. At various times we've drawn links from major sites ranging from...

Samsung announced a 7.2 megapixel cam phone last week (photo). Late last year, Nokia announced the N95, a 5 megapixel cam phone. Could these phones be the next gadget for the mobile archivist? Combined with Abbyy OCR software, text versions of the documents scanned this way could even be transmitted to one's personal ivory tower to be dissected by minions before you get back. If any of our readers speak Korean, I'd appreaciate a translation of Samsung's original announcement page, because the Babelfish translation leaves too much to the imagination. So far, I am not even sure this is a phone...

One problem with multimedia e-books is that they're a challenge for low-powered devices such as cell phones and PDAs. But what if the chips get more powerful and are easier on batteries? And suppose you can read even regular e-books for longer periods of time? That ultimately could be the bottom line of new developments in chip tech. Check out the details from the New York Times and Ars Technica. Related: Working in a clean room at Intel, from the company site. "Bunny suit" photo is of an exhibit in the Intel Museum....

As a hot e-book reader, the $100 laptop excites me. You've got to love the tablet shape that it can take, and the display could be a worthy rival for E Ink-style technology. But the OLPC machine has a lot more going for it, even a feed reader for video blogs. See the Coevolving Innovations blog for further info on some fun details. Of far greater importance, however, from school and library perspectives, is the issue of just what books and other goodies will be available to the Third World children for whom OLPC designed the machines. I've given my two...

Dear Google: A a very minor stockholder, I hope you're not counting on a killing from novels read via your E-book Museum approach, which doesn't permit downloads. Listen to the ladies at DearAuthor.com and their angry readers. The DA headline tells all: I've Seen the Vision of the eBook Future via Google and Random House and It Stinks. Yes, I know: fiction will be just part of your virtual inventory. Still, if a very informal TeleRead poll is representative, even the nonfiction won't appeal to most people if you and certain publishers insist on an E-book Museum strategy. Better to offer...

I wonder if the upcoming generations of seriously hearing impaired people---mostly from improper use of headsets---will eventually impact on audiobooks. Or will they just turn up the volume, thereby doing more damage? Moderator's pointer to related link: Apple software update will reduce iPod ear threat. Rejoice, audiobook and podcast fans! Looking back, I think that headline was too kind to Apple. - David Rothman...

"It would be far more efficient for publishers to transmit native XML files to Google for ingest." - Peter Brantley, a newly elected IPDF board member who is executive director of the Digital Library Federation and earlier worked at Random House....