Entries tagged with “rss” from Tools of Change for Publishing
Tagging the Real World through Barcode Apps
Mac Slocum
November 14, 2008
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Earlier this week, Peter Brantley noted an interesting barcode application for Android phones that connects the ISBN data on a physical book with Google Book Search listings. This merging of the physical and digital worlds isn't novel -- other companies offer similar applications -- but the discussion surrounding these apps tends to focus on retail threats and opportunities rather than broader uses.
Speaking as an unabashed content geek, I find the information curation possibilities from this digital-physical merge particularly interesting. The Web has provided an assortment of organization tools -- RSS feeds, readers, tags, categories, etc. -- that help me find and synthesize a vast amount of information. But the same can't be said for the real world. If something pops onto my radar while I'm sitting in front of the TV or shopping at a store, I need to open a browser (assuming I have a computer or phone), punch in the information and save it for later retrieval. This isn't an arduous task, but it lacks the elegance of scanning and tagging Web-based data.
My online efficiency increased exponentially a few years ago when I incorporated RSS feeds and readers into my daily routine. Instead of tediously visiting particular sites or running open-ended search queries, I could now gather useful sources in one application and sort that data into segments geared toward my own needs. Not to get too syrupy here, but it was an eye-opening experience that revealed a new depth to the Web. These barcode apps offer similar possibilities for seamlessly accessing the physical world's stored information. Armed with a cell phone and a data plan, those of us who are curation minded can expand the boundaries of discoverability into an untapped region.
Q&A with Hadrien Gardeur, Co-Founder of Feedbooks
Mac Slocum
September 23, 2008
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Feedbooks is a Web-based service that converts, catalogs and distributes ebooks in a variety of formats. Co-founder Hadrien Gardeur discusses Feedbook's system and future services in the following Q&A.
How would you define your company? Is Feedbooks a distributor? A digitizing service? A social network? Something else?
Probably all three. We already distribute a massive number of ebooks and most of our users currently use Feedbooks to discover and download public domain or Creative Commons licensed ebooks. But we're also working on various tools for authors and small publishers to create ebooks. We'd like to turn our readers into potential authors, and create a service where new authors can distribute their creations to a large user base.
Who is your typical user?
Do we really have a typical user? We probably used to have typical users when we mostly provided ebooks for dedicated reading devices: heavy readers. But that's not the case anymore, now that we've extended the service to the iPhone, too.
Why did you start Feedbooks?
We've seen a lot of very exciting services for music and video these last few years and I really believe that there's a huge potential for ebooks too, thanks to E Ink-based devices and multi-purposes platforms such as the iPhone and Android. I love reading and I'd like to create a great service where anyone can discover new books, and where authors can easily connect with readers.
Your Web site lists support for the Kindle, the Sony Reader, the iRex iLiad, the Cybook Gen3, the iPhone and other smartphones. How are you able to support all of these devices?
We use an abstract representation, somehow similar to DTBook, to store all of our books. We can generate a file on the fly based on this representation. Adding new formats is fairly easy thanks to this technology. We were the first service to distribute books in EPUB for this reason.
Which ebook format is most popular with your users? Which e-reader is most popular?
EPUB and the iPhone are probably the most popular right now thanks to our seamless integration into Stanza. The most popular dedicated device is the Kindle.
Have established book publishers used your service to create ebook editions?
No, we're still working on those features. I expect major publishers to use XML+XSLT or Adobe InDesign rather than a dedicated service. We're creating our publishing feature with the end-user or small publishers in mind rather than major publishers.
Do you plan to sell ebooks?
We do. I believe that free content and user-generated content in general shouldn't be in a different environment than the rest of ebooks. It makes a lot more sense to have both in the same environment and create an optimal experience for the user.
When will sales begin?
No specific date yet, we'd rather focus on building a good service first and then add this component.
Print on demand (POD) services seem like a logical extension for Feedbooks. Is this something you're planing?
Sure, I consider POD as another potential format for our platform. It's a lot easier to turn an ebook into a POD book than the other way around.
The Feedbooks RSS tool appears to be targeted at Kindle users who want to receive updated news and information from RSS feeds. Do you anticipate other uses for this tool, such as a blog-to-book service?
It's not targeted at Kindle users only. I use it every day on a Sony Reader, and it's actually quite popular with the iPhone, too. I've been experimenting with blog-to-book, there's a lot of such "blooks" (blog+book, serialized novels using blogs) out there. I created a catalog entry for Stanza to test how the readers react to these serialized novels. Such a tool could probably be very interesting for publishers, too.
Feedbooks and Lexcycle, the company behind the Stanza e-reader, have a close working relationship. How did this come together?
Lexcycle launched the iPhone version of Stanza a few days before we decided to release the first version of our new API. Marc [Prud'hommeaux, principal developer at Lexcycle] contacted me: they were looking for content that could be directly integrated into Stanza's online catalog. We exchanged a lot of e-mails with various information, and did a lot of work together to make sure that this would work from day one. There's still a lot of new features that I'd like to introduce and we'll continue improving both the API and Stanza in the future, to create an optimal experience.
How are publishers and others using the Feedbooks API?
I would describe our API as read-mostly for the moment. It's mostly useful for reading systems such as Stanza. Once we turn it into something that's read/write, the situation will be quite different and I can imagine various innovative publishing techniques based on this.
What publishing techniques do you foresee?
Publishing should be more of a seamless experience. We already use a lot of publishing tools (blogs, social networks etc...) and we shouldn't have such a gap between these tools and ebooks.
What are the biggest issues with digital conversion?
There's a lot of formats, and you can expect standards such as EPUB to evolve in the near future. But I believe that the biggest issue for publishers is to find the right balance between what users are allowed to do and the ability to preserve the layout and design of a book. The holy grail for publishers is probably something as powerful as PDF, but reflowable. Ebooks allow users to customize a lot of things and preserving the design of a book shouldn't be at the cost of this flexibility.
Q&A with Susan Danziger, CEO of DailyLit
Mac Slocum
June 18, 2008
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DailyLit is a digital service that delivers short, scheduled book installments to subscribers by email and RSS. The company offers free and pay-per-read titles in plain text, which makes them accessible through nearly all email clients, browsers or mobile devices. In the following Q&A, DailyLit CEO Susan Danziger discusses the company's philosophy, process, and upcoming services.
How many titles do you offer through DailyLit? How many do you hope to have by the end of 2008?
We currently have over 950 titles (450 or so which are available on a pay-per-read basis), and by the end of this year, we're targeting several thousand pay-per-read titles.
Releasing titles in plain text seems like a simple way to avoid the formatting needs and device restrictions that come with proprietary ebook formats. Was this your intention, or was plain text just an easier way to get started?
It was definitely our intention to allow the installments to come in on any device, which is an important part of how we designed the experience. We started with plain text because it was the easiest to implement, and we will be launching HTML shortly as well.
Do most DailyLit users read installments on mobile devices?
10%-20% of our readers currently read their installments on mobile devices, but as the reading quality on mobile devices improves (the iPhone is a great start), we're confident that more and more people will be reading their installments on these devices.
Can readers purchase print editions or ebooks through the site/service?
At this point, only DailyLit editions are available. We're starting to allow publishers and others to sponsor certain titles, which would allow a link to purchase other editions. With this sponsorship model, instead of readers paying for the title, sponsors would pay for them instead.
How will the sponsorship model work? Also, in regards to "other editions," are you only referring to printed editions, or does this include different ebook formats as well?
DailyLit readers would have access to free DailyLit versions of the books under the sponsorship model. Sponsors of titles would be able to include links that would lead to their sites (or other sites that sponsors indicate). "Other editions" could be printed editions or other digital formats.
How many DailyLit users receive updates via email? How many via RSS?
About 90% of our readers receive installments via e-mail; 10% via RSS.
How much time goes into prepping books for delivery? Is production handled in-house?
The production time depends on the format in which the book is delivered. If the book is delivered in PDF, the production time can be up to eight weeks. We prefer it if books are delivered in EPUB or XHTML, which greatly reduces the production time, not to mention cost. Production is handled in-house for certain titles, but for most titles we use an outside production house.
How are installments defined? Is it by word count? Average reading time?
Installments are usually around 1,000 words, which is under five minutes of reading. If a chapter is about to end, we'll adjust the length of the installments accordingly. Certain books, such as books of quotes, have much shorter installments. Under the "Manage Your Subscriptions" feature, folks can personally adjust the length of each installment (to 2 times or 4 times the length), so an avid reader can read more.
Are fiction titles the easiest to serialize, or does any chapter-based book work?
Fiction titles are probably easier to serialize since they're more straight forward. With non-fiction titles, we need to account for footnotes and other ancillary materials. That said, we're featuring titles from all different genres, from science fiction, such as books by Cory Doctorow, to such non-fiction best-sellers as Skinny Bitch. We also feature language books, such as titles from Berlitz, business books, as well as romance titles from Harlequin.
What types of books don't lend themselves to serialization?
Reference books that readers do not want to read cover to cover don't work in serialized form. Apart from that, since DailyLit is intended for those readers too busy to read (or who want to sneak in an extra book during the day), any other kind of book works well. After all, folks are avidly reading War and Peace, Moby Dick, The Art of War and Pride and Prejudice, and none of these books were originally intended to be serialized.
Who sets the pricing for titles?
Since we've structured this as a licensing deal with publishers, DailyLit sets the price.
Are you licensing a specific version of a book (i.e. "text-only" or a particular ebook format)?
We characterize it as "digital serialization rights" so it's a combination of serialization (typically understood as a license) and a digital rendition of the book. Depending on rights available for the title, we might license text only or with illustrations/photographs.
How have publishers responded to DailyLit?
We've had a great response from publishers. On the whole, they've been really excited about this new format, which combines marketing and potential incremental revenue. We've also been developing innovative technology -- several initiatives will be rolled out shortly -- which will help the publishers market their titles and expand their reader base.
What sorts of tools will you be releasing?
One such tool is public subscriptions, which will allow publishers, authors or third parties to serialize a book publicly on their site. Each day on that site, folks will be able to view a new installment of a book. This is a way to build community on their site and would be an alternative to giving away free PDFs of books. We'll also offer readers the opportunity to receive a personal e-mail or RSS subscription to that title if they don't want to return to the site each day, but for that they [consumers] would need to pay. As such, it's a neat viral marketing tool as well as having potential for incremental revenue.
Do you use digital rights management (DRM) on titles?
We put the reader's experience first, which means that there are no attachments or files that need to be opened with a special device or software. With respect to illustrations or photographs, we are able to track where they go and, in the event of a hot link, we can disable use of an illustration associated with a particular subscription.
Have you run into any piracy issues? Is this a concern?
We haven't run into any piracy issues. Since books are divided into hundreds of installments, there is less concern that individual installments are copied or forwarded. In fact, any installments forwarded by readers have been viewed by publishers and authors as a way to virally market their titles.
In addition to books, you feature Wikipedia tours, language lessons and SAT prep. Are other non-book projects in the works? Where do you see DailyLit expanding?
We're in the process of adding newly created titles for DailyLit, including allowing authors and publishers to create content that work well in the serialized format. We're also developing lots of interesting technology to help market books and expand the current reach to additional readers. For instance, we recently launched via Twitter a group read or virtual book club so that folks can read books according to the same schedule. Folks can sign up now to participate.
Researchers: Government Should Build Reusable Data, Not Web Sites
Peter Brantley
June 10, 2008
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In a paper going around quite rapidly, researchers argue that the government should move to emphasize structured, reusable data over solely user-facing Web portals. From Ars Technica:
A new paper from researchers at Princeton University suggests a different strategy. David Robinson, Harlan Yu, William Zeller, and Ed Felten, all of Princeton's Information Technology Policy Center, suggest that government officials abandon the dream of developing usable web sites, and instead focus on providing raw public data such as regulatory decisions, Congressional votes, and campaign finance data in open, structured formats such as RSS and XML. This raw data would be made freely and publicly available to anyone who wanted it and could be used for any purpose.
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