MetaFilter posts tagged with EBook

Library eBooks Have Arrived!

ZakDaddy — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 20:20:18 -0800

Wow. I was going to say something witty and clever, and I got nothin, so: "The new Web-based Sony Library Finder tool can be used to find e-books in the local library that can be checked out, downloaded onto a desktop computer and then loaded onto a Sony Reader device -- all without charge." [Note - Probably USian] Via Google News and this article. Money quote: "...the New York Public Library said it had 29,000 e-books available in its systems. 'Anything that promotes reading is a good thing,' said a spokeswoman for the library." Could this be a tipping point? I've already got my PRS-505 and love it. It's just good enough to do exactly what I want: be an electronic book that effectively simulates paper. All I need now is a NYPL membership card...

Kindling an interest in reading, or listening

filthy light thief — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 09:13:49 -0800

Amazon's Kindle 2 was debuted on Monday at the Morgan Library (as speculated), where Stephen King read (and read) from his kindle-exclusive story. If you couldn't be there, read some live-blogging accounts. The interface and refresh rate is improved, now features text-to-speach (which upse the Author's Guild, who claim this feature is "an audio right, which is derivative under copyright law.") But Kindle isn't the only the only e-book device. Going farther from the more book-shaped e-readers, you can read ebooks on iPhones or iPods (the latter has a DIY option), Gameboy Advances, or even the Mattel's Juice Box.

Free eBook: "Art & Science of CSS" from Sitepoint

spock — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 21:16:06 -0800

A 4-star rated book on CSS: The Art & Science of CSS is a FREE DOWNLOAD for 14 days from the folks at Sitepoint. Reader reviews give it 4 stars at Amazon. 208 pages. A direct link for the impatient. (27MB — zipped pdf) Enjoy!

stop crying kindle fanboy

taz — Sat, 13 Sep 2008 07:16:24 -0800

Some are calling it the "Kindle Killer". (Demo launch video at engadget.) Plastic Logic's new e-reader, expected to be out in the first half of 2009, does promise to offer a lot that Kindle and most other other popular e-readers don't, like a larger display, big enough to provide a newspaper or magazine layout; touch-based markup and annotation; the ability to read standard documents and other file types without conversion; (promised) Wi-Fi connectivity (including the ability to transfer documents between readers); and last but not least, a screen display that you can hit with a shoe, and isn't that something we've all been waiting for during these tense times? But in the Plastic Logic vs Amazon Kindle smackdown, "Plastic Logic says they don't plan to compete with Kindle directly, instead, it's targeting business mobile professionals with 'a lot of documents already,' not those who will get all their content from the Amazon store." Heh. The question on everyone's lips, of course, is what about price? Wired reports that while pricing has not been announced, "officials said the reader would be "priced competitively" with devices such as the Kindle, which currently costs $359". Other questions? The NYT touches on issues of privacy, mentioning that, "as an electronic device, newspapers can determine who is reading their paper, and even which articles are being read. Advertisers would be able to understand their audience and direct advertising to its likeliest customers" and wonders "how much people will pay for a device and the newspaper subscription for it". (emphasis mine)

It's more free maths!

Iosephus — Sat, 02 Aug 2008 01:00:59 -0800

Online Encyclopedia of Mathematics Edited by Michiel Hazewinkel (CWI, Amsterdam), and originaly published in dead tree form in 2002, now free to browse and poke into. Seems to have been made available online by Springer-Verlag for 2 years or so, and somehow I missed it all this time until I stumbled on it during a somewhat obscure googling for a calculus question over AskMe. It seems to lack a search functionality, which is a pity. "The Online Encyclopaedia of Mathematics is the most up-to-date and comprehensive English-language graduate-level reference work in the field of mathematics today. This online edition comprises more than 8,000 entries and illuminates nearly 50,000 notions in mathematics. The Encyclopaedia of Mathematics is updated on a regular basis to remain a quick, precise source of reference to mathematical definitions, concepts, explanations, surveys, examples, terminology and methods, which will prove useful for all mathematicians and other scientists who encounter mathematics in their work. "

Post the past

Abiezer — Wed, 19 Dec 2007 05:40:05 -0800

Gutenberg-e now offers open access to Columbia University Press history ebooks. "These award winning monographs, coordinated with the American Historical Association, afford emerging scholars new possibilities for online publications, weaving traditional narrative with digitized primary sources, including maps, photographs, and oral histories." Found via a link to How Taiwan Became Chinese, one of the books available.

Free books, but not just any free books

StrikeTheViol — Mon, 12 Nov 2007 08:04:22 -0800

Munseys, formerly Blackmask, still my favorite free book site.

A 4-star Ruby On Rails book is free for 60 days

spock — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 19:03:38 -0800

"Build Your Own Ruby on Rails Web Applications" book is free for 60 days. Reader reviews give it 4-stars at Amazon. Like most first editions, there are a few typos to watch out for. Sitepoint has been mentioned a lot in comments and AskMe, but never mentioned in the Blue?

Confessions of A Long Distance Sailor

phrontist — Sun, 17 Jun 2007 12:11:00 -0800

Confessions of A Long Distance Sailor - I had been sitting in dark rooms, punching computer keys, for years. I had always wanted to learn SCUBA diving, hike around in the tropics, so I booked a flight to Hawaii. But a month later I was in — are you ready? — a traffic jam on Maui. I understand now, from the moment I touched that sailboat's dock lines, I was doomed to sail.

The Spy of the Heart

Burhanistan — Mon, 16 Apr 2007 08:50:35 -0800

The Spy of the Heart - The story of an American's exploration of Islamic spirituality within the turmoil of Afghanistan. Full book (PDF) available free onsite.

Japan? Nutshell!

stavrosthewonderchicken — Thu, 11 Jan 2007 05:00:41 -0800

Professor Solomon's Japan in a Nutshell By the lost-object-finding author of The Book Of King Solomon, How to Make the Most Of A Flying Saucer Experience, and Coney Island. Share and enjoy!

Give Me a Lass with a Lump of Land

mwhybark — Fri, 17 Feb 2006 18:11:07 -0800

Eighteenth Century E-Texts, a sub-branch of Eighteenth Century Resources, maintained by Jack Lynch, of Rutgers.

Holy Tango of Literature

mendel — Tue, 06 Dec 2005 17:07:45 -0800

~~Anthology~~ Holy Tango of Literature: "The question of what would happen if poets and playwrights wrote works whose titles were anagrams of their names is one that has been insufficiently studied in the past." Francis Heaney has published his book online under a Creative Commons license, along with the Holy Tango Basement Tapes.

Heaven or Hell? It's Your Choice

metameme — Mon, 07 Jul 2003 14:54:43 -0800

Heaven or Hell? It's Your Choice
A new shareware E-Book is out, penned by the likes of Captain Crunch and Matthew Smith, that makes the claims:

Don't bother planning your pension, the world is about to change and we can prove it, please just take 2 minutes out of your life to read this page, it may change your life. Artificial intelligence is coming and it may become smarter than any of us. Smart networks using grid technologies could become a threat to us ALL, this is the real Matrix. From Dot.Net to the X-Box, from M-Theory to the Playstation 3 the future is V.R. / A.I. and Nanotech. If you ever wanted to know what the system is and what it has done to you, then this ebook is for you. You left school, you were standardised, you took an exam, you were graded, they made you believe in money, this is the last great social control mechanism. There's more to this, than you can imagine.

...and there you have it. Or do you?

Su — Sun, 23 Jun 2002 21:23:31 -0800

At Virus Books(mostly German, but it doesn't matter), you can download short visual summaries of books for your PalmOS portable. Even if you don't have a handheld, there are images of the results, so you can have a look, anyway.

Atom Heart Mother — Thu, 30 Aug 2001 08:38:25 -0800

What a fantastic conspiracy theory. This article basically accuses the Department of Justice of taking Dmitry Sklyarov hostage. It has convinced me, although admittedly that doesn't take a lot.

davidchess — Wed, 18 Jul 2001 04:50:04 -0800

A Russian security expert has been arrested for showing how easy it is to crack an e-book. All hail the DMCA! Some information is just Too Dangerous to be Revealed! (See also wildly detailed coverage, including the affidavit, from Planet eBook.)

gknauss — Mon, 02 Oct 2000 16:36:36 -0800

So how much money is Stephen King throwing away? G. Beato's take on the world's most famous e-publishing experiment makes a great point: King has the clout to drive traffic, and that can worth a hell of a lot more than what he's getting directly from his readers. King's got brand identity and endless content -- why is he bothering with a subscription fee?

grumblebee — Mon, 12 Jun 2000 21:49:55 -0800

This illustration of the human digestive tube is just one of the many joys of Gray's Anatomy (1918 Edition). "This 1,396-page ebook is divided into nearly 300 sections, with 1,247 illustrations (many in color and unchanged since the first edition of 1859) rendered in three different resolutions, and with an encyclopedic subject index comprising some 13,000 entries hypertext-linked directly to their respective pages in the text." And it's yours for free at bartleby.com. [via researchbuzz (a very cool weblog which deserves more attention)]

grant — Thu, 11 Nov 1999 20:31:27 -0800

Something that may finally make e-books palatable is this new display technology that has an incredible resolution of 202 pixels per inch. Imagine a digital display with the same image resolution as a high quality printed magazine.