I’ve been testing out some social reading apps on the iPad in recent weeks, and while I hope to post something more in-depth in the near future, I read some items today that corroborate a general disappointment I’ve been feeling. Too many restrictions About a week ago, a study about ebook buying and reading habits [...]
services
The Atavist: publish to any format you like
It’s not released to the public yet, but longform epublisher The Atavist is putting the final touches on a free version of its conversion tool, which will enable authors to publish to a variety of platforms at once without being tied to any one company’s overly restrictive fine print. (Yes, that’s a jab at iBooks [...]
eReaderIQ improves Kindle deal alert service with new filters and categories
Two days ago I noticed something new in the daily email I get from eReaderIQ. Actually, I noticed a couple of new things. The first was that suddenly the books were being organized according to genre, which makes it a lot easier to skim. The second was this notice at the bottom: I clicked through [...]
Set public domain content free from locked PDF files
Lately I’ve been digging around online to find old genre short stories written in the 19th and early 20th centuries. In many cases it’s clear that the works have passed into the public domain, at least here in the U.S., but in other cases there’s a questionable copyright claim, as when a modern publisher slaps [...]
New Kindle weather website launches, competes with other browser utilities
I got an email from Kindle Weather Station this morning, a new service in beta that offers a full screen weather report (via the experimental browser) for your neighborhood. The good news is the weather is presented in a huge, easy-to-read layout that I find quite useful. The other news—maybe not “bad” but not necessarily [...]
Apple’s OS X Lion can create EPUB files!
If you’re using or plan to upgrade to the latest Apple operating system, Lion, you’ll discover a nifty ebook trick baked into the Automator program: it can create EPUB files! The website Mac OS X Automation reported it first, so far as I know. From that site: Mac OS X Lion includes an Automator action, [...]
ReadBeam makes it easy to read newspapers and blogs on your ereader
If you don’t want to use Calibre, or can’t be bothered to figure out how to use it to subscribe to news feeds and send them to your ereader, you might want to give ReadBeam a try. The service offers around two dozen popular blogs and online newspapers. You’ll have to sign up with a [...]
Literature Map from Gnod uses fancy robot math to suggest new authors to you
From what I can tell by the intro paragraph on the home page, Gnod is an experiment in creating a self-aware deathbot who will someday enslave us all. But until that day it’s a fun way to discover new authors you might enjoy. Gnod’s literature section, Gnooks, includes a free service it calls a Literature [...]
Readability adds “send to Kindle” support
Readability, the free service that makes web pages easier on the eyes with a simple click, has introduced a new “send to Kindle” feature. This is essentially what Kindlebility has been offering for a few months, but now it’s baked right into the original service. You’ll have to install a free add-on to Firefox, and [...]
Build your own multi-article EPUB with GrabMyBooks Firefox add-on
Do you forage the web for articles that you’d rather read on your ereader device? Here’s a cool tool that lets you collect them into a single downloadable EPUB file.
No time to look for good articles? Let Delivereads do it
Look at how many awesome tools we now have to keep ourselves stocked with high-quality reading material: Instapaper and Read It Later are great services if you’ve found an article you want to save for later; Readability and Readable do a great job of stripping out bad design elements and ads so you can focus [...]
Using Amazon Cloud Drive to store ebooks
Does Amazon’s new Cloud Drive online storage service play well with the Kindle? I tested it out on the first day, and the short answer is yes, but for now not very well.