Electronic+Books

Electronic Books by Sophie Klasan

What are Electronic Books? An E-book is "an electronic version of a printed book which can be read on a PC or a handheld device."

How are they better than real Books? E-Books are good for frequent readers because they provide access to remote resources (distance education) make out-of-print books available for purchase, can be used as a archival/delivery for Print on Demand, can be used in an Academic environment (ex. photocopier), offers greater searchability and portability and allows previously nonviable publications to be published. Like a printed book, it’s (usually) a final form document and non-editable, except that at order, the font and font size can be chosen, and recently the font can be edited with the E-reader programs available, and E-books can have an ISBN associated with it, so that it can be registered and searchable with embedded metadata. Usually E-books are formatted for on-screen viewing (6 x 9”), using a font (primarily) designed for screen reading and usually images downsampled to screen resolution (72dpi) and ideally compact and transportable in a single self-contained file but without left/right margins, but equal margins on either side. As well as this, E-books generally have "traditional" layouts including a title page, a TOC, aknowledgments and an Index.

How are they worse than real Books? They allow previously nonviable publications to be published, even if they did not make it to print previously because they were not good enough factually, for non-fiction books, or because they had copyright issues etc, for fiction books. Also Archives would need to be computerized and that would take time, energy and money, and a standardized format has not yet been determined as to what the e-books need to look like or cost. In addition, who owns the rights to the E-books has not been determined, as previously the Author and the publishing company would own the rights, but with E-books the publisher could either be skipped or the e-book provider would have to own a share. As well as this, to involve the Digital Divide, they are not available to those without computers or handlelds for multiple reasons.

What IT Systems are involved? E-books are in multiple formats. Here are a couple and the issues involved with them.

PDF :- Suitable for richly formatted documents (academic textbooks, magazines, ect) Currently the published proprietary standard OEB :- Open eBook Format, suitable for trade books, simple text and graphics. Open standard. LIT :- Microsoft’s wrapper around OEB TK3 :- NightKitchen’sformat, incorporates support for text, images, sounds and videos. Looks like a Windows application TXT :- Project Gutenberg eTextsare based on vanilla ASCII text. Over 3400 titles. HTML, AportisDOC, Palm Reader, and many more can also be used, as well as the new software in development sor specific handheld devices like the Kindle or Sony Reader.

In most cases, you can’t select a single output format and use that without exception. That’s because your choice of format depends on: The content itself (text, complex graphics, the source document (FrameMaker, Quark, Word,PostScript, Paper), the production system, the eBook Retailers sales system, the Intended Digital Rights Management system, the target devices, and the phases of the moon. (joke)

However, currently there are two ‘dominant’ formats in use for eBook content, OpeneBook Format (OEB)/.LIT and Adobe’s Portable Document Format (PDF).

OEB is used primarily for simple text documents with limited table and image support(MicrosoftReader, MobiPocketReader, and Ansyr’sMobileOffice.) However it can be used with most handhelds, except if they have their own programs.

The Open eBook Publication Structure Specification 1.01, provides a specification for representing the content of electronic books. From the latest edition, July 2, 2001, of the specification, its purpose is: 1.To give content providers and tool providers minimal and common guidelines which ensure fidelity, accuracy, accessibility, and presentation of electronic content over various electronic book platforms. 2.To reflect established content format standards. 3.To provide the purveyors of electronic-book content a format for use in providing content to multiple reading systems.

OEB is a non-proprietary specification that specifies eBook file format and structure. • OEB is based on XML, well-formed not valid. • Is expected to comply with XHTML • Dublin Core elements are used for describing metadata • Defines its own style language based on CSS1 & 2. (This is to provide a baseline rendering functionality) • An OEB package file specifies the OEB documents,images and other objects that comprise the ‘publication’. No means is defined for a physically bundling files together (zip, tar, etc…) • OEB does not address DRM at this stage, hence one of the reasons why .LIT has emerged.

PDF is used for richer documents due to its high fidelity and complex layout capabilities. Academic textbooks and magazines are more suitable for conversion to PDF. Handheld is possible, although desktop is preferred. POD suitable. PDF is Adobe’s Portable Document Format and has been around since 1991 • It is a “published” proprietary format that Adobe specifically grants copyright permission to “anyone” to use. • Unlike OEB which uses markup, PDF uses a “marking” syntax to draw marks on pages. • You can position text and images exactly within a PDF file which allow you to reproduce visually rich books such as Academic Textbooks and Science Technical Medical (STM). • PDF and/or PostScript is often already part of a production workflow which makes creating electronic book versions fairly simple and straightforward. • PDF is complex and mostly suitable for display on the desktop, with the exception of Ansyr’s MobileOffice product (Primer) PDF was referred to by JoeEschbach, VP ePaper Solutions Gp, as the reliable digital master. This is because PDF acts as a complete wrapper containing all fonts, images, text used within a document in a single wrapper. Consequently, PDF is becoming increasingly used in the workflows of prepress agencies and professional print production. • Because of this and of PDF’s relationship to PostScript, it is a reasonably easy process to redirect a for-Print book to a PDF-based eBook. And by the same logic, it’s equally easy, to use a PDF-based eBook for Print on Demand. The same could not be said for OEB at this stage.



What social and ethical issues are involved? When deciding whether or not to sell a book as an E-Book, Security in one of the major issues involved. "By locking up content you place more barriers in place for your customer and make it difficult for them to enjoy your product or service, making it less likely that they’ll return to buy your product/service again in the future." "By not locking your product, you run the risk of rampant piracy destroying and cannibalizing your livelihood –the ‘napsterizing’ of eBooks. They say you won’t be around in the future if you choose." Option 1. • At this stage, the jury is still out, but it’s definitely a contentious area. • With that said, there’s a number of general solutions available to you as follows… – Post the files as plain .LIT files, .OEB (in some form of wrapper), .PDF or any other unencrypted content and require payment before you provide the files. – Encrypt your files and secure access using a password – Inscribe the Reader’s name into the file, hopefully preventing them from passing it on. – Supply them with an encrypted version, and a voucher which only functions on the computer they purchased the book on.

PDF Security Adobe Systems have built an extensible plug-in model for Adobe Acrobat. Hence it’s possible for any developer to build what’s called a Security Handler to add their own Digital Rights Management (DRM) system to Adobe Acrobat. However, the following products are available for normal purchace: Adobe Content Server (formerly Glassbook Content Server) FileOpen Publisher Indataco’seBook Serve DocGuard Plus from Normex Authentica’s PageRecall :– not for eBooks, but arguably the most secure solution available today

.LIT Security • Remember: No DRM for OEB at this stage. • There are a number of levels of security for .LIT. Originally 5 levels but pared down to 3*. To implement these you require the Microsoft Digital Asset Server, and to pass a set of requirements associated with it. 1. Sealed: The content is encrypted to ensure the authenticity of the content. Text inside the eBook can’t be modified. Anyone can read the content. 2. Inscribed: Sealed titles (as above) with the user’s name on the front page of the book. Think of it as acustomized eBook. Anyone can read the content. 3. Owner Exclusive: Fully secure. Only the device with the license file can decrypt and read the content.

What is my Opinion on E-books? I reallllly do not like E-books because although they are environmentally friendly and stuff, they do not give the same reading experience as real books do, and they would ensure that even people who read much would be stuck on computers all day long, for everything they do, thereby making the

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