Comments on: E-book apps: Which are your faves, which do you hate, and which publishers allow ePub extraction? http://www.teleread.com/ebooks/e-book-apps-which-are-your-faves-which-do-you-hate-and-which-publishers-allow-epub-extraction/ News & views on e-books, libraries, publishing and related topics Wed, 15 Feb 2012 23:28:27 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 By: Martin http://www.teleread.com/ebooks/e-book-apps-which-are-your-faves-which-do-you-hate-and-which-publishers-allow-epub-extraction/comment-page-1/#comment-1113325 Martin Wed, 29 Jul 2009 21:37:42 +0000 http://www.teleread.org/2009/07/29/e-book-apps-which-are-your-faves-which-do-you-hate-and-which-publishers-allow-epub-extraction/#comment-1113325 <a href="http://www.universalis.com" rel="nofollow">Universalis</a> is interesting because it is an infinitely long e-book - different content for every day of every year, for ever - packaged into a <a href="http://www.universalis.com/n-download.htm" rel="nofollow">downloadable application</a> that's about 4MB. Since e-book readers aren't programmable, there's no way Universalis can be a straightforward ePub e-book. But we've given the Windows version of the app the option to create ePub or Mobipocket private e-books containing the Universalis content for any day (31KB), week (210KB), or month (850KB) of the user's choice, infinitely far into the future. In that sense we're selling an unlimited e-book synthesizer for non-programmable platforms, packaged into an e-book app for programmable ones. It means we don't have to sell subscriptions, and social DRM on the generated e-book files is enough to keep us happy. <a href="http://www.universalis.com/n-ebooks.htm" rel="nofollow">More about it here</a>. We haven't done something similar with the iPhone version because it's a little hard to see where the generated ePubs should go - if you know, tell us and we'll think about it. On the other hand, we operate a "one licence for all platforms" policy, so an owner of the iPhone version can use the Windows version free in any case. Universalis is interesting because it is an infinitely long e-book – different content for every day of every year, for ever – packaged into a downloadable application that’s about 4MB.

Since e-book readers aren’t programmable, there’s no way Universalis can be a straightforward ePub e-book. But we’ve given the Windows version of the app the option to create ePub or Mobipocket private e-books containing the Universalis content for any day (31KB), week (210KB), or month (850KB) of the user’s choice, infinitely far into the future. In that sense we’re selling an unlimited e-book synthesizer for non-programmable platforms, packaged into an e-book app for programmable ones.

It means we don’t have to sell subscriptions, and social DRM on the generated e-book files is enough to keep us happy.

More about it here.

We haven’t done something similar with the iPhone version because it’s a little hard to see where the generated ePubs should go – if you know, tell us and we’ll think about it. On the other hand, we operate a “one licence for all platforms” policy, so an owner of the iPhone version can use the Windows version free in any case.

]]> By: Dan http://www.teleread.com/ebooks/e-book-apps-which-are-your-faves-which-do-you-hate-and-which-publishers-allow-epub-extraction/comment-page-1/#comment-1113254 Dan Wed, 29 Jul 2009 17:47:16 +0000 http://www.teleread.org/2009/07/29/e-book-apps-which-are-your-faves-which-do-you-hate-and-which-publishers-allow-epub-extraction/#comment-1113254 O'Reilly's Safari Books Online (m.safaribooksonline.com). Though I generally prefer real apps to web apps, this web app has a killer feature not found in other iPhone e-book readers: clipboard support. O’Reilly’s Safari Books Online (m.safaribooksonline.com). Though I generally prefer real apps to web apps, this web app has a killer feature not found in other iPhone e-book readers: clipboard support.

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