| Are Amazon Fire and Kindle e-reader owners suffering from fatigue? It seems every month the Seattle based company is hyping some deal to get their base of customers to upgrade their devices. Valentines Day is no different and there is some big deals to be had $79 Kindle for just $59 $119 Kindle Paperwhite for $99 $99 Fire HD 6 for $84 $139 Fire HD 7 for $114 $149 Fire HD 6 Kids Edition for $134 $189 Fire HD 7 Kids Edition for $164 Fire phone is available unlocked with a no contract price of $199 (starting on 2/11) Amazon has Mad Deals on e-Readers and Tablets Right Now is a post from: Good e-Reader |
Tuesday, February 10, 2015
Amazon has Mad Deals on e-Readers and Tablets Right Now
Scribd Adds 10k Comics & Graphic Novels to Subscription Service
| The rising tide of ebook subscription services has been gaining ground lately with more and more major publishers getting onboard with the idea. Scribd has been doing their part to expand on their monthly subscription service, which costs $8.99 per month. Over the past three months they’ve added audiobooks, signed with Macmillan to bring in […] |
You can add Teacher’s Notebook materials to your Marketplace cart
| One of the best ways to get your faculty excited about your digital library is to ask your teachers what titles they'd like for their classes. Having your teachers (and students) assist in collection development is a surefire way to increase usage and promotion of your collection. But did you know that in addition to purchasing your eBooks and audiobooks in Marketplace, you can also get 100% teacher created lesson plans and classroom activities from Teacher's Notebook as well? Teacher's Notebook has thousands of educational resources available, including novel review materials and interactive activities for sale within Marketplace. With collections ranging from language arts, math, science, social studies and more, this newly available catalog is perfect for your classroom. Your teachers can even earn money by opening up a shop of their own! When you add titles for your teachers, you can sort them into a special section on your school OverDrive-hosted website called the Teachers' Lounge. That way, it is easy for teachers to find what they are looking for. Ask your Account Specialist for more information about adding Teachers' Lounge to your digital library today. Adam Sockel is a Social Media Specialist at OverDrive |
Amazon Launches Giveaway Tool
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The program allows users to set up giveaways of any of the eligible items on Amazon, including self-published titles. At the time of this writing, though, ebook titles (even those posted through both KDP and KDP Select) were not automatically included, although print counterparts were. The user selects the item, clicks the Giveaway button towards the bottom of the sales page, and walks through the process on-screen. There are variables to choose, such as how many items to give away, how to select the winner, and whether or not the entrant must follow the host on Twitter before entering. Unfortunately, users have already experienced a flaw, one that will hopefully be worked out soon. On giveaways that require a Twitter follow to enter, one user pointed out that following the account also resulted in favoriting that account. This turned on notifications automatically when using an Android phone. Overall, the process is quick and fairly inexpensive. But keep in mind as authors that you will be purchasing your own print editions at full retail cost on Amazon in order to participate in the giveaway, not at your CreateSpace author price or the discount offered by other print on demand services. While this still results in a royalty, that amount is far, far lower on a print edition than on an ebook. Your $10 investment can end up returning only a dollar or two. But as one critic has pointed out, it’s the cost of doing business…or buying Twitter followers, however you look at it. The important thing will be remembering to leverage all the followers you just paid for by sharing personal, focused content on your Twitter feed in the days immediately following your giveaway.
Amazon Launches Giveaway Tool is a post from: Good e-Reader |
Raspberry Pi Weather Station for schools
| When I first joined the Raspberry Pi Foundation, over a year ago now, one of my first assignments was to build a weather station around the Raspberry Pi. Thanks to our friends at Oracle (the large US database company), the Foundation received a grant not only to design and build a Raspberry Pi weather station for schools, but also to put together a whole education programme to go with it. Oracle were keen to support a programme where kids get the opportunity to partake in cross-curricular computing and science projects that cover everything from embedded IoT, through networking protocols and databases, to big data. The goals of the project was ambitious. Between us we wanted to create a weather experiment where schools could gather and access weather data from over 1000 weather stations from around the globe. To quote the original project proposal, students participating in the program will get the opportunity to:
After a year of grafting on hardware prototypes and software development I'm pleased to announce that the final PCB design has been committed to manufacture and we are ready to start pre-registering schools who'd be interested in participating in the programme. We have 1000 weather station kits to give away for free so to find out how your school can be part of this read the rest of this post below, but first some background on the project. If you’ve been on Twitter a lot you’ll have noticed me teasing this since about March last year. Below is a photo of the very first version.
I did a lot of testing to ensure that the components were reliable and wouldn’t become problematic on the software side after a long period of uptime. The goal was to have the Pi controlling everything, so that we could leverage learning opportunity: helping kids to learn about writing code to interface directly with the sensors, as well as displaying and analysing collected data. I settled on the following set of sensor measurements for the weather station:
This seemed like a good enough spread of data. I’m sure some people will ask why not this measurement or why not that. It was important for us to keep the cost of the kit under control; although there is nothing to stop you from augmenting it further yourself. Once that was nailed down I wrote a few lessons plans, and Lance and I trialled them with with two schools in Kent (Bonus Pastor Catholic College and Langley Park School for Boys). BBC Schools Report were on site and recorded a short feature about the day here. We gave the kids one lesson from the scheme of work, showing them how to interface with the anemometer (wind speed sensor) in code. One thing that was clearly apparent was how engaged they were. Once their code was up and running, and was able to measure wind speed correctly, they had a lot of fun seeing who could get the fastest movement out of the sensor by blowing on it (current record is 32 kph, held by Clive “Lungs” Beale). Warning: there is a fainting risk if you let your kids do this too much! We went away from this feeling we were very much on the right track, so we continued to design the scheme of work. I’m also very glad to report that we’re not doing this all on our own! We’ve partnered with the Met Office and OCR Geography to produce the learning resources that will cover understanding how weather systems work and interpreting patterns in the data. The scheme is has been broken down into three main phases of learning resources:
My next task was to take the breadboard prototype and create a PCB test version that we could use in a small trial of 20 or so units. I had not done any PCB design before this. So over the course of a couple of days I learnt how to use a free, open source, PCB design tool called KiCAD. I used a brilliant series of YouTube videos called Getting To Blinky by Contextual Electronics to get to grips with it. Below is my second attempt. This board is what most hardware designers would call a sombrero. The Pi goes in upside down so it’s like a HAT that’s too big! I was aware that it was a huge waste of PCB real-estate. However, for the small volume run we were making, it was a convenient way to mount the board inside a cheap IP65 junction box that I wanted to use as the case. Below is the PCB prototype when first assembled. The little silk screen rain cloud graphic was borrowed from BBC Weather (thanks guys).
You’ll notice there are two boards. The small board marked AIR holds the pressure, humidity and air quality sensors. Since these must be exposed to the air they are at risk of atmospheric corrosion, especially in coastal environments. I wanted to avoid this risk to the Pi and the main board so this is why I split those sensors off to a separate smaller board. Below is how they look inside their respective cases.
The Pi sits inside the water-tight box on the left with M20 grommets to seal the cables going in and out. The AIR board on the right has conformal coating (a spray on protective layer), and is connected to the main board by a short length of cable. There are three large holes on the base of its case to allow the air in. The weather station also needs a reliable network connection for remote monitoring, further code changes, to allow it to upload to Oracle, and to make sure that other computers on your school network can load its web pages. Most importantly it also needs power. So instead of considering large batteries or solar panels I decided to kill two birds with one stone and use power over Ethernet. This allows power and network connectivity to be supplied through a single cable, reducing the number of cable grommets needed. You might be thinking that WiFi is an option for this; however, school WiFi networks are notoriously overloaded with many mobile devices competing for service. So, if you go the same way as me, your school will need a long cable to run from the school building out to the location that you choose for the weather station. This basically means you never have to worry about its power or network connectivity. You are welcome to solve these challenges in your own way though, and this can actually be a very engaging and fun activity for the students to do themselves. Once I had the PCB prototype working I had to get twenty more made and tested. This involved spending hours (it seemed longer) on the Farnell website building up a massive basket of electronic components. When the new boards and components were in my possession we took them down to a local company, EFS Manufacturing, in Cambridge for assembly. Here are the twenty assembled and tested boards:
And here is another layer of the conformal coating spray going onto the AIR boards in the Pi Towers car park. It was a bit smelly and I didn’t want to gas out the office!
You’ll notice there are small bits of sticky tape on there. This is because the conformal coating needs to protect the solder joints on the board, but not block up the air holes on the sensors. This was a bit of a delicate job involving cutting the tape into tiny shapes, waiting for the coating to dry, and peeling it off using a scalpel. So then it was just a matter of assembling the 20 kits with everything required to build a weather station. From the power bricks, rain gauges and wind vanes right down to grommets, screws and rubber washers. The trial participants were chosen by us to give us a coverage of field-trial users, schools and promotional partners. We kept one back to put on the roof of Pi Towers, and the rest were shipped at the end of November last year.
Slowly but surely reports have been coming in about these prototype kits being used in schools and code clubs. Dan Aldred of Thirsk School & Sixth Form College has introduced Weather Wednesdays.
Matthew Manning, who runs the awesome YouTube channel RaspberryPiIVBeginners, made this video about setting his one up: Andrew Mulholland, of Raspi-LTSP fame, has been using one at a Raspberry Jam where he volunteers in Northern Ireland.
James Robinson’s year 10 pupils from Soham Village College have been working through the scheme of work too.
OCR are putting one on their roof, and we’re still trying to acquire permission from the building owners at Pi Towers so we can put ours up on the roof. (Right now it’s operating from an outside window ledge.) Meanwhile, now that I was confident about it, I handed over the electrical schematic of the prototype to our engineering team. They imported it into the professional CAD package that the Raspberry Pi was designed in, and proceeded to make the Weather Board into an official HAT. They have gone through it and essentially reworked everything to the same standard that you would expect from our products. So here it is, feast your eyes. You snap off the one side, and that is the equivalent of the small AIR board on the prototype. If you join our weather station scheme, this is what you will get, along with all the wind vanes, screws and other bits you’ll need. The plan is to mount the HAT onto the Pi using standard 11 mm stand-offs. Those will then mount onto a perspex sheet, and that sheet will screw into the electrical junction box. Nice and cheap. The Raspberry Pi Weather Station kit is a great way to get your pupils involved in a wide range of computing activities whilst undertaking a practical science experiment. There is lots of opportunity for cross-curricular discussion on the science of meteorology, geography and global climate change. You will also get to participate in a global programme with other schools around the world. We have 1000 weather station units to give away to schools that sign up. The supporting educational resources are written in the English language and targeted at students aged around 15-16 years old; however we’re anticipating participation from pupils both younger and older than this. If your school would like to be one of this thousand then please sign up on THIS PAGE. People we would like to thank:
In case you missed it above, here’s the School Sign Up again. |
Viz Manga Adding “Boys Over Flowers, Season 2″
| Viz Manga has announced the next round of manga they’ll be running in their Jump Start initiative, and one is the long-awaited Flowers, Then Sunny Skies; otherwise known as Boys Over Flowers Season 2. The manga serves as a sequel to 1992’s shojo hit. The original Boys Over Flowers follows the life of a sixteen-year-old girl named Tsukushi Makino. She is a poor student at Eitoku Academy, a school for the rich and upper-class, where she is known as the “weed” of the Academy. The school is ruled by a group of handsome, high-society boys known as the “Flower Four,” or the F4. Tsukushi finds herself on the wrong side of the F4 when she becomes the only girl in school who doesn’t immediately fawn over the F4 leader, Tsukasa Domyouji. Boys Over Flowers was a hit from the start, spawning a movie, two live action adaptions, and seven television dramas including a top Korean drama. The author, Yoko Kamio, has done several other manga series since, but is now returning to Eitoku Academy. Season 2 takes place a few years after the graduation of Tsukushi and the F4, bringing all-new charactes to the cast list. It will tell a new story from the familiar setting, but hopefully the readers will still get some hints at how the lives of the old favourites are going. It will begin on February 16th. The issue of Shonen Jump will be running the first three chapters, and after that, a new chapter every two weeks. As Boys over Flowers Season 2 is part of Viz Manga’s Jump Start program, chapter releases will be simultaneous with Japan’s. Anyone who was a fan of Boys Over Flowers, who liked the Korean TV drama, or who enjoys shojo in general will need to read this manga! The original was a staple of the genre, and Season 2 will certainly not disappoint. Viz Manga Adding “Boys Over Flowers, Season 2″ is a post from: Good e-Reader |
Monday, February 9, 2015
My Hero Academia Voted Breakout Manga of 2015
| Da Vinci, a Japanese print media magazine, has worked with Niconico for a second annual survey asking manga readers which series they think will make it’s big break. The only Criteria only included that it must have published up to it’s third volume with the year. From a whopping 27692 responses, My Hero Academia took the top spot and the magazine’s samurai comedy Isobee joined the list! My Hero Academia by Kohei Horikoshi Set in a modern day, except people with special powers have become the norm throughout the world. A Boy named Izuki Midoriya has no powers but he still dreams of becoming a hero. The Ancient Magus Bride by Kore Yamazaki Hatori Chise is only 16 but has lost far more than most. With no family or hope, everything seemed closed off to her until a chance encounter changes everything. A mysterious magus appears before her, offering her a chance she cannot refuse. The Story of Isobe Isobee by Ryo Nakamura Isobe Isobee is a lazy slacker samurai with big dreams. He lives with his mothers who respects him. Lazing around the house and looking at Edo-period pornography without mothers notice, he plans to one day become a respectable samurai! Mr. Nietzsche in the Convenience Store by Hashimoto A dark humor packaged between a friendly grocery store worker and his new dark philosophical coworker. Hinomaru Zumo by Kadawa It is a divine ritual, a martial art, a combat sport, it’s sumo! Ushio and the small sumo club climbs it’s way to the top. The goal: Hinoshita Kaisan! Relife by Sou Yayoi A jobless 27 year old, Kaizaki Arata, fails at every job interview. After meeting Yoake Ryou of the ReLife Research institute, he’s give the chance to take a drug to turn him into a 17 year old and redo one year of high school. Green Worlds by Yusuke Osawa Plants have taken over the planet. In 2017 with the few survivors, they must join an average high school student named Akura as he challenges the plants in a struggle for survival. Helck by Nano Nanaki The demon lord has been defeated and the human world is now at peace. The demon world is now hosting a tournament to host the next king only to find out that one of the contestants is the great hero Helck Chôeki 339 Nen by Tomaka Ise In a world where God’s word is absolute truth, the story follows Haro, a young man who commits a great crime and is imprisoned for 339 years and the tales of his many incarnations. Kasane by Daruma Matsuura Before Kasane’s mother died, she was given a special tube of lipstick. She was told that if times ever got really hard, she should wear it and kiss whatever she truly desires. A blessing in disguise or a curse? Scum’s Wish (Kuzu no Honkai) by Mengo Yokoyari Awaya Mugi and Yasuraoka Hanabi appear to be the ideal couple, though they share a secret no one knows. Both Mugi and Hanabi have unrequited feelings for two different people they could never be with and in turn have come together to soothe their loneliness. Orange by Ichigo Takano One day, Takamiya Naho recieves a letter written to herself from the future. As she reads on, she discovers that her future slef had many regrets and wants to change things, especially regarding Kakeru who Naho finds out is no longer with them in the future. Instant Bullet by Akasaka Aka Everything in this world is his enemy in a worthless world. A demon boy, who has no human heart finds his heart beating quickly when he finds out he must save the world. Though it is the last thing he wants to do. Amaama to Inazuma by Gido Amagakure Inudzuka is a teach who has ben caring on his own for his little daughter after his wife’s death. A series of events lead him one evening to a restaurant run by a mother of one of his students. Feeding them regularly, the three come together to ease their loneliness and cook tasty food together. Puberty Bitter Change by Masayoshi After an accident of falling from a tree, Yuuta and Yui manage to switch bodies with each other. With attempts to switch back failed, they must live each other’s lives in a family that are vastly different from each other. Almost three years pass, how will they cope with their situation as they begin to grow up? Himouto Umaru-chan by Sankaku Head Sixteen year old Umaru is the renowned beautiful girl in town. The perfect sister with a kind heart, though that is what everyone believes. Umaru hides a secret and becomes someone different when she enters her room. Takahashi is Listening by Yuu Houkuou High school idol, Takahashi Ena, has a secret hobby. She often wears headphones, pretending to listen to music when in reality, she is eavesdropping! She particularly likes to listen to her two male classmates banter, though she has to be careful or such a secret could ruin her idol image! Inu Yashiki by Hiroya Oku Inuyashiki has a family, a wife and two kids who do not care about him. After learning he only has three months to live, he realizes the only person to miss him will be his dog. After a crash landing of an alien ship, his body is rebuilt and he has the chance to change his life. Jewel of the country by Haruko Ichikawa In a place inhabited by Jewels that take the form of people Phosphopyllite (Phos) is weak and considered useless among his peers. He recieves an assignment to create an encyclopedia, which begins a journey of self improvement. Girl Meets Bear (Kumamiko) by Masume Yoshimoto In the deeo regions of the Tohouko area, 14 year old Machi and her childhood friend, the talking bears Nats, takes place as Nachi struggles to qualify for city life with Natsu’s assistance. That is a very comprehensive list and voted on by a super hardcore manga fan-base. If you are looking for something new to read, you should look into it. My Hero Academia Voted Breakout Manga of 2015 is a post from: Good e-Reader |
Overdrive Starts Marketing Digital Magazines and Newspapers to Libraries
| Overdrive is getting into the digital magazine and newspaper business, which was the last major vertices that now makes them an all in one solution. The company has announced that conjunction with Barnes and Noble there is now more than 1,000 issues available for libraries in the US and UK to incorporate into their collections. The collection includes the best coverage of the top 200 circulating U.S. magazines such as Glamour, Better Homes and Gardens, The New Yorker, Reader's Digest, WIRED, Bon Appétit and more! Libraries until this point have been having to deal with 3rd party companies such as Pressreader and Zinio if they wanted magazines and newspapers. This means the patron has to install more apps if they want to borrow this type of content, sometimes two or three, depending on the branch. Overdrive has the sole distinction of being the only all in one solution in the library space. They have audiobooks, e-books, magazines, music, newspapers, and videos. Things aren’t all sunshine and rainbows though, Overdrive with so much content makes navigating and purchasing content difficult. They also charge more money than their competitors, which is why budget conscious libraries often deal with many different companies for more specialized content. It is important to note that this service is only available in the US and UK and likely will never expand. This is because Overdrive is basically distributing the content from Barnes and Noble. The bookseller lacks worldwide rights to distribute content outside these two counties, so libraries located in Australia and Canada are out of luck. Overdrive Starts Marketing Digital Magazines and Newspapers to Libraries is a post from: Good e-Reader |
Viz Media Unveils Digital Manga Starter Bundles
| Viz Media is offering digital Manga updates with new series debuts as well as promotional Digital Manga starter bundles this February! Updates will include the launch of several thrilling manga series as well as new volume releases of many continuing titles including several popular series finales will you not want to miss. A new opportunity Viz Media is offering, is for readers to take advantage of the new Digital Manga Starter Bundle Promotion. This offers readers an opportunity to dive into opening volumes from a wide collection of acclaimed manga series. The sale is only available for a limited time during February 9th to February 28th via http://www.vizmanga.com/ as well as the Comixology platform, so act fast! Each bundle contains multi-title opening volumes that have been sampled from Viz Media imprints including Shonen Jump, Shonen Sunday and Shojo Beat. The bundles will include volume 1 editions at great savings over the digital MSRPs. Readers can also mark Valentine’s Day with the Shojo Beat Digital Valentine’s sale! It will offer unique bundles collecting entire runs of several ‘Slice of life" romantic titles by some of the Shojo genre’s most celebrated creators including Chika Umino (Honey & Clover), Io Sakisaka (Strobe Edge) and Hinako Ashihara (Sand Chronicles) Readers can enjoy all these manga titles that are available on http://www.vizmanga.com/ and the VIZ MANGA app for Android and IOS devices. Manga’s can also be purchased through the Nook, Kindle, Kobo, Comixology, ibooks and Googleplay stores! With all the available platforms, fans can have the opportunity to explore and enjoy a massive catalogue! New February Digital Manga Series Debuts are as follows! Honey Blood Vol. 1, Rated "T" for Teens, Digital MSRP: $6.99 (US/CAN), AVAILABLE NOW After an attack of a girl from her high school, rumours have it was a vampire. High school student Hinata Sorazono refuses to believe in the existence of vampires until she meets her new neighbor, that is. Junya Tokinaga, an author for an incredibly popular vampire romance novel, she begins to suspect he may be a vampire, and worse yet, possibly the culprit! The One I love (Single Volume), Rated ‘T’ for Teens, Digital MSRP: $4.99 (US/CAN), Available February 10th A unique 12-story anthology dives into the creator’s intimate lives and passions. CLAMP brings you a beautiful story that deals with the matters of insecurity and honesty, marriage and independence, writing about a subject CLAMP knows best- love. Wish Vol. 1, Rated ‘T’ for Teens, Digital MSRP $4.99 (US/CAN), Available February 17 Another dynamic series from CLAMP, on a moonlit night, Shuichiro saves an angel who finds herself stuck in a tree. As a reward, the angel will grant him a wish to repay his generosity to which Shuichiro replies, "I need no wish, I can get what I want on my own." But they both soon discover that some wishes cannot be fulfilled alone. Someday’s Dreamers Vol. 1 Rated ‘T’ for Teens, Digital MSRP: $4.99 (US/CAN), Available February 24 Yume wants nothing more than to follow in her mother’s footsteps and become a magic user. Though her intentions are pure, she goes about it the wrong way, but innocently practicing her magic on others. Helping a struggling soccer player, the wrongly incarcerated and a student who wants to show his lunar obsessed teacher an eclipse. Follow Yume in this coming of age story filled with genuine imagination and passion as she learns that true magic in life comes from within. FRESH JUMP Bundle • Promo MSRP $9.99 • All You Need is Kill Volume. 1 JUMP CLASSIC Bundle • Promo MSRP $9.99 • Bleach, Volume. 1 SHONEN SUNDAY Bundle • Promo MSRP $9.99 • Arata: The Legend, Volume. 1 SHOJO BEAT Bundle • Promo MSRP $9.99 • Library Wars, Volume. 1 There will also be additional digital manga updates that will include updates to 19 popular continuing series. Some of the included, not to be missed series finales include Happy Marriage?! (Volume 10), Nura: Rise of the Yokai Clan (volume 26), Mad Love Chase (Volume 5) Duklyon Clamp School Defenders (Volume 2) and The Third (Volume 2). Most manga volumes are available for purchase and download within the US and Canada within the Viz Mana App starting from only $4.99 each. Readers also have the option to preview the first chapter from every series before committing to the purchase! For more information please visit http://www.vizmanga.com/ or http://www.viz.com/apps Viz Media Unveils Digital Manga Starter Bundles is a post from: Good e-Reader |
Energy Sistem PRO e-Reader Review
| Energy Sistem, a Spanish tech brand has been developing e-readers for the last four years. The company has just released a new range of e-Readers that will appeal to varied demographic of users. The Energy Energy Reader PRO is the high end model and will likely have the most traction. The Energy Reader PRO features a six inch e-Ink Pearl HD display with a resolution of 1024×758 pixels. It has a touchscreen, which makes it easy to click and navigate around the UI or just simply flip the pages in your favorite e-Book. It also incorporates a front-lit screen that allows users to read in the dark. Underneath the hood is a ARM Cortex A9 1.0Ghz dual core processor and 8 GB of internal memory. It also has the option to expand the memory up to 64GB with a SD/SDHC card. There are physical page turn buttons on the left and right hand side of the e-reader. This will appeal to people who like the tectonic feel of physical buttons or often hold their reader in one hand while commuting and exclusively using the touchscreen does not make practical sense. Flipping pages is quick and robust, but there is a noticeable flickering of the e-ink page, due to the older screen tech the PRO is employing. The one hardware feature I really like is the inclusion of audio. There is a 3.5mm headphone jack, but no external speakers. Unlike anything issued by Amazon, Barnes and Noble or Kobo you can actually listen to music or audiobooks with the Energy Sistem PRO. The audiobook quality is fair, it really depends on what kind of headphones you are using. Software The Energy Sistem PRO is running Google Android 4.0 and will be upgraded to 4.4 in the near future. The fact that it runs Android is likely the biggest selling point. It allows users to basically install any Android app that they want. This is important because there is no integrated bookstore on the reader, so if you want to get new content you need apps. There is no dedicated app store bundled on the PRO, but Gmail and Dropbox come installed. Users will have to download the app store of their choice, such as Amazon, 1Mobile or Good e-Reader. This will open up a new world of content so you can buy books from any major retailer and even install your favorite comic book, manga or PDF reading apps. Wrap Up This e-reader is a solid investment. The stock e-reading app allows for a ton of customization features to change the font size or even change the font type altogether. There are 500 free e-books in around 7 different languages, so no matter where you live you can start e-reading right away. Hardware wise, there is enough internal memory that you don’t need to buy an SD card right away. I think this e-reader will appeal to the mid to advanced user that wants a heavily customizable e-reader and doesn’t want to spend an arm and an leg. Android allows a heavy amount of flexibility to deal with the e-book ecosystem of your choice, but also ups the versatility.
Energy Sistem PRO e-Reader Review is a post from: Good e-Reader |
OverDrive Now Offers 1000+ Popular Magazines and Newspapers
| Early last October, OverDrive and Barnes & Noble’s Nook Media announced a new partnership to bring digital magazines and newspapers to public libraries for lending. That prospect has finally come to fruition as OverDrive officially announced today that periodicals are now available for libraries to purchase and add to their collections for lending to patrons. […] |
Stop the presses! OverDrive now offers popular magazines and newspapers
| We are excited to announce that we, along with Barnes & Noble NOOK®, now offer more than 1,000 popular magazines and newspapers for digital lending through our library partners in the U.S. and U.K. The collection includes the best coverage of the top 200 circulating U.S. magazines such as Glamour, Better Homes and Gardens, The New Yorker, Reader's Digest, WIRED, Bon Appétit and more! Now patrons can enjoy their favorite periodicals on all popular devices. Readers will experience the best-in-class user experience of the free NOOK® reading apps and the visually stunning magazines and newspaper layouts. All your patrons need is a library card, a NOOK® account and the free NOOK® app. Best of all, you won't need to add an additional platform. Readers access this service on the same website as they do with your OverDrive eBooks, audiobooks and streaming video. And to get started, we're including a special introductory offer: Add periodicals now and take advantage of 40% off access fees through March 31, 2015. Login to Marketplace today to order periodicals for your library or school. For more information about OverDrive Periodicals, visit our Periodicals page or contact your Collection Development Specialist. |
Kindle Valentine’s Deals: $99 Paperwhite, $59 Kindle, More
| Amazon is currently running a Valentine’s Day sale on select Kindle ebook readers and Fire tablet devices. The deal is valid from now until February 15th—the 14th is Valentine’s Day—for the devices listed below except the 8.9-inch Fire HDX. That deal ends tonight. E Ink Kindles Kindle for $59.00 – $20 off the regular price […] |
Is Kobo About to Release New eBook Readers?
| There are a few signs that point to a possibility that Kobo is getting set to release a couple of new ebook readers. An announcement could happen as soon as tomorrow. Something is going to happen tomorrow, that much is certain. Kobo posted the above image on Facebook, with a quote that says “Check back […] |
Xenon Death Flash: a free physics lesson
| If you own a Raspberry Pi 2, congratulations: you’re also the proud owner of an elegant demonstration of the photoelectric effect! At the weekend, Peter Onion, a veteran of our forums and of Raspberry Jams in Cambridge, Bletchley and surrounding areas (visible, costumed, in the background of this photo at the Christmas CamJam), discovered what we think might be the most adorable bug we’ve ever come across. The Raspberry Pi 2 is camera-shy. Peter’s bug report came via our forums. He’d been proudly photographing his new Raspberry Pi 2, and had discovered something peculiar: every time the flash on his camera went off, his Pi powered down.  The blip you’re seeing here is what happens when you point a xenon flash at a Pi 2. Jonathan has spent much of the morning emitting flashes and poking an oscilloscope. We’ve found out what’s going on, and the good news is that it’s completely benign: your Pi will not suffer any permanent effects from being flashed at. More good news: the effect only happens under VERY specific circumstances. Flashes of high-intensity, long-wave light – so laser pointers or xenon flashes in cameras – cause the device that is responsible for regulating the processor core power (it’s the chip marked U16 in the silkscreening on your Pi 2, between the USB power supply and the HDMI port – you can recognise it because it’s a bit shinier than the components around it) to get confused and make the core voltage drop. Importantly, it’s ONLY really high-intensity bursts like xenon flashes and laser pointers that will cause the issue. Other bright lights – even camera flashes using other technologies – won’t set it off. You can take your naked Pi 2 in the sunshine for a picnic or take it to a rave, and it’ll be perfectly solid. Just don’t take it on the red carpet at the Oscars. Jon is currently shining an 1800-lumen led light at a Pi 2 on his desk: not a wobble. This component that’s causing the issue is in a WL-CSP package: a bare silicon die which has solder balls attached. This is a picture of the underside of a similar package (enormously magnified) – each circle is a minuscule ball of solder: WL-CSP packaging is a common technique for more high-tech electronics parts, as it means no further packaging of the device is required. It is also the smallest physical package possible, which designers of mobile things (and people making very tiny computers) really care about. What’s causing the component to behave so oddly? It’s the photoelectric effect, where metals emit electrons when hit by light. The video below is a really good tutorial on how that works. What you’re seeing with Pi 2 and xenon flashes is the same effect, but in semiconductor material, not metal. Semiconductors, like metals, have free electrons which can be ‘knocked off’ by photons. Photodiodes, solar cells and phototransistors all use this effect to function. If you’d like to learn more about how a solar cell works, there’s a nice explanation here at Physics.org. Silicon junctions (the types that are responsible for making diodes and transistors and other such electronic miracles function) can be ‘upset’ by this photoelectric effect if it is large enough (enough light of the right energy [i.e. colour] is fired at them). This seems to be what is happening to our power supply chip – somewhere in the complex silicon chip circuitry there are some transistors or diodes that malfunction when hit by high energy bursts of light, causing the power supply to ‘drop out’, so the Pi reboots. Jonathan is actively investigating exactly what happens when U16 is flashed with a high energy pulse from a xenon flash tube, and we are also looking at possible ways to make future production Pis immune to this issue if we can – we know you like to take pictures of them. We have found no evidence that ‘flashing’ your Pi2 with a xenon flash can cause any real damage, but we still don’t recommend doing it (it will crash or reboot, and this means you may corrupt your SD card). I’ve said it above, but it bears repeating, because I’ve seen some of you mention this in the forums and in comments sections elsewhere: common everyday light sources – e.g. bright sunlight, indoor lighting, angry cyclists – don’t cause this to happen, so please don’t worry! If you need to use your Pi 2 in a situation where it might be flashed at, our advice is to cover U16 (make sure you get the sides too) – the current easy fix is to use a small blob of Sugru or Blu-Tak covering the whole component (someone in the forums used a pellet of bread: the first yeasted bug fix we have encountered), or simply put the Pi in an opaque case. Secretly, I’m kind of hoping for another (similarly benign) bug this abstruse. I love writing this sort of post. |
Digital Content Adds New Layer of Relevance to Libraries
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Part of that shift includes a wider adoption of digital content, and not just through the industry mainstays like OverDrive or 3M. New opportunities through periodical platforms like Next Issue, PressReader, and Zinio, as well as ebook catalogs through Freading, Boopsie, and Smashwords’ unprecedented distribution agreement with OverDrive have meant that not only do libraries have options for providing relevant formats to their patrons, but they also have competitive choices that can lead to better budget options. In an article for The-Dispatch.com, one library explained the options to patrons thanks to increased access to affordable digital content. “I found that in comparing some of the titles from the independent publishers were offered in the library’s NC Digital Library, several had waiting lists, and were also in Freading where they could be checked out with no delay,” said Library Director Ruth Ann Copley. “With Freading, patrons will never find an ebook in use and unavailable. “We certainly need and want to continue to invest and participate in the NC Digital Library consortium where our patrons have access to so many best-sellers and popular titles in ebooks and audiobooks from those ‘Big Five Publishers’ and their subsidiaries as well as other publishers. Not only have we invested in content in this consortium since 2005, but we have benefited from the continued investment and continued growth of the collection thanks to ongoing contributions of the 19 other member library systems. Freading is a means of enhancing our readers’ borrowing powers and giving them additional options.” This growth has resulted in an era when 95% of public libraries offer ebook checkouts, and 66% of school libraries offer digital circulation.
Digital Content Adds New Layer of Relevance to Libraries is a post from: Good e-Reader |
School Libraries Vital to Literacy Rates Among Students
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So if we all agree that libraries are important centers of learning and provide services that individuals cannot get elsewhere, even if we ourselves do not make as much effort to visit a library on a regular basis, why is there such a budget problem for libraries? One report coming from Australia’s educational system painted an even more alarming picture. According to the fifth annual Softlink Australian School Library Survey, there is a direct correlation between how well-funded and well-stocked a school library is, and how high the literacy rates and reading performance of the school’s student body are. “It's encouraging that the survey results demonstrate some stabilization of school library budgets in Australia,” Softlink's Managing Director, Nathan Godfrey, said. “Budget allocations have stabilized, however we are not yet seeing any upward trends.” “Many school libraries are operating under lean conditions, which makes it difficult for them to introduce digital innovations and resources which can influence learning and literacy outcomes.” The report went on to investigate commonalities such as the link between highly trained library staff and student success, digital adoption in the schools and book checkouts, and more. Interestingly, mobile device use and after-school access to the libraries’ digital materials played a key role in this year’s findings. According to the report, “This year, 43% of respondents said half or more of their student population owned a personal mobile device (iPod, iPad, smart phone or other tablet) a similar figure to 2013 (44%). The percentage of respondent schools that indicated they provide digital devices to students reduced from 58% in 2013 to 44% in 2014. This corresponded to a higher percentage of respondent schools that encourage BYOD use both inside and outside the classroom (from 14% in 2013 to 24% in 2014). In 2014, 13% reported that they encourage BYOD use at school but only outside the classroom and 19% indicated that personal device usage was not encouraged at their schools'. This year 27% of respondents indicated that they have a BYOT/BYOD strategy. This reflected a substantial increase of schools who have implemented a BYOT/BYOD strategy from 2013, when the result to the same question was 19%.”
School Libraries Vital to Literacy Rates Among Students is a post from: Good e-Reader |
Sunday, February 8, 2015
Has Literature Evolved in the Last Decade? Yes and Here’s Why
| Has literature evolved in the last decade? You would be hard-pressed to tell the difference between a new title written today and one penned at any time period in the last fifty years. A book written in the last decade fundamentally does not feel more modern than a book written twenty or thirty years ago. Mystery, horror, romance all sell really well, and it doesn’t matter when the book was published. Even modern day cyberpunk books don’t feel any different from when William Gibson published his seminal works in the 1980’s. If you were to ask me what has changed, other than common vernacular and writing styles, is censorship in literature. If J.D. Salinger had written The Catcher in the Rye now, it would probably contain certain words he did not dare write back when he wrote his book and it would have made his character Holden Caulfield all the more realistic. The lack of censorship also drives the success of 50 Shades of Grey and the onslaught of Bigfoot porn. I think one of the big changes in literature has been the advent of visual novels and motion books. Unfamiliar with these terms? So is most of the publishing world, lets look closer. Unlike graphic novels or manga, a visual novel is an interactive fiction game, featuring mostly static graphics, most often using anime-style art or occasionally live-action stills (and sometimes video footage). As the name might suggest, they resemble mixed-media novels. Visual novels are an extension of popular anime franchises and do quite well in Japan, where they made up nearly 70% of all PC game sales. Even the most popular and famous Japanese visual novels usually never see a western release; instead they're translated by unofficial fan groups. Where the publishers and game creators do not generate any additional revenue. However visual novels have slowly been garnering popularity on Steam ever since Valve introduced the tagging system. Before visual novels came to steam, they were normally sold directly to customers from the publishers or game studios websites. They sometimes cost over $100 and were made in very limited quantities. Now that publishers are using Steam to distribute their titles, they merely delivered via digital downloads. Visual novels have not sold in huge numbers yet on Steam, but this may change in 2015 as bigger budget titles start to make the crossover. Motion comic books are a relatively new genre and this medium combines elements of print comic books and animation. Individual panels are expanded into a full shot while sound effects, voice acting, and animation are added to the original artwork. The two big players in this space are Marvel with their adaptive audio series and digital start up Madefire. Marvel Unlimited is a platform, which is being billed as the Netflix for comics. It charges customers a low monthly rate and you can read as many comics as you want. In a bid to lure customers over to their platform they developed Adaptive Audio, which is an immersive experience that goes beyond simple loops and creates a pacing of the stories, the pivotal moments in scenes and how certain characters are associated with specific sounds. You can think of it as storytelling device as opposed to just being some music that plays in the background. There is less than a handful of comics using Adaptive Audio, mainly just a bunch of Captain America issues. There is background music in conjunction with sound effects. You can hear a character walking up the stairwell and hear the beeps of a holographic display. Villains are accompanied by ominous overtones and Captain America frames have soaring crescendos. Madefire has apps for every major smartphone, tablet and computer platform. Their motion comics are similar to what Marvel does, but their business model is very interesting. They have leveraged their Motion Book Tool and established a partnership with the art nexus DeviantArt. DeviantArt remains one of the largest digital artist communities, with 26 million registered users and 150,000 daily submissions. Just about everyone in the game art, comic, 2d, and 3d field has used this site at one point or another. Artists who want to take advantage of the new motion tools can apply on the website for it and the first round of 20 comics are LIVE now! Content creators will be able to sell their books both through DeviantArt's own premium content platform and Madefire's existing iOS apps and Flash based internet website. The revenue share program is poised to give the creators 20% of everything sold through all the various platforms. Technology plays a central role in modern literature being fresh and accessible. Fan-fiction used be relegated to zines, but now companies like Wattpad have billions of stories read every single day. There are no barriers in self-publishing and anyone can write about anything and find an audience for it online. New digital distribution methods are changing the game for comics and manga. In the end, are the stories really changing? Is the actual construction of a story on a fundamental level different now from a decade, two decades or even fifty years ago? I would say yes and we can thank the lack of censorship and the proliferation of digital distribution systems to take more risks. Has Literature Evolved in the Last Decade? Yes and Here’s Why is a post from: Good e-Reader |
Hybrid Crowdfunding Blends Two Publishing Paths
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Inkwell, who had taken almost two years to pen his debut novel, turned to self-publishing. “Just because the industry was tired of selling vampires didn’t mean the readers were tired of them!” he explained. That’s the premise behind the hybrid model of crowdfunding in which companies like Inkshares–whose platform is currently hosting the book campaign for Gary Whitta’s first self-published novel–allow the public to fund a book’s production through pre-orders before sending it on to a traditional publishing house. Typically, book crowdfunding has worked like any other type of project funding in which the public is involved. Whether through a multi-dimensional site like Kickstarter or the book-specific platform Pubslush, the readers are able to throw their support towards the creation of a book through what essentially amounts to a pre-order process. But with hybrid models, the function of the pre-publishing support isn’t so much to provide the author with the funds to develop the book, but to demonstrate the interest of a readership to a traditional publisher. There can easily be support and criticism for this type of concept. On the one hand, a major criticism of the traditional publishing industry is that a small pool of tunnel-visioned editors get to decide what the public will read. At the same time, this model gives voice to readers who then have the power to say to that small group of gatekeepers, “I’ve decided that this book is worth it.” Inkshares will serve as a traditional publisher with regards to providing the editorial and publishing services that self-published authors typically have to secure on their own. But in addition to a 50-50 split on the print and the more standard self-publishing royalty of 70% of ebook sales, authors enjoy knowing they have a built-in audience for their work, if they manage to get the backing they need to go to press in the first place.
Hybrid Crowdfunding Blends Two Publishing Paths is a post from: Good e-Reader |
Are e-Book and Print Sales Cycles Different?
| We are living in a digital world where major publishers have firmly embraced the e-book format into their distribution cycle. When a new title is released in hardcover it is immediately available as an e-book. Print books depend on the lucrative holiday season to drive sales, as people tend to buy them as gifts and most big budget novels normally come out in the last three months of the year. Gifting an e-book is difficult, so people tend to buy them just for themselves. Knowing this, is the sales cycle for digital and print really different? Nielsen BookScan is likely the best source for garnering meaningful data on the traditional publishing industry and e-books. The company gleans its e-books data from companies such as Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Books-a-Million. Their print numbers normally stem from bookstores and a myriad of non-traditional book selling outlets such as big department stores or supermarkets. Nielsen condenses the information and then distributes it to major newspapers such as the New York Times. Finally, once all of the hard data crunching is done, they redistribute it back to the same outlets that provided them with the initial data. Everyone in the publishing world knows that print books tend to peak in the last three months of the year and this is where bookstores all over the world tend to see the greatest volume of sales. E-Books, however, seem to peak in the first two quarters of the year, presumably as consumers load up on content to enjoy on the tablet, smartphone or e-reader that they received as a Christmas present. This trend has important implications for how commentators view the book market. Until now, the tradition has been to monitor the health of the book market in January following Christmas sales. This latest data from Nielsen though will prompt publishers and online retailers to compare these two peak quarters more easily, and avoid direct (and possibly unfair) comparison between physical and digital book sales in the final quarter of the year. Hopefully bloggers and industry analysts will cut booksellers like Barnes and Noble a little bit of slack when the company reports their fiscal earnings. Many journalists get all up in arms when they hear that e-book sales have fallen in the holiday quarter and project doom and gloom. e-books and print do a different sales cycle from one another and its important to understand that. Are e-Book and Print Sales Cycles Different? is a post from: Good e-Reader |
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