| Jhonny Göransson was part of the team that made what’s simply the daftest and most wonderful music hack we’ve seen so far. The moment he tweeted about it last night, we knew we had to show it to you as soon as we could. It’s called Panflute Hero. Panflute Hero was the result of a weekend at Way Out West Hackathon 2013. It’s a very silly panpipe version of Guitar Hero, which doesn’t use a plastic guitar controller. Instead, it’s controlled by a hand-built, bamboo set of faux panpipes (which are built according to the Golden Mean), all equipped with Arduino sound sensors that detect blowing, and controlled by a Raspberry Pi sending “blow” events to a desktop over TCP. Simulated flute noises are emitted when a “blow” is sensed, and…well, see for yourself. The game itself is built in Lua, and runs on a PC (no reason you couldn’t run a port on a Pi). There’s some considerable *cough* sophistication in there, with libspotify playing some of Spotify’s horrifyingly large library of panpipe choons, which are delicately gameified for your panpiping pleasure. Instructions, code (Jhonny says: “In the spirit of hacking and hackathons, our code really blows (get it?). You can look at it in BitBucket and publicly shame us if you want. Please don't.”), and some kick-ass panpipe cover versions of the greats are available on the project webpage. Let us know if you make your own; I can imagine the controllers getting mildly unhygienic after much shared use, but any party involving Panflute Hero is bound to be a blast. A gently tootling blast. |
Tuesday, January 28, 2014
Music hack of the decade: Panflute Hero!
Monday, January 27, 2014
Video: Reading Digital Magazines on the iPad Mini with Retina
| Welcome to another Good e-Reader Video! Today Michael and Peter look at the overall magazine reading experience on the Apple iPad Mini with Retina Display. The high resolution tablet really makes graphic heavy content shine and you will get a sense how everything looks. The iPad Mini with Retina handles magazines differently then dedicated platforms like Zinio offers. Each magazine is in essence its own app, and the entire magazine section in the iTunes area just houses publishers singular delivery vehicles. We installed the Rolling Stone Magazine and first had to install their official app. You can select to buy a single issue or take out a subscription to have them all instantly delivered to your account. Rolling Stone handles things a bit differently than your average digital magazine. There is iTunes integration that will allow you to both play and buy music. This is handy if you read an article about an up and coming folk artist and wonder how they sound. Going digital allows you to hit play, and get a 30 second sample of it, which is perfect for a music magazine.
Video: Reading Digital Magazines on the iPad Mini with Retina is a post from: E-Reader News |
Podcast: Executives Flee B&N and Discussion on eBook Bundling
| Welcome back to another awe inspiring edition of the Good e-Reader Radio Show. Today, Michael Kozlowski and Digital Book World’s Jeremy Greenfield discuss the exodus of Barnes and Noble and Penguin executives. They also talk about why the publishing industry needs to bundle more eBooks and audiobooks together, to make purchasing multiple books easier for the customer. Digital Book World occurred fairly recently and Jeremy shares his thoughts on the most captivating events and sessions. There is also a new survey that has just been released that gives us an introspective on the childrens eBook industry. Apparently the older kids get, the less educational content they consume and publishers are starting to rush to appeal to the lost generation. Podcast: Executives Flee B&N and Discussion on eBook Bundling is a post from: E-Reader News |
Video: Top 5 iOS Games for January 2014
| Welcome to another exciting edition of Good e-Reader Video News! Today Michael and Peter look at the top 5 most compelling games that they were fiendishly playing all January. Some are very new and others are old favorites. Good e-Reader gives you a sense on what these bring to the table, discuss micro-transactions and show in-game footage.
Video: Top 5 iOS Games for January 2014 is a post from: E-Reader News |
Energy Sistem Energy eReader E4 Mini
| Earlier I posted about a couple of Icarus ereaders that I found listed on Amazon. I also found another oddball ereader that I hadn’t noticed before, even though it’s been listed on Amazon since April of last year. The ebook reader in question is the Energy eReader E4 Mini put out by a Spanish electronics […] |
Let the wedding planning begin!
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I actually fell into that 33% on New Year's Eve and one of the first things I did was go to my local library's OverDrive site to checkout and download some eBooks to start the planning process. To help manage the influx of newly engaged patrons, I created a list of our 100 most popular titles about Wedding Planning. These titles cover everything from budgeting, photography, eco-conscious, cake and flower design, speeches, themes and anything else wedding-related you could imagine. Be sure to stock up on extra copies! If you would like more suggestions, your Collection Development Specialist is available to help create recommended lists. Email collectionteam@overdrive.com for more information today! *Some titles are metered access and may have limited regional or platform availability. Check OverDrive Marketplace to find what is available for you.
Rachel Somerville is a Collection Development Analyst at OverDrive.
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Welcome to the new Collection Development Blog!
| Welcome to our brand new Collection Development blog! This is the best destination to keep up with all the news relating to the great content that your patrons will be interested in. We will be transitioning our Big Books Blasts to this new space in the next couple of weeks as well, and the Collection Development Team will use our new blog to make sure your library's selectors know all about new content, what's hot, and anything else related to the thing we all care about the most—the eBooks, the audiobooks, the movies, the music! Please click on the link in the right hand column to subscribe to the blog to make sure you don't miss any of our posts.  |
Retailers Name Image Comics Publisher of the Year
| Image Comics, which has made a strong showing in recent years with such creator-owned titles as The Walking Dead and Saga, was named the Publisher of the Year in the Diamond Gem Awards, sponsored by Diamond Comics Distributors. BOOM! Studios took the Publisher of the Year award for publishers with a market share of less than 4%. The awards were chosen by a vote of comics retailers. While Marvel and DC continue to focus on legacy properties that cater to a fairly narrow range of genre fans and are produced by artists who don’t own the characters they work on, Image has gone in a different direction with an array of creator-owned comics that include superhero, science fiction, and other types of stories. Their other innovations include holding their own event, Image Expo, at which they announced a number of new titles this year, and selling DRM-free digital comics directly via their website. While Image and BOOM! took the top honors, DC led the pack in terms of numbers, with six awards, including Top Dollar Publisher of the Year (for Superman Unchained #1), Backlist Publisher of the Year, and Reprint TP (trade paperback) or HC (hardcover) of the Year (Batman: Death of the Family, vol. 3). Dark Horse took five awards, including Licensed Comic of the Year (The Star Wars: Lucas Draft #1), Original Graphic Novel of the Year (Hellboy: Midnight Circle), and Manga of the Year (Lone Wolf and Cub omnibus, vol. 1). Marvel was named the Top Dollar Publisher of the Year and their Superior Spider-Man #1 NOW! was named the Comic of the Year in the over $3 category; Archie’s zombie comic Afterlife With Archie was the Comic of the Year in the under $3 category. Retailers Name Image Comics Publisher of the Year is a post from: E-Reader News |
Slashed Budgets Mean Libraries Need Digital Lending More than Ever
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With news this morning that UK libraries are also feeling the pinch, the situation is taking on a global crisis level of concern. According to an article in The Bookseller, in just the Birmingham area, the city council has proposed a £1.65 million cut to the library system, of which £50,000 is intended to be taken from its fund to purchase books, and an additional £150,000 will be carved out of the fund to host public events, such as author appearances and book signings. In the US, a Harris/Readers Digest poll proved that 40% of US mayors planned to cut library budgets and make up the difference by reducing the operating hours, shedding some staff members, and further slashing operating expenses. In 2010, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel planned to save money by eradicating almost three hundred vacant library positions in his city, as well as cutting the staff through lay-offs of an additional 284 existing employees. But what is the solution? Cities are hard pressed to meet their budgets as it is, and an obvious source of extra income is to reduce the amount spent on an entity that does not contribute monetarily to the city coffers. In light of the need to reduce staff and cut operating hours, ebook lending becomes more vital than ever, especially under systems that allow patrons to browse for ebooks via the library websites and borrow them directly through the online portal for web-based or device agnostic reading. Another initiative would be that which Simon & Schuster has already implemented, in which libraries can use ebooks and then sell those titles to patrons after a predetermined time period. Finally, offering libraries affiliate status to a wide variety of book retailers’ or publishers’ websites for patrons to purchase titles would add much-needed revenue at a time when libraries are simply hoping to keep their doors open.
Slashed Budgets Mean Libraries Need Digital Lending More than Ever is a post from: E-Reader News |
The 6″ Icarus Essence and 8″ Icarus8 eBook Readers
| Back in 2012 I reviewed an ebook reader called the Icarus Excel, a 9.7″ E Ink ereader with a Wacom touchscreen and Pearl display. It is sold from a company called ICARUS based in the Netherlands, but they also sell through a third-party merchant on Amazon.com called Odyssey Shop. In fact the Icarus Excel is […] |
CourseSmart, Naseej Ink Agreement for Arab Digital Textbooks
| One of the more exciting applications for digital publishing has always been in the educational sphere, allowing instant downloads and cost-effective purchasing of digital textbooks to penetrate academic markets around the world. As device proliferation continues to move forward globally, the academic content providers are following closely behind to ensure that the content is there for educators and students. CourseSmart, the world’s largest provider of digital educational titles, has signed an agreement with solutions provider Naseej to bring a library of titles from over fifty educational publishers to the schools that it serves in the Arab nations. In a press release today, CourseSmart and Naseej explained the potential impact this can have on the hundreds of schools throughout the Middle East that will benefit from going digital on the device agnostic platform. "We are delighted to join with Naseej in the common goal of increasing educational access and improving learning outcomes for students in the Arab world," said Sean Devine, CEO of CourseSmart. "Together we are responding to the strong market demand and potential in this region, and we are providing eTextbooks already to twelve universities in the region, including such visionary institutions as Higher Colleges of Technology, Saudi Electronic University, and University College of Bahrain. Naseej's strong local presence and technical expertise are integral to our international growth strategy overall, and our ability to provide excellent service to current and future customers throughout the Arab world." "As we continue our mission to spread knowledge and information throughout the Arab World we are pleased to join with CourseSmart to provide digital course materials to students and institutions throughout this region," said Eng. Abdullah Al Turaifi, VP of Naseej. "The combination of CourseSmart's large catalog of digital course materials, strong technical and process expertise, and flexible business models meet our rigorous standards for providing world-class digital solutions to customers in this region." Along with access to CourseSmart’s catalog of titles, Naseej will now be able to offer its schools CoruseSmart’s Analytics platform for measuring students comprehension and academic improvement, as well as a full complement of interactive learning titles.
CourseSmart, Naseej Ink Agreement for Arab Digital Textbooks is a post from: E-Reader News |
Daily Deals & Freebies – January 27
| Kindle Daily Deals 4 books in The Kathleen Turner series by Tiffany Snow Being a bartender by night and law firm runner by day helps make ends meet for Kathleen Turner. Mostly. Being 23 and single in Indianapolis wasn't exactly a thrilling adventure, but then again, that's not what Kathleen wanted. At least, not until […] |
Dave Hunt’s time-lapse touchscreen controller
| Regular readers will know Dave Hunt well. He’s behind some of the…no, scratch that; he’s behind THE most beautiful posts we’ve featured here. (There’s a new example of Dave doing something beautiful with the Pi in this post: you’ll have to read to the bottom before you get to it.) Dave is a photographer, and he’s used the Raspberry Pi in several different rigs to replace much more expensive specialised hardware. His water droplet photography rig is easy and inexpensive to set up, and it produces extraordinary results. His focus-stacking Pi solution will save you around £600 on a clean macro photography setup; his rising/falling time-lapse rig has taken video that will have you running to the travel agent to book tickets to Ireland as soon as you’ve watched it.  A quick reminder of some of Dave’s previous work with the Pi. Click the image to find out how to take a photo like this yourself. Dave said last year that he was looking to add more elements to the time-lapse rig (amazing, really, given that it already has features like a little heater to evaporate any dew that threatens to condense on the lens). The rig already raises and lowers the camera in tiny incremental stages as the time-lapse is being shot, so the camera moves as the footage is being taken, which adds a lot of interest to the shot. Dave’s now refined that action by adding touchscreen controls using Adafruit’s PiTFT Mini Kit (which we saw recently being used by the good folks at Adafruit to turn a Raspberry Pi Camera Board into a touchscreen point-and-shoot camera). He adapted Phil Burgess’ graphical user interface (GUI) from that project to create one that controls the length of the pulse sent to the motor, the delay between shots, the number of shots and the motor’s direction. All this means that where previously the Pi-powered time-lapse rig had to be sent commands wirelessly via a phone or a laptop, it can now be controlled directly from the touchscreen panel mounted on the Pi itself. The user interface he’s built allows you to position the dolly on the rail via the motor control buttons; change the motor pulse duration between shots; change the delay between shots; change the number of shots; see what time is left for the current sequence; and start and stop the time-lapse. Dave has provided, as always, a parts list (the whole controller, including the Pi and the screen, will come in at around $100), full instructions, and all the code you’ll need on his website. And the results? We think they speak for themselves. |
Mobile Bloatware Banned in South Korea
| Here finally is some respite for those who hate being bogged down by the sheer number of unwanted apps that manufacturers or various service providers cram the devices with. For the same has now been banned by the South Korean ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning. What this entails is that the apps should be allowed to be deleted if desired by the owner of the device though this won't be applicable to those apps that allow for Wi-Fi connectivity, near field communication or App Store themselves. Nevertheless, this should still make for a great precedence for others to follow elsewhere in the world where bloatware is looked down upon almost unanimously. The next best thing users are left to do is root their device to get rid of the unwanted apps that opens some storage space though not everyone is technically competent enough to root their devices. The bloatware is often blamed for an unnecessary drain on the battery as well.
Mobile Bloatware Banned in South Korea is a post from: E-Reader News |
Sunday, January 26, 2014
Digital Comics Best-Sellers for January 26, 2014
| The Walking Dead hits three of the four charts we’re looking at this week, and so does Injustice: Year Two, but the Nook chart remains solidly impervious to these trends and continues with remarkable consistency from week to week. 1. The Walking Dead #120 This week’s best-sellers line up about like you’d expect, with new releases of three top-selling comics, The Walking Dead, Injustice: Year Two, and Batman leading the pack. It separates out nicely by publisher, too, with an Image title in the top spot, followed by three DC comics, and the rest of the list is all Marvel. So who won the week depends on whether position of number of slots counts more heavily in your reckoning. 1. Hyperbole and a Half Allie Brosh’s blog-turned-book Hyperbole and a Half tops the Kindle chart for the fourth week in a row, and the latest issue of The Walking Dead and both issues of Injustice: Year Two make the chart as well. There are two George R.R. Martin graphic novels, but overall, nothing we haven’t seen before on this chart except for the first issue of The Unwritten, most likely from people sampling the series as it moves into its final arc. 1. Naruto, vol. 64 This week’s chart is last week’s chart. My new theory about this is that people buy Nook graphic novels in small surges, as when a new volume of Naruto comes out, and other than that the sales are all in the long tail, not the top ten. iBooks 1. The Walking Dead #120 The ponies have it in the iBookstore, and that issue #16 in the fourth slot is a pre-order, which means enough people are shelling out for this comic before it comes out to boost it to a decent rating. And then there’s the latest Walking Dead, making its third appearance of the day, and the first two issues of Injustice: Year Two, as more people jump into the series and others pick up the latest issue. Digital Comics Best-Sellers for January 26, 2014 is a post from: E-Reader News |
eBook Review: Simple Perfection by Abbi Glines
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The bizarrely addictive love story that Glines started in Twisted Perfection comes full circle in the follow up title, Simple Perfection. And despite the alternating POV on a chapter-by-chapter basis, coupled with the overly simplified view of mental illness, it was a fun, quick read. Having said that, Glines followed suit like so many of her contemporaries and pulled a plot-twist fast one for us, one that was a little jarring at both its suddenness and its departure from the story line of Woods and Della. There was also a very rushed feeling to this book, almost as though the story was spilling forth; considering Glines’ vast fan base, however, it’s also likely that the rush was due to the need to satisfy her fans’ desire to learn the outcome. What has been fun to see in this genre is the way that authors are exerting more control over their characters and story lines, especially in the era when authors and readers are connecting like never before. Despite the publisher of this series and the industry’s former rigid adherence to tried-and-true romance plots, Glines has been able to construct the story that she and her readers wanted. Apart from those issues, Simple Perfection was a pleasant read with just the right amount of tension, romance, genuine horror on a variety of levels, and the requisite happily ever after, at least for some characters. The title is available now.
eBook Review: Simple Perfection by Abbi Glines is a post from: E-Reader News |
The “New” Self-Publishing
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This week, Good e-Reader interviewed two spotlight authors who opted to self-publish via CreateSpace, both from vastly different ends of the genre spectrum but both alike in that they did not actively seek the traditional industry for an agent or a publisher. Steven Konkoly and M. Louisa Locke, both authors who self-published in their respective genres, took note of where the industry was headed and made the informed decision to go it mostly alone. “I started looking at it, and my timing was really ideal,” explained Konkoly, author of the Black Flagged series and The Jakarta Pandemic, as well as the more recent title The Perseid Collapse, in an interview. “In the fall of 2010, some of these firebrand previously-traditionally published authors like Joe Konrath and Blake Crouch really made me consider self-publishing in terms of not feeling like I had to query agents or go the traditional route. I really wanted to get my book out there, and went into it with no expectations in terms of sales. I had worked hard on a book, and I wanted to get it out.” In the case of Locke, author of Maids of Misfortune, the author was actually able to help grow the historical mystery genre into what has now come to be known as “cozy mysteries” in the book industry. With three books and two short stories to her credit, Locke transferred her doctorate in history into a popular series of titles about the core concepts developed in her dissertation. “I knew that someday I wanted to write a mystery based on what I was learning about women,” Locke said, making the point that publishing a dissertation is more for scholarly audiences, but crafting a fictional mystery based on that research would speak to far broader audiences. “I had the idea that each book would focus on a different 19th century female occupation.” In Locke’s experience at the time of the original writing of her first draft, historical fiction and historical mystery were not widely published genres and many publishers were reluctant to invest in the title. After working with a print-on-demand publisher on her first title, agents and editors refused to even look at the book, still clinging to the stigma that initially marked self-published titles. Like Konkoly, Locke also read information from Konrath about the benefits of self-publishing, especially true for authors of niche genres. “The turning point for me was I went to a mystery conference and I went to the sessions about publishing. I asked questions.” At this same conference, Locke was still told by professionals in attendance that they would not even look at a book that had been self-published, a fact that has laughably come full circle as publishers now actively recruit successful indie authors. In what is becoming more and more common and viable, both Konkoly and Locke are full time authors, writing and publishing their own titles and living off the royalty income, another feat that would have been barely fathomable only five years ago. Now, both authors are contentedly successful in terms of titles published, control over their work, and the growth of a strong reader base. “There are millions and millions of readers. I’ve reached the 100,000 sale mark recently,” said Konkoly, “but it’s nothing compared to how many other readers there are out there. This is an opportunity.”
The “New” Self-Publishing is a post from: E-Reader News |
eBooks Overtaking Global Markets
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So what’s behind the rumor mill that ebooks are or are not faring as well as some data suggests? One thing that supporters and naysayers alike forget to take into account is how the comparison between digital and print was created, as well as what titles affected the figures. It’s not enough to look at a number comparison when things like blockbuster titles account for distribution. In the case of Scholastic‘s publication of Suzanne Collins’ wildly successful Hunger Games trilogy, print books should have accounted for a higher percentage of sales, given the prevalence of print over digital in that demographic; at the same time, ebook sales of E.L. James’ 50 Shades of Grey trilogy and the anonymity of digital purchases–coupled with the self-publishing numbers from the first go-round–made ebooks seem to be the clear frontrunner. Around the world, ebooks have told a different story in terms of sales. Russia has only now moved into the third place position behind the US and China, recently edging out the UK. This rise in sales rank seems to be connected to the popularity of a recent ebook piracy counteraction with the launch of LitRes, who made ebook sales popular for the first time within the country. The smart money all this time, however, has been that there are genres and markets for both print and ebooks, and that different factors will lead consumers to make purchasing decisions of one over the other. Publishers and authors alike would do well to ensure that reading consumers can access both editions in order to make their selections.
eBooks Overtaking Global Markets is a post from: E-Reader News |
Daily Deals & Freebies – January 26
| Please note that I’ve made it so only today’s Daily Deals & Freebies post appears on the front page of The eBook Reader Blog since the deals become out-dated each day. You can still find the older posts in the Deals section for reference. Kindle Daily Deals Amazon has a 75 ebooks on sale today […] |
Ooh, BETTy (look, it’s Sunday morning, it’s the best I can do)
| The RPF Education Team is just back from BETT, the education technology show, and it was very good indeed. I love BETT: you get to talk to lots of interesting people about stuff that you’re passionate about; play with the Raspberry Pi and pretend that it’s work; see all the latest education tech; and generally show off. (At the same time it’s also an extraordinarily gruelling four days of demos, talks, meetings, interviews and PR. I feel like I’ve spent the last week being simultaneously coddled with a tickling stick and beaten with a sock full of oranges.) The show got off to a great start for us when Education Secretary Michael Gove called Raspberry Pi a “brilliant British tech business” in his opening keynote and highlighted the MOOC that we’ve helped create with OCR and Cambridge University Press. It was also surprising and gratifying to see Raspberry Pis on so many stands and in products around the show. Anyway, it’s Sunday so less writing and more pictures are in order:  The Raspberry Pi Foundation Education Team. From left: Dave Honess, Carrie Anne Philbin, Clive Beale and Ben Nuttall  Dave doing technical stuff that I don’t understand.
 Carrie Anne doing her funky Sonic Pi thing. Or a rabbit puppet show.  Ben gets personal with a Raspberry Pi camera  Clive talks mainly with his hands  The graffiti at BETT is of a very high quality  No one would listen to me when I told them that the command to invert the picture was ‘rm -rf *’  Teaching the world how to be awesome. Go Team Pi! Finally, a big thanks to:
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