Comments on: Will iPhone App Store ban Stanza, eReader and other promising apps?

By: pete

pete — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 19:28:46 +0000

I’d like to be able to read Kindle format ebooks on my iPod touch. I’m not going to purchase another device, but I would like to get some of the ebooks that Amazon sells.

Is there any application that does this? (I’d also use it on my laptop.)

By: Hadrien

Hadrien — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 12:15:50 +0000

Just read your update Yoda74. We’re indeed improving the feature on Feedbooks and my goal is to turn it into a tool that’s easy enough for everyone to use.

I’m not really interested in a quick and dirty method though, mostly because it’s usually REALLY dirty. Multiple flows for example are very important if you’d like to have some sort of support on the PRS-505, and a TOC can be useful too.

Quick and dirty conversions work best with limited formats, such as Mobipocket for example. You could design a good tool for this, but it’ll be more of a power-user tool (command line stuff) where you have to specify a way to detect multiple flows, TOC etc…

By: Yoda47

Yoda47 — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 13:48:47 +0000

Mike:

There aren’t many options right now, but I’ll have a section added to my tutorial by the end of the day.

http://www.jedisaber.com/eBooks/tutorial.asp

By: Christo

Christo — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 07:49:02 +0000

I am also with kittens to discover an automated ePub creation process. I have tried the mamual method and while they work, it is too much hassle to do regularly.

By: Mike Cane

Mike Cane — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 18:58:50 +0000

Yoda47: Please tell me about these ePub creation links! I need them! TIA.

By: Hadrien

Hadrien — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 08:54:06 +0000

We’re still working on it, it’ll be better in the upcoming weeks. I’ll do a full tutorial and video presentation once it’s ready too.

By: Yoda47

Yoda47 — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 02:21:37 +0000

I download them to my computer first so that I have them backed up. Also, the ones I get from Feedbooks, I can go and get them again if something happens to my iPod.

Yes, I still manually create ePub books (the ones I can’t find on Feedbooks or Munsey’s anyway ), but even with blank template files it’s fairly labor intensive. So I wanted to try out the Feedbooks system to see how it works. Also, I want to add a small section to the end of my ePub creation guide with links to automated options for creating ePub files for people who don’t want to do it all manually, and I want to review it before recommending it. (It’s very nice, BTW.)

By: Hadrien

Hadrien — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 14:35:27 +0000

Too bad that there’s no current way to backup your downloads from the iPhone/iPod Touch though. They’re all ePub files and it would be a very good way to avoid such problems.

Do you still manually create your ePub files Yoda47 ? You recently posted a book on Feedbooks, although I thought that you created all your ePub on your own. Nice upload anyway !

By: Yoda47

Yoda47 — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 13:53:45 +0000

This is exactly why I only use Stanza for my iPod Touch. All my books are in ePub format, and it Apple does something stupid, I can still read my books.

By: Hadrien

Hadrien — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 12:17:50 +0000

This sort of things happen very often with Facebook too. Instead of removing the apps though, they simply add something similar as a core feature and push it to every user.

You can’t rely on platforms such as Facebook or iTunes as your only business model exactly for this sort of reasons.

My advice to all the developers releasing an e-book app on the AppStore: release everything on Android and various competing mobile platforms too. This way, you’re not entirely screwed if Apple is in a bad mood.

By: Daniel Udsen

Daniel Udsen — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 20:51:01 +0000

please dont tell me your surprised Apple have always been extremely hostile to 3rd party developers trying to change the basic vision for the platform.

The exact same thing happened with the macs they had all the buzz there was a vibrant industry surounding it and apple just managed to kill it all with their stubborn refusal to listen to focus groups or let 3rd party companies near anything, where there was a diverting Jobs aproved right way. As soon as a viable altilernative arived.

By: Mike Cane

Mike Cane — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 18:01:18 +0000

Oh snap. I never even considered the ramifications for current eBookware if Apple does eBooks!

Apple rejecting that podcast app is simply Major Dumb.