LordVader717 Ever scanned a whole book on a consumer-grade A4 scanner? Not a very fun way to spend a Saturday morning, I can assure you.
I do it all the time. It's not the scanning that's the long tedious part. It's the manual proofreading. But i save the proofreading for weekends and hey, it's my intention to digitize my entire personal library and not have to worry about space and I can keep my books FOREVER.
Think about it. No more having to buy books. Just check out your favorite books from the library (sometimes i have to use ILL interlibrary loans because my library system doesn't have it), digitize them as well as your own personal collection you've built up and you can then sell off your physical collection and have your books digitally FOREVER!!
Most times i don't even have to do any scanning because it's already on the web somewhere. hehehe
oh and let me add even more importantly about
NEVER OUT OF PRINT--In ebook format, no book has to ever be out of print; you won't have to pay $100 for that rare, out of print book because it's in digital form, there for you anytime rather than having to lay out the dough at ebay. There are a lot of books that are now out print that lots of people like because the authors knew how to write and the stories or info are still relevant today, so yeah, giving our culture more chances to come by that book allows the continuity of our culture.
"am one who thinks eBooks are foolish. Here are the problems I see:
Quite often, the physical book is cheaper, thanks to Amazon or some other discount provider. eBooks are overpriced and rarely discounted.
I agree. Overpriced models by publishers (hello Penguin books!) because they don't know how to price their ebook versions, just force the public to make their own ebook versions to share with others.
I cannot loan an eBook to a friend. I do this a lot with regular books, so it's a real concern.
True, but if you scanned your own personal book and maybe proofread it after OCR, then you could store it easily on your computer and easily email it to your friend.
I cannot borrow an eBook from a library.
Have you used your library online? Many libraries now have ebooks where you can "borrow" them for a certain length of time before they expire on your machine. Yeah, i hate their drm methods or even the method of being forced to be online to read thru page by page slogging thru the book and not being allowed to just download it to read offline on your own time.
Thousands of books for free.
in the library, true. but i you don't want to go out in the cold weather, use expensive car gas and wait in line to talk to the librarian and check out the book and use precious energy roaming the stacks where books are hard to find because they've been shelved wrongly, then you can appreciate ebooks which are easily stored on a hard drive, easily searched, and if you need to read new books, there's the filesharing services/websites, also for free.
I cannot sell the eBook when I'm done with it. Same basic point: I cannot buy a used eBook like I can a real book (and used books can be rather cheap).
I agree. We should have the same privileges from pbook(physical book) to ebook(ebook).
DRM. I run the risk that the permission granting service closes up shop. This has happened to other media, so it's a real concern.
That's one main reason I always make sure I can convert the ebook to an open format like rtf or html or txt. If I can't convert it, I don't buy it.
But what are good reasons for having ebooks (and I'm talking non-DRM, non-proprietary, easily convetable to open format if not already in open format)
1. IMMEDIACY. Let's say we both want to read a certain book that will help us in our careers or in a specialized field. You have to wait months because you're waiting for the pbook to be published. I can download right away in 5 minutes from an ebookstore or a filesharing service/site/torrent and in 2 days read the book in its entirety while you're left in the dust waiting for p copy.
2. SPACE/CONVENIENCE: I don't have to throw away books because I'm running out of space. In fact, i could use that space for something else, like getting a pet. Since all my books are digital, I can take 200 of them anywhere on the size of a keychain from one computer to the next or a laptop. I can be in a third world country which rarely has english books in its stores and still have access to all my hundreds of favorite english books or download them thru the web.
3. NEWEST BEST READING MATERIAL: Let's face it, most publishers don't want to "waste" money on what they see as extremist, fringe, or "out-there" reading material, so the newest exploration material which take more risks in their stories and authors will be online with small ebook publishers since they pay $0 for distribution, they can afford to take chances with new authors with new stories, rarely or never seen in pbooks.
4. ENVIRONMENTALLY FRIENDLY: pbooks need dead trees to be made as well as the waste of gas pollution for distribution. ebooks don't.
If your against ebooks(the open format or easily converted to open format kind), then yeah, you just might be a Luddite.
Pretty soon, most material will be in ebook form just like we use cars now and not horse drawn carriages. A lot of people found horses a lot less risky then, a lot less expensive, but the world moved on.
******************
I hate DRM too, but if we don't encourage it as a culture, then it wouldn't continue.
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I do it all the time. It's not the scanning that's the long tedious part. It's the manual proofreading. But i save the proofreading for weekends and hey, it's my intention to digitize my entire personal library and not have to worry about space and I can keep my books FOREVER.
Think about it. No more having to buy books. Just check out your favorite books from the library (sometimes i have to use ILL interlibrary loans because my library system doesn't have it), digitize them as well as your own personal collection you've built up and you can then sell off your physical collection and have your books digitally FOREVER!! Most times i don't even have to do any scanning because it's already on the web somewhere. hehehe
oh and let me add even more importantly about NEVER OUT OF PRINT--In ebook format, no book has to ever be out of print; you won't have to pay $100 for that rare, out of print book because it's in digital form, there for you anytime rather than having to lay out the dough at ebay. There are a lot of books that are now out print that lots of people like because the authors knew how to write and the stories or info are still relevant today, so yeah, giving our culture more chances to come by that book allows the continuity of our culture.
Quite often, the physical book is cheaper, thanks to Amazon or some other discount provider. eBooks are overpriced and rarely discounted.
I agree. Overpriced models by publishers (hello Penguin books!) because they don't know how to price their ebook versions, just force the public to make their own ebook versions to share with others.
I cannot loan an eBook to a friend. I do this a lot with regular books, so it's a real concern.
True, but if you scanned your own personal book and maybe proofread it after OCR, then you could store it easily on your computer and easily email it to your friend.
I cannot borrow an eBook from a library.
Have you used your library online? Many libraries now have ebooks where you can "borrow" them for a certain length of time before they expire on your machine. Yeah, i hate their drm methods or even the method of being forced to be online to read thru page by page slogging thru the book and not being allowed to just download it to read offline on your own time.
Thousands of books for free.
in the library, true. but i you don't want to go out in the cold weather, use expensive car gas and wait in line to talk to the librarian and check out the book and use precious energy roaming the stacks where books are hard to find because they've been shelved wrongly, then you can appreciate ebooks which are easily stored on a hard drive, easily searched, and if you need to read new books, there's the filesharing services/websites, also for free.
I cannot sell the eBook when I'm done with it. Same basic point: I cannot buy a used eBook like I can a real book (and used books can be rather cheap).
I agree. We should have the same privileges from pbook(physical book) to ebook(ebook).
DRM. I run the risk that the permission granting service closes up shop. This has happened to other media, so it's a real concern.
That's one main reason I always make sure I can convert the ebook to an open format like rtf or html or txt. If I can't convert it, I don't buy it.
But what are good reasons for having ebooks (and I'm talking non-DRM, non-proprietary, easily convetable to open format if not already in open format)
1. IMMEDIACY. Let's say we both want to read a certain book that will help us in our careers or in a specialized field. You have to wait months because you're waiting for the pbook to be published. I can download right away in 5 minutes from an ebookstore or a filesharing service/site/torrent and in 2 days read the book in its entirety while you're left in the dust waiting for p copy.
2. SPACE/CONVENIENCE: I don't have to throw away books because I'm running out of space. In fact, i could use that space for something else, like getting a pet. Since all my books are digital, I can take 200 of them anywhere on the size of a keychain from one computer to the next or a laptop. I can be in a third world country which rarely has english books in its stores and still have access to all my hundreds of favorite english books or download them thru the web.
3. NEWEST BEST READING MATERIAL: Let's face it, most publishers don't want to "waste" money on what they see as extremist, fringe, or "out-there" reading material, so the newest exploration material which take more risks in their stories and authors will be online with small ebook publishers since they pay $0 for distribution, they can afford to take chances with new authors with new stories, rarely or never seen in pbooks.
4. ENVIRONMENTALLY FRIENDLY: pbooks need dead trees to be made as well as the waste of gas pollution for distribution. ebooks don't.
If your against ebooks(the open format or easily converted to open format kind), then yeah, you just might be a Luddite.
Pretty soon, most material will be in ebook form just like we use cars now and not horse drawn carriages. A lot of people found horses a lot less risky then, a lot less expensive, but the world moved on.
****************** I hate DRM too, but if we don't encourage it as a culture, then it wouldn't continue.