| A few months ago, I decided to install Android on my Kobo Glo to see how it functions as an E Ink Android tablet. I was able to do this thanks to a hack over at MobileRead. It works on the Kobo Glo, Kobo Aura HD, and Kobo Touch. Here’s the page with all the […] |
Tuesday, June 10, 2014
Kobo Glo Android Hack Video Demo
Oaxis InkCase E Ink Covers for Smartphones (Video)
| In the recent video tour of E Ink’s booth at Computex 2014, we saw a number of E Ink’s protoypes and products, but one that was missing was the Oaxis InkCase. The Oaxis InkCase is a specially-designed smartphone cover that has an E Ink screen. You can pair it with a phone and display content […] |
Onarbor Addresses Academic Publishing Challenges with Crowdsourcing, Peer Review
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Unfortunately, the world of academic publishing is even more notoriously difficult to break into than the world of trade publishing. With often small-numbered committees of just two or three individuals deciding what is worthy or not, many frustrated academics have grown disillusioned with the industry. One such person is Tim Peterson, a biology doctoral candidate from Harvard who actually secured a paper for publication in a prestigious journal, but he recalled that the entire nine-month ordeal left him feeling as though there had to be a better way. Peterson founded the site Onarbor, a platform that not only provides a publishing pad for quality works, but also encourages peer review that goes well beyond three stuffy academics looking over the tops of their glasses at the mountain of submissions. Instead, Onarbor builds a community of reviewers, people whose own “scores” are generated based on their reviews of prior submissions. Essentially, if a reviewer simply passes through a fluff piece, his score as a reviewer can drop, making him less of a prestigious name associated with a submission. More important than just the publishing and review opportunities, though, is the ability for users to crowdfund particular projects through donations. Interestingly, cybercurrency source Bitcoin is accepted on the site for crowdfunding. In this article on Onarbor by Avi Wolfman-Arent for The Chronicle of Higher Education, Peterson is quoted as saying this model stands to rise above the current method of peer review due to the sheer numbers of people who will review a submission. It’s one thing to have a triumvirate of academics with a political agenda to declare your work as suitable, but it’s something else entirely to have thousands of highly qualified professionals make that assessment. While the trade publication industry is slowly but surely release its stronghold as the only viable publishing route and erasing some of the stigma associated with self-publishing, we can’t look for the scholarly industry to do that anytime soon, especially when there’s serious money to be made by blocking publication of some pieces and allowing others. In time. though, sites like Onarbor could potentially make enough of a name for themselves that the scholarly publication community sees the rigid stronghold for exactly what it is and agrees to accept the validity of a community-vetted platform.
Onarbor Addresses Academic Publishing Challenges with Crowdsourcing, Peer Review is a post from: Good e-Reader |
Entitle Launches Christian eBook Subscription
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Entitle Books announced its recent launch of an ebook subscription that is aimed at the Christian book market, allowing its members to find new titles without wading through content that they may wish to avoid. Entitle Christian, as the service is called, allows its members to download up to four books per month depending on the pricing option they choose; unlike typical subscription models, this one serves as more of a book club of sorts, as the ebooks do not disappear after a predetermined amount of time. The books are the users’ to keep, even if they cancel their subscriptions later. Entitle’s CEO Bryan Batten noted that readers of Christian fiction tend to stick with the genre, much in the way that romance readers are thought to be passionate fans of their favorite story lines and authors. While the industry is experiencing unheard of rates of crossover, not only among readers but among authors as well, some genres more than others experience this level of dedication to their books. Of course, one of the more appealing aspects of the service–something that members are willing to spend significant money on considering that the two-book-a-month plan starts at $9.99 and increases from there–is the vetting of the titles for appropriateness and content. In recent years, most major retailers have had to take unpopular action against books and authors that were mislabeled. Hard-core erotica works ended up on display and promoted even in the ranks of children’s ebooks, a fact that caused a number of retailers to take swift action in deleting any content that they deemed inappropriate. Entitle Christian’s platform is compatible with all major devices and operating systems, and has been able to secure contracts with several major publishers. Of the platform’s 200,000+ ebooks available for sale, more than 10,000 titles have been included in the Entitle Christian service to date.
Entitle Launches Christian eBook Subscription is a post from: Good e-Reader |
Amazon Integrates WhisperSync for Voice into Kindle for Android
| WhisperSync for Voice is a program that was designed to build synergy between eBooks sold by Amazon and the audio edition from Audible. It was designed to give readers a discount for purchasing both the eBook and audiobook edition and flip between the two wherever you left off. For example, if you are reading a novel at night and stop reading at page 92, you can pick up on the audiobook where you left off when commuting to work the next day. This used to just a program exclusively for the Kindle Fire line of tablets and now is available on the official Kindle app for iOS and Android. Professional narration is available for more than 45,000 Kindle books and growing—including popular best-sellers from an array of genres. You can easily add professional narration to your favorite Kindle books with one click using Matchmaker (www.amazon.com/matchmaker), a service that scans your Kindle library to find which of your Kindle books have a companion Audible version available. Audio upgrades are available for as little as $0.99, with upgrades to bestsellers like the Outlander series and The Hunger Games series available for as little as $3.99. Whispersync actually gives you discounts on the audiobook edition if you already have the Kindle book. This allows for a few dollars in savings if you want to take advantage of Whispersync for Voice, but sadly there is no bundling program yet to buy both at a lower price. The new Kindle app is available via iOS and the Good e-Reader App Store. Amazon Integrates WhisperSync for Voice into Kindle for Android is a post from: Good e-Reader |
Avoid the summer slide with Teachers Notebook and OverDrive
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To combat the summer slide, it is important for parents and guardians to carve out some time every day for children to do educational activities or read. Teachers Notebook (TeachersNotebook.com) and OverDrive can help keep children's minds active over the summer months with free educational activities and eBooks. AvoidTheSummerSlide.com is packed with free educational games and activities for children. You can start your search by grade and subject and then browse for more at Teachers Notebook. These educational activities are available in a wide range of subjects from science to social studies, so you are sure to find an activity that is so fun it doesn't feel like learning! Reading is also important for children over the summer. Children can lose more than two months' worth of reading skills during summer break, and they struggle when they head back to school in the fall if they haven't picked up a book all summer. To make reading fun, why not check out an eBook from your local library through OverDrive? Several libraries are now equipped with a kids' or teens' eReading room, which is a custom version of the website filled with titles just for kids and teens.  |
Kindle Apps Get Audiobook Integration and Lots of Other New Features
| Amazon has released major updates to their Kindle reading apps today. Amazon issued a press release announcing the biggest change: Audible integration. Kindle reading apps now support audiobooks, aka Whispersync for Voice. This feature was previously only available on the latest line of Kindle Fire tablets. Now all the Kindle reading apps have the ability […] |
MagPi issue 24, out now!
| The MagPi’s a little late this month, but it’s full of good things. The MagPi is the free magazine for Raspberry Pi enthusiasts, written, typeset and edited by the community for the community. This month’s issue has plenty for Pi fans of all levels to get their teeth into.  Click the image to visit The MagPi We’re biased, but our favourite article this month is the interview with our very own Carrie Anne Philbin about Picademy, our free teacher training courses, where she talks a lot about the Raspberry Pi Foundation’s approach to education. And our hearts went pitter-patter when we saw the Wolfram Language-powered spectrophotometer from Robert J LeSuer, which can be used to calibrate colours: in this instance Robert is using it to make sure his watermelon punch is precisely the correct shade of red. There’s the final instalment in Michael Petersen's Weather Balloon series, a project from Daniel Pelikan which turns your Raspberry Pi into an oscilloscope, and much more. The MagPi is a free download: the volunteers on the project donate their time and skill every month for free, and we are very grateful to them. If you’d like a printed magazine, we’re selling the MagPi’s Kickstarted binders of the first nineteen issues in the Swag Store: get them while they’re hot!
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Monday, June 9, 2014
Top 10 Blackberry Apps of the Week – June 9 2014
| The Blackberry Playbook is woefully underserved and little to no new apps come out on a weekly basis. Blackberry 10 on the other hand does get a ton of support, but few popular apps actually get released. Good e-Reader spends a great deal of time converting apps, testing and posting the ones that work the best. Today, we look at the top new apps to be released via Good e-Reader. Ace of Tennis - A really great tennis game with cartoony graphics and dynamic gameplay. It feels like something that would have done really well on the Nintendo 64. Wikipedia Beta – You can install Wikipedia Beta alongside your current version of Wikipedia for Android, so you can test our new features before they go live for all Wikipedia for Android users. Your feedback will help us fix bugs and decide what features to focus on next. Pinball Deluxe - Each of the tables have unique features and play very differently. Will you be able to unlock the 4-bit matrix classic minigame for each table? You will be rewarded for your quick reflexes with plenty of action. Make sure to try our Brix table where you smash destructible bricks in an ever increasing challenge – or be the sheriff in Wild West. Now with Multiplayer & Tournaments by Grantoo! E3 2014 - The Official Show App of E3 2014, which takes place June 10-12 in Los Angeles. Explore the E3 exhibitor list, navigate the show floor with our interactive floor plan, share with your social networks, and stay up-to-date with all things E3 – all from the palm of your hand. Aircraft Combat 1942 - Have you ever imagined that you could use clever strategy in air combat game to get much much more fun? FTBpro – The Soccer News App - Do you eat, drink and sleep soccer? The FTBpro news app is a must have for every soccer fan and sport lover. Mini Toss – Ka-boom, the explosive world of Mini Toss is here! With dozens of maps to master, unlimited costumes, super-charged weapons, and powerful attacks – Mini Toss will literally blow you away! What are you waiting for? Join the adventure today! Step In The Line - A very exciting and creative game, you can play it a finger. Drag to move the dots, you must drag dots to stay in the line. Angry Birds Seasons – Angry Birds Seasons takes the captivating gameplay of the original to a whole new level! From Halloween to Chinese New Year, the birds are celebrating different festive seasons around the world! With more than 300 levels and regular free updates, these special episodes offer more challenging levels of pig-popping action and golden eggs to discover. Instagram – This app ONLY works on the Z10 or other BB10 devices and not the Playbook. You cannot make NEW accounts with this version, you can only log into existing accounts. Top 10 Blackberry Apps of the Week – June 9 2014 is a post from: Good e-Reader |
miBuk ILUSION Available Soon in Spain
| The e-Reader market is certainly stabilizing in North America and the UK, with only a handful of established players in the market and little to no alternatives available. Spain is one country where the e-reading revolution is starting to just take off and this year a number of new devices have become available. The Papyre 630, Szenio DC 1600 and miBuk ILUSION are all vying for readers attention. The miBuk ILUSION features a six inch e-Ink Pearl display screen with a resolution of 800×600. It will do a fine job in reading your standard eBooks, but might struggle with more high-definition content, such as PDF magazines and newspapers. Underneath the hood is a Allwinner Processor E200 processor, 4 GB of storage and an SD card to 32GB of additional memory. When it comes to modern e-readers, they often forgo built in audio or speakers because they need to be able to offer their devices as cheap as possible. The ILUSION actually has an external speaker and a 3.5mm headphone jack to listen to tunes in MP3, WMA, FLAC, AAC, WAV, OGG, DTS, AMR formats. This reader is going to be available in the next few weeks via the Wonderelectronics website and is retailing for €89.00. The good thing is, this is not just relevant in Spain, but does have compatibility with English, and Portuguese, French. miBuk ILUSION Available Soon in Spain is a post from: Good e-Reader |
Indigo Flounders as Tech and Lifestyle Gambit Fails
| Indigo bet big in 2013 with their gravitational shift from selling books to peddling pillows, wine glasses and gourmet chocolate. They also devoted significant square footage in each store to Indigo Tech and made agreements with Apple, Beats and companies involved in wearables. The gambit has failed, as the largest bookseller in Canada posted a loss of over 31 million dollars last year. Indigo's annual loss was $31-million compared to net earnings of $4.3-million last year. Annual revenue slid 1.3% to $868-million for the fiscal year compared with revenue of $879-million in the prior year, when the company had five more stores. Bookselling in Canada is best seller dependant, and little books of note matched the scope of Fifty Shades and Hunger Games in fiscal 2013. e-Reader sales have also declined with perennial favorite Kobo seeing lackluster demand. Indigo has a veritable monopoly in Canada with their chain of Chapters bookstores. You would figure they would be swimming in cash with little to no competition, but sadly this is not the case. Booknet Canada recently reported that sales across the total market in 2013 were down by 3.41% compared to 2012. However, some categories were stronger in 2013 than the previous year: unit sales increased by 5.57% for juvenile nonfiction and 21.91% for biography and autobiography. In addition, sales figures in The Canadian Book Market do not include ebook sales, nor online sales of print books, so the overall book market may be healthier than reflected.Although Indigo suffered some big loses, the company is still bullish on their future. "In an industry which is world-wide experiencing meaningful sales declines, we are pleased with the customer response to all our transformation efforts, with the sales performance, and with the potential for further growth and profitability moving forward," said chief executive officer Heather Reisman in a statement released by the company. Indigo Flounders as Tech and Lifestyle Gambit Fails is a post from: Good e-Reader |
Facebook Briefly Launches Snapchat Competitor: Slingshot
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Slingshot behaves very much like the already popular Snapchat: the modern day digital equivalent of “I’ll show you mine if you show me yours.” You take a photo or video and broadcast it out to your friends –if they want to see it, they need to send you something first (in return, but ahead of time… if that makes sense). Once they unlock your transmission, a button in the app lets them react to what you’ve sent. Social media addicts love this spontaneous approach to sharing life’s little moments, others of us wonder just how many more ‘spur of the moment’ shots of their latest meal we can take. Because this slip-up happened prior to the actual launch of the app, it isn’t known for certain whether we will also see Slingshot for Android. Facebook Briefly Launches Snapchat Competitor: Slingshot is a post from: Good e-Reader |
Next Big Book Innovates with Big Data
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Next Big Book, the winner of this year’s Startup Challenge at BookExpo America, has been taking an in-depth look at artists and public engagement for years. Beginning with its roots in the music industry under its sister entity Next Big Sound, the company essentially tracks multiple sources of data based on current trends and actions that correlate to a specific author and his work. Next Big Book’s Alex White spoke to Good e-Reader about what publishers can learn from tracking this kind of online reference, specifically as it relates to their first major customer, Macmillan, who signed a three-year deal with the company. “What we’re doing is combining all the public social data for every author and title, with our customers’ private sales numbers–paper and digital–to help them understand which social signal are leading indicators of their sales numbers and which marketing events were able to reliably drive social and sales numbers.” In other words, Next Big Book helps publishers know which of their efforts are paying off both in terms of actual book sales and in reader buzz through social media. “We started five years ago in the music industry, and we supported tens of thousands of artists and managers and labels. We believe very strongly in the power of data to transform industry. We’re trying to figure out the timing and technical challenges behind releasing the marketing dashboard we built with Macmillan to any author or book publisher. The issue is really around the sales data, and since we are not working with the retailers directly, the only way to get this data is with the publisher.” Macmillan is considering using their dashboard directly with the agents and authors, so new features and functionalities are expected as authors give their feedback, which Next Big Book can incorporate in a scaled roll out. At this time, there’s no simple solution to providing this kind advanced metrics to indie authors due to the difficulty of building a dashboard for every single individual. “It would take as much work to integrate a single author as it does a major publishing house, so the economics don’t quite make sense. We’re still trying to figure that out.”
Next Big Book Innovates with Big Data is a post from: Good e-Reader |
Podcast: New Nook Tablets, Audiobook Industry, InkedIN and Amazon Hachette Updates
| Welcome back to a jampacked edition of the Good e-Reader Radio Show with Michael Kozlowski and Jeremy Greenfield of Digital Book World. Today on the show we talk about the new Samsung and Barnes and Noble tablet partnership, and what it means for the bookseller going forward. Also on the show is a riveting discussion on YA Books and why Adults are reading them in record droves. The Audiobook industry is currently worth over two billion dollars globally, which is a far cry from $450 million in 1997. Publishers are wanting to accelerate growth further and we discuss how they intend on making it happen. Amazon has announced a new mobile subscription platform today, S&S has announced a new social network and Entitle has developed a new Christian solution. This is a great show with lots of excellent discussion, check it out! Podcast: New Nook Tablets, Audiobook Industry, InkedIN and Amazon Hachette Updates is a post from: Good e-Reader |
RosettaBooks Goes Mobile with New E-Book App
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Unfortunately, you cannot use the app to make purchases as it does not support direct sales, but you can review excerpts and information about the authors and follow links to the digital publishers’ retail partners if your interest is raised. This ‘lack of feature’ is a bit frustrating, because while the app is quite easy to use with a nicely responsive interface –there is no quick and easy way to purchase a title once you are enticed by the sample chapter (it requires some hunting around, clicking the information button for the book and then knowing to click ‘View More’ from a secondary screen which then takes you to an outside website that will then finally link you to the website you can buy it from). If you think of this app as a convenient way to electronically ‘browse the aisles’ of your favourite bookstore, you will be in a literary happy-place. RosettaBooks Goes Mobile with New E-Book App is a post from: Good e-Reader |
Amazon Introduces Digitial Subscriptions with Mobile Payment System
| Amazon has been offering 3rd parties to login and pay with their Amazon accounts for around a year now. The Seattle based company has quietly introduced a new feature that may play into the new phone they are going to announce in the next few weeks. Amazon currently has over 240 million active users that have their credit card details stored in the Amazon system. The new program will allow customers to pay for services such as a monthly phone bill or a digital music subscription. Amazon then charges a fee on each transaction. Amazon getting into the recurring subscription arena will certainly contend with PAYPAL, who dominates this medium. The big downside about Paypal is that they are not crowdfunding friendly and tends to hold and freeze funds indiscriminately, sometimes making people wait six months to see their money restored. One benefit to Kindle Fire and Kindle e-Reader customers is that you can take out a digital newspaper or magazine subscription and pay by the month. It will also allow you to pay for services such as Pandora, Spotify or Beats on a monthly basis. In the next few weeks Amazon is poised to reveal their smartphone that has 3D elements and many cameras. Many industry experts are agreeing that you might be able to pay your phone bill using the new Amazon subscription system. Instead of paying the phone company in the traditional sense, you would be throwing down with Amazon to simplify your life and keep all of your purchases in one place.
Amazon Introduces Digitial Subscriptions with Mobile Payment System is a post from: Good e-Reader |
Penguin Canada eBooks Now Available for Canadian Public Libraries!
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In addition to the selection of Canadian authors, Penguin Canada also offers well known titles from other countries. Are you a fan of the Millennium series? I definitely am, and now The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and its two sequels are available as well. Can't keep suspenseful mystery on your (virtual) shelves? Nicci French's tales are right up your alley. Or check out some of the truly great novels from John le Carre including Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy which was also made into a movie blockbuster. Summer is here and in full swing, and with the addition of Penguin Canada, you can give your patrons something to fill their eReaders with for those long trips to the cottage, the beach, or wherever the road takes them! Please click on the links below to see the great selections of titles in Marketplace or contact your Collection Development Specialist. We are always here to help! Penguin Canada – Canadian Authors PenguinCA – Big Names, Big Books
*Geographical rights may vary by title. Kate Seivertson is a Collection Development Analyst at OverDrive.  |
Hachette to Cut 3% of US Staff
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According to a statement issued by the company: “”Today, we had to make some difficult changes at HBG as part of a cost-savings initiative that will improve our company’s resilience to a changing marketplace and position HBG for future growth. Unfortunately, these changes mean that some of our colleagues will be leaving the company.” On the one hand, now that the industry has a firm grip on ebook publication, digital rights, and other aspects associated with the digital publishing boom, there may very well be positions that are no longer as necessary as before. The teams of professionals that publishers relied upon to create digital editions and to further their social media strategies may be seen as superfluous in a publishing climate that has its digital legs under it. However, in spite of the announcement that this move has nothing to do with the ongoing negotiations with Amazon, this has been a trying and expensive time for traditional publishing houses. Apart from the growing sentiment that self-publishing may lead to better returns and longer careers, there’s the recent costly settlement over allegations of price fixing to contend with, as well as the loss of untold amounts due to Amazon’s removal of pre-order buttons on Hachette titles, and their refusal to sell or deliver certain HBG titles under their contract matter is resolved. Despite assurances from the publisher, those obstacles were costly and may continue to have lasting impact on not only HBG, but other major publishing houses who are working to stay relevant…and stay open.
Hachette to Cut 3% of US Staff is a post from: Good e-Reader |
Lowther Hall gives window shopping a new twist
| Imagine ambling down a street lined with stores, looking at all the window displays. You can do this whether stores are open or closed, but if you want to actually get something, the store has to be open and you have to have money. Now imagine you can get what you want, for free. And right away. Window shopping just got a whole lot more enticing, right? Lowther Hall Anglican Grammar School in Australia has transformed their Library Resource Center windows into “virtual library shelves” by decorating them with book covers. Now that would be enough to grab my attention, but they've taken it one step further and added QR codes on the covers so that students can scan them with their smart phone or tablet. They're then taken directly to the title's details page on their school's OverDrive digital library, where students are able to easily borrow the title. Lowther Hall has seen an increase in checkouts each month in 2014, and giving their students such visible and quick access to their titles has certainly been a big reason why. You can read more about their concept here and see a picture here. Do you have any creative ideas that have helped your students get the most out of your digital library? We, along with other schools, would love to hear about them. Now, if there was only a way to bring free window shopping to the dessert industry…  |
James Bond villain-style alarm clock for the deaf
| A quick post today: I’m in a tearing hurry trying to get our display for today’s UK Technology Industry reception at Buckingham Palace ready, in the face a few awkwardnesses. We’ve got an entire education team and half an engineering team that’s off sick with something we’re calling the Raspberry Flu, and an SD card that corrupted when someone who will not be named yanked the power cable at an awkward moment. Frustrated weeping commenced about thirty minutes ago, but I think we’re going to get everything sorted in time. Here is Kim Wall’s rather magnificent giant deaf alarm. It’s very feature-heavy, with a fire alert, an IRC interface, and the ability to hook up to other things around the house like the doorbell and phone. I’ve spent ages using my Google-fu to try to find out more information about it, but sadly all we’ve been able to come up with is this video, and the explanatory text next to it on YouTube: Over at YouTube, Kim says:
We’d love to learn more about your setup, Kim; if you’re reading this, please drop us an email! |
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