By Elizabeth Wood

Sometimes it’s important to step back and remember that Worldreader is about reading. We are not ‘the e-reader NGO’, nor ‘the Kindle guys’. We are simply ‘the folks who are transforming reading.’

Our core mission is to enable folks all over the developing world to read.  We do that by using new technology to deliver thousands of books to those who previously had few to no books.

For the past two years, we have been doing this using 3G enabled e-readers (the amazing Amazon Kindle) in schools in Ghana and Kenya.  We have proven that if you give the right books to folks – relevant, local books – they will read more, and read better.

Last year Worldreader began to investigate the development of a book app for mobile phones – as just another way to deliver more books to more people.  Mobile penetration across the developing world is skyrocketing and in many African countries, including Ghana, has reached over 80%.

By cosmic coincidence, on the other side of the globe in Syndey, a small start up called biNu was developing a new technology that turns low-end feature phones into smart phones.  Thanks to biNu, the 4 billion people around the world with low end phones, can enjoy instant access to news, Facebook, Twitter…. and books. 

As a passion project, biNu’s Joe Lipson developed a book reader app to run on the biNu platform. biNu’s CEO, Gour Lentell then reached out to Worldreader and generously offered to let us take the app and make it better by procuring great locally relevant content that will hook folks on reading.  And so is born the Worldreader App (beta).

Will the Worldreader App be a way for millions of people in the developing world to enjoy books? We hope so, and we intend to find out.  Stay tuned.

(Via Worldreader Blog.)

The name makes me think of uranium and radiation, the proprietary DRM issue remains, and Apple isn’t a supporter. But the Readium initiative, announced this morning, is a still big step forward for the International Digital Publishing Forum, the main e-book industry trade group.

A demo reader mixes ePub 3 e-book format, XML, HTML5 standards and the WebKit rendering engine used in many Web browsers.

Aided by this “reference implementation, developers will more easily be able to create ePub reading software with “support for video, audio, interactivity, vertical writing and other global language capabilities, improved accessibility, MathML, and styling and layout enhancements” (link added). Demos already exist as extensions for Chromium browsers in Windows and Mac OS/X. I’ll see if I can’t get screenshots up today or later this week.

Meanwhile I’m rooting for free and easy tools to be available to create files, just like Apple’s iBooks Author. EPub based standards and software, not the proprietary kind from Apple—which will force you to rely on Apple devices for reading and on Macs for file creaction—are what schools and libraries should insist on. We don’t need Apple’s iBooks-related bastardization of ePub. The IDPF announce did not position the Readium initiative as a way to fight Apple (a member, in fact) and Amazon (nonmember) by popularizing the sophisticated typographical capabilities and other wrinkles of pure ePub3. But in effect that’s what Readium will do.

Luckily some heavy-hitters are behind the the ePub-related Readium initiative—from Barnes & Noble to Google, Sony, Adobe, Samsung, and the American Association of Publishers.

As I see in the best DRM system is none, but Bill McCoy, the IDPF’s executive director, tells me a common one might eventually be developed for ePub. For now, clashing proprietary DRM systems encasing ePub files can get in the way of compatibility when publishers and distributors use “protection.”

Via e-mail I exchanged comments and questions with Bill, and here’s a transcript:

Rothman: Why is Apple not among the announced supporters of Readium, and are you hoping it will be someday? Could Apple’s bastardization of ePub have something to do with it? Are you trying to bring Apple into the Readium fold, and if so, is there any chance you’ll succeed? Why? I do notice that Apple is still in the IDPF (though Amazon is not).

McCoy: Apple has been a significant contributor to EPUB 3 as well as to the WebKit open source project so I certainly would welcome Apple becoming a contributor to the Readium Project.”

Background: Here is my take on Apple & iBooks Author, unchanged basically, but clearly they already have a capable WebKit-based EPUB reading system in iBooks and weren’t interested in open sourcing it at this time.

If the community shows that everything iBooks can do (and more) can be done with the open format and interoperable tools then I think there’s no reason for their proprietary path to continue. [Bill saysCSS page templates are “going to help a lot - esp. with the #1 tool about to support” them.]

Rothman: Would the IDPF or Readium be likely to cooperate if an open source initiative were started to come up with free creation tools with an interface as easy as that of Apple? Or could Readium itself undertake such an initiative? As we know, Apple has tied its creation tool to Mac hardware and so far is making the format readable only on iPads. Bad, bad, bad for K-12 and libraries, in terms of hardware costs if nothing else. Lock-ins reduce customer bargaining power.

McCoy: Several of the initial organizational supporters of Readium are strongly interested in the authoring tool side. It’s agreed that capable rendering support is a prereq, but this is a potential area of work for the project, whose goals wil be set by the contributors, not by an IDPF committee structure. That said there’s some feeling that authoring tools will be advantaged via commercial solutions that can apply greater resources than an open source tool… however a common runtime may be an enabler for both.

Rothman: How close to dedicated e-reading software will Web browsers be in usability and aesthetics, even without plug-ins? And if that’s the Web browsers do well as e-book readers, why would vendors of e-reading apps want to stick with the initiative?

McCoy: There’s as many different opinions on the future dedicated e-Reading SW vs. browser-based solutions as there are people. My personal opinion is that EPUB is fast becoming the portable document format for the Open Web. Its future isn’t just for a narrow niche of e-Books but for all kinds of documents that can adapt to different devices and be accessible. As such given that PDF support is increasingly built-in to browsers (e.g. Chrome ships with PDF support) it’s logical to imagine built-in EPUB support in browsers in the not so distant future. This would mean the browser itself can paginate, etc. And with built-in support aesthetics would be unlimited. This path will enable a wide variety of online and offline content experiences. But, again, this is my personal opinion, not speaking for IDPF or any Readium supporter.

Rothman: What will this mean for traditional DRM for libraries if HTML5 catches on? Isn’t it possible for there to be time-limited offline caching at the users’ end–to allow reading to books to the end of an expiration period? Could this be a viable alternative to a proprietary approach for people with access to the cloud? I do see that the Readium FAQ specifically mentions there could be proprietary DRM schemes, and does not offer a common standard. Couldn’t this lead to replication of the current Tower of eBabel in the library world and elsewhere? I myself would love to see no DRM for owned books and social DRM if need be as a compromise–and nonproprietary timed-offline caching for library books (perhaps even mixed with some kind of social DRM).

McCoy: IDPF is actively investigating the potential of standardizing some type of DRM (such as a social DRM) with EPUB. But this is as yet only an early-stage investigation.

Rothman: Is it possible that the IPDFor Readium could be in touch with the Harvard-based Digital Public Library America about a hosting initiative that could include both library and commercial content–with stable interbook links on a common server with reliable backups? As we know, no matter how formal the content, the Web is far from a permanent medium. Library-guaranteed stable linking could be manna even for commercial networked books and make “ownership” (quotes deliberate) more attractive than otherwise. Balkanized storage isn’t good for the publishing industry. The library approach could actually open up more commercial opportunities for publishers.

McCoy: Yes.

Rothman: Why the name “Readium”? Makes me think of “radiation” and “uranium.” Sure you don’t want to change it? Who came up with it? Don’t take it personally if you did. Either way, I’m happy the IDPF and friends are trying to get their efforts some mindshare.

McCoy: My bad—I’ve had name winners & losers, I categorize EPUB and OpenType among the former, OPDS among the latter. It’s intended as somewhat of an homage to Chromium, the open source configuration of Google Chrome which is also built on top of WebKit. But that’s a pretty subtle/geeky reference

[Via LibraryCity]

It’s interesting just how much emphasis experts are placing on taking advantage of social media to reach a wider audience. Of course, you’d expect it in this case from someone with a vested interest in social media distribution, but that doesn’t mean it’s bad advice. Yet at the same time, publishers get upset about social media “ripping off” their content, as seen with Pulse, Flipboard, Zite, and now Pinterest.

I suppose it’s the same as the old dichotomy of cable carrying broadcast television, in which an argument raged for years about whether the cable networks benefited more from being able to offer broadcast stations to their subscribers, or the broadcast stations benefited more by reaching the cable-subscribing audience. Are social media making a profit from other people’s work, or helping more people find that work? Looks like both from here.

Jacobs writes that he prefers the slow, click-intensive method of annotating common to e-ink readers rather than the “easy” method with tablets, because he is better able to remember what he annotates through e-ink readers’ more difficult process.

E-books are in their infancy now: there’s little textual design to speak of, typography is often terrible, illustrations are limited, errors are shockingly frequent. They’ll get much better. But it would be cool if, when they improve, readers were given means of introducing a bit of cognitive friction when that would make the reading experience a stronger one. Sort of like cranking up the speed and increasing the incline on an elliptical trainer.

Most e-ink readers seem to be locked into one font, unlike tablet- or smartphone-based readers that usually offer plenty of font-changing options. But even on the readers that have the options, I’ll admit I’ve never really considered intentionally making books harder to read so I remember them better. And it should have crossed my mind when I wrote the post about the original study—or when I ran across the post from a neuroscience blogger who suggested that easy-to-read e-readers might interfere with remembering what we read.

Anyway, I still find it amazing to consider that there could actually be a useful purpose for Comic Sans.

Not surprisingly, Experian found Pinterest users are also more likely to be interested in hobbies and crafts than the rest of the online population. Those who visit both hobbies and crafts websites and Pinterest tend to be “baby boomers and young adults who are heavy web users who spend time on house and garden, sports and fitness, and family-oriented websites.”

But Jeff Roberts of PaidContent reports that it is stirring up a bit of copyright controversy. A number of photographers are complaining that their pictures are being used without permission. The site does have a DMCA takedown procedure, but on the other hand, given that its entire business model is based on using images without permission, it is unclear whether its DMCA safe harbor would hold up in court.

Of course, the conflict between new media technology and old copyright isn’t exactly new. Aside from the examples PaidContent mentions, media aggregators Pulse, Flipboard, and Zite have both heard complaints from disgruntled rights-holders about their articles being scooped and redisplayed out of the web browsing context. Fortunately, they were able to come to accommodations with those rights-holders.

And Pinterest may be able to reach an accommodation of its own with photograph rights-holders. It is in talks with Getty Images, and the money it is receiving from affiliate links will undoubtedly help it pay license fees if required.

I am intrigued by all the interest Pinterest is receiving, and will be checking it out myself when I have the chance. The network is invitation-only, however, so I will need to wait until I can find someone to send me one. (If any TeleRead readers are Pinterested, could you possibly oblige?)

What strikes me most about indie writers, however, is not what they write, but how they publish it. Konrath may be a ‘downmarket’ writer for some, but he is a first-rate publisher for many, as was Hocking: they wrote regularly, priced to the market, and promoted like hell. Heinze and Wilkinson may be looking for publishing deals: they just can’t be bothered waiting for traditional publishers to "discover them".

Traditional publishers need to learn from these successes, if they are to throw off the irritating "legacy" tag some self-published writers hang around their necks.

He suggests publishers should be trying models similar to that floated by Macmillan New Writing (which is unfortunately closed for new submissions right now when it should be scooping up all the fresh “indie” talent it can). They should be building communities and courting the more successful self-published authors (as with Amanda Hocking).

All that makes sense, but the article’s close in which Jones suggests that badly-edited and poorly-presented self-published e-books will put readers off over time, and traditional publishers could improve their appearance, is actually rather amusing. I find myself wondering just where Jones has been over the last few years if he thinks that “professional” e-books are uniformly well-edited or presented. I’ve seen plenty of self-published works that were better than some pro-published for typos.

This is only the latest in a number of reports that have suggested a 9-inch Fire could launch sometime this year, so the only thing really new about it is the source. It made a lot of sense for Amazon to introduce a mid-sized tablet early on and get people hooked on its platform. At least some of those will be inclined to upgrade to the 9-inch version, and people whose friends enjoyed the 7-inch version but who want something larger themselves might be more inclined to buy it as well.

The only downside for Amazon is that this larger Fire will be going head-to-head against Apple’s same-sized iPad, rather than positioning itself in a niche Apple had no plans of filling. The most visible previous competitors in that position—the BlackBerry PlayBook, the HP TouchPad—haven’t done so well. And if Apple kicks the game up another notch with a new Retina Display in this year’s iPad 3, that will steal some of the luster from a cheaper standard-display 9” Fire.

And, of course, we’ve not yet seen any confirmation that Amazon is really planning a 9” Fire at all.

If 2011 was the year of the iPad 2, will 2012 be the year of the iPad 3? Said a source familiar with the device: “What do you think?”

Assuming it really does come with a Retina-resolution screen, that means the iPad will finally be able to show high-definition video in its native resolution, and it also means e-books should look absolutely incredible. Amazon’s Kindle Fire had just better watch its back!

Kindle Fire vs. Nook Tablet from School Library Journal on Vimeo.

New Features

• Auto-adding: Add an option to check for duplicates when auto adding.
• Content server: Export a second record via mDNS that points to the full OPDS feed in addition to the one pointing to the Stanza feed. The new record is of type _calibre._tcp.
• Allow specifying a set of categories that are not partitioned even if they contain a large number of items in the Tag Browser. Preference is available under Look & Feel->Tag Browser
• Allow setting a URL prefix for the content server that run embedded in the calibre GUI as well.
• Allow output of identifiers data in CSV/XML/BiBTeX catalogs
• Driver for Motorola Droid XT910, Nokia E71 and HTC EVO 3D.
• Cut down the time taken to launch worker processes by 40%
• You can now configure the calibre settings for the currently connected device by right clicking on the device icon in the toolbar, instead of having to go through Preferences->Plugins

Bug Fixes

• Auto-adding: Do not add incomplete files when files are downloaded directly into the auto add folder.
• When running multiple delete from device jobs, fix the device view sometimes marking the wrong books as being deleted, after the first delete job completes.
• MOBI Input: Handle files that have spurious closing and/or tags in their markup.
• RTF Input: Strip out false color specifications, as they cause artifacts when converted to MOBI

By reducing the weight that its planes carry, the move could save the Air Force as much as $1.2 million in fuel costs per year. (I wonder how much is saved in fuel costs by airline passengers bringing Kindles instead of a bunch of print books?)

"Moving from a paper-based to an electronically based flight publication system will not only enhance operational effectiveness, it can also save the Department of Defense time and money," said Maj. Gen. Rick Martin, the director of operations for the Air Mobility Command. "Electronic flight bags are becoming an industry standard due to their operational, environmental and cost savings benefits."

This is in keeping with a directive President Obama issued in November directing all branches of government to reduce their reliance on costly paper.

(Found via Slashdot.)

After buying the Kindle, she discovered she liked it so much she has used it it constantly ever since—though mostly for travel and commuting, where a slim device that can replace a ton of books is most useful. She will “always choose a ‘proper’ book” for reading at home.

Parks does not have an “emotional attachment” to her Kindle, but acknowledges that some generations might, and thinks that it is a good thing that something has moved non-readers to start reading.

It’s true this isn’t really “news”, but it’s nice to see that at least some e-reader skeptics can be swayed enough to enjoy the device for its advantages without assuming it’s going to “kill” reading.

Wright compares Kindle Select to Michael Roberts’s MP3.com independent music distribution site, which allowed independent musicians (such as Wright) to upload mp3 tracks to catch the attention of the Internet audience.

That was, without question, the most fun I’ve ever had online. MP3.com started providing tools for musicians, including the ability to upload mp3 tracks and convert them into a CD — so you could sell your CD alongside the tracks you were giving away from free. No one had ever thought of this before. It was nuts. And the best part of it was meeting other musicians.

MP3.com set up forums and the musicians would talk, trade recording tips, talk about what kind of marketing worked and what didn’t, advertise shows, and organize meet-ups in the real world. The best part was it was completely cross-genre — I was a punk/noise musician but I was making friends with country musicians, house musicians, funk musicians, metal, hip-hop, gangsta rap… you name it. And I got exposed to music I never would have considered listening to before hand. I still carry most of those MP3′s around in my collection.

However, after the site went public, MP3.com instituted a “Payback for Playback” program, which split a pool of money among the artists whose tracks were most played—a very similar idea to the Kindle Select lending library. This program served as an apple of discord, Wright writes, effectively ending the camaraderie and leading a number of artists to try to game the system. 

Wright sees history repeating itself with the Kindle Select program, and points out that Amazon already has problems with people trying to game the self-publishing system with plagiarized and duplicate content. He wonders how long it will be before the same thing happens with Kindle Select.

He also points out that giving Amazon exclusivity over works harms the publishing ecosystem as a whole. Even if Amazon is accounting for the lion’s share of income right now, keeping content off of its competitors handicaps the competitors’ ability to compete with Amazon.

In the end, whether authors go with Select or not is up to them, but it’s good to hear from all points of view on the issue. It remains to be seen whether Select is vulnerable to gaming or not. As Wright acknowledges in a postscript, the limitation to one book checkout per month for $80/yr Kindle Prime subscribers does restrict how badly the system can be abused, but he is not sure that necessarily removes the vulnerability.

From a Chip Chick post.

The QOOQ tablet really shines with a subscription to QOOQ’s services, though. A subscription will net users 3,500 interactive recipes from some of the world’s top chefs, 1,200 of which include video instructions. Those recipes are accompanied by a comprehensive and detailed wine list and suggestions for each meal. There are also 100 featured chefs that offer up video tutorials for individual cooking techniques, in addition to whole recipes. That by itself isn’t overwhelmingly impressive – those kinds of resources can be found with a little poking around the Internet. The QOOQ tablet does have some more tricks up its sleeve, though, with a cool feature that automatically adjusts recipes to account for how many people are being served. Over time, the tablet will feature recipes and tips tailored to each user’s preferences and habits. The recipes are a nice bonus, but the QOOQ tablet’s main purpose is to make life in the kitchen a little more efficient, and it seems like it will be successful in that effort.

A lot more details in the article.

From the Worldreader blog.  Worldreader aims to put a library of books in the hands of families worldwide, using e-reader technology.  They have a post on their blog thanking volunteer  for his efforts.  Here is part of it:

Here are a few things that have us in awe with Carl back in our Barcelona office and excerpts from his blog:

1. His knack for trouble-shooting and encouraging kids to use built-in features on their Kindles:

“I suggested they tried out the ‘text to speech feature’ one day, a function of the Kindle Keyboard, which reads out a book’s content with a computer voice. Stephen’s [A Worldreader student] opinion: ‘The e-readers are great to read by yourself, but sharing and using them together with someone makes you enjoy them even more.’”

2. The connection he’s building with Worldreader’s students and families:

“We went on to visit Mabel and her family, a smaller but equally welcoming family, consisting of Mabel, her parents, her sister Millicent and her baby brother Abdel-Asis. Mabel’s father is a cab driver, while the mother stays at home to take care of the family. Both Mabel and Millicent have an e-reader, and they are often seen reading together outside of their house. Their mother had become a great supporter of Worldreader’s work and reported how both children had improved at school and in speaking English. They did indeed speak good English, particularly Millicent spoke great English for a primary school student, benefiting from the being in the e-reader class, and reading at home with her elder sister. Together with Diana [another Worldreader student], we read another of their favorite books on the e-reader: Ananse and the Pot of Wisdom.”

3. His keen observation and the questions he asks:

“Towards the end of our chat I asked if he had any suggestions for improvements. ‘Reading Lights,’ he suggested, ‘So students can read at night. And e-readers for all the other classes as well, so people don’t constantly come and want to borrow ours.’”

You can find out more about Worldreadere here.