Saturday, October 09, 2004
26 Benefits of Ebooks
26 Benefits of Ebooks (by Michael Pastore)
Author James Michener liked to write large books, he said, because once, when standing in a store that was being robbed, he was shot in the posterior, and the bullet passed through his back pocket and then lodged on page 450 of his novel.
Ebooks can't do that. But here are some beneficial features of electronic publications that make ebooks an invaluable supplement to the paper-based books we know and love.
1. Ebooks promote reading. People are spending more time in front of screens and less time in front of printed books.
2. Ebooks, faster to produce than paper books, allow readers to read books about current issues and events.
3. Ebooks are easily updateable, for correcting errors and adding information.
4. Ebooks are searchable. Quickly you can find anything inside the book. Ebooks are globally searchable: you can find information in many ebooks.
5. Ebooks are portable. You can carry an entire library on one DVD.
6. Ebooks preserve books. The library of Alexandria was burned and the collection ruined. Richard Burton's wife, after his death and against his wishes, destroyed a book he had been working on for ten years. The original manuscript of Carlyle's The French Revolution was lost when a friend's servant tossed it into the fire. Ebooks are ageless: they do not burn, mildew, crumble, rot, or fall apart. Ebooks ensure that literature will endure.
7. Ebooks are good for the environment. Ebooks save trees. Ebooks eliminate the need for filling up landfills with old books. Ebooks save transportation costs and the pollution associated with shipping books across the country and the world.
8. Ebooks can be printable: and thereby give a reader most or all of the advantages of a paper-based book.
9. Ebooks defy time: they can be delivered almost instantly.
10. Ebooks defy space: ebooks online can be read simultaneously by thousands of people at once.
11. Ebooks are cheaper to produce and to purchase.
12. Ebooks are free. The magnificent work of Project Gutenberg, and other online public libraries, allow readers to read the classics at no cost.
13. Ebooks can be annotated without harming the original work.
14. Ebooks make reading accessible to persons with disabilities. Text can be resized for the visually impaired. Screens can be lit for reading in the dark.
15. Ebooks can be hyper-linked, for easier access to additional information.
16. Ebooks -- with additional software and hardware -- can read aloud to you.
17. Ebooks let you tweak the style. Many ebooks allow readers to change the font style, font size, page size, margin size, colors, and more.
18. Ebooks may allow the option for the addition of multimedia: still images, moving images, and sound.
19. Ebooks, with their capacity for storage, encourage the publishing of books with many pages, books that might be too expensive to produce (and purchase) in paperback.
20. Ebooks are evolving. As technology develops, ebooks may contain new features. For example, a book of recipes may contain a recipe calculator to figure how much maple syrup is needed to bake 200 cookies. An ebook that prepares you for the GRE could include an interactive test. An ebook about politics might allow you to click a link and register to vote, or send an email to a Presidential candidate that tells him he is not a good environmental steward.
21. Ebooks empower individuals to write and to publish, and in this way help to challenge "the crushing power of big publishing", that excludes so many authors from the New York City publishing circus. Publishing can move from the impersonal and profitable, to the personal and pleasurable.
22. Ebooks allow publishers to publish (and readers to read) works by a larger number of authors, and works on a wider variety of topics. Critics of traditional book publishing (such as Jason Epstein and Andre Schriffin) state that economic pressures have reduced and limited the number of authors and topics that traditional publishers will now produce.
23. Ebooks defeat attempts at censorship. All these works were banned: Analects by Confucius. Lysistrata by Aristophanes. Ars Amorata by Ovid. Pro Populo Anglicano Defensio by John Milton. The Scarlet Letter by Hawthorne. Wonder Stories by H.C. Anderson. Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman. The Kreutzer Sonata by Leo Tolstoy. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, and Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain. Ulysses by James Joyce. ... Many of these books were confiscated, burned, or denied availability in libraries, bookstores and schools. Ebooks guarantee that readers maintain their right to read.
24. Ebooks -- thanks to the simplicity and speed of publication and feedback -- allow authors to experiment in many themes and styles.
25. Ebooks help paperbook publishers to sell paperbooks. Cory Doctorow has explained that the giving away of ebooks, for free, has helped to sell the paperback editions of his stories and novels.
26. Ebooks are good for paperbook publishing. By setting an example for diversity and freedom of expression, ebooks may motivate the stagnant book publishing industry towards the renewal of small presses, the end of the blockbuster-bestseller publishing mentality, and a healthier balance between the needs of commerce and culture.
Note: this article, 26 Benefits of Ebooks, is excerpted from the forthcoming ebook: Epublishers Weekly Guide to Ebooks and Electronic Publishing.
Author James Michener liked to write large books, he said, because once, when standing in a store that was being robbed, he was shot in the posterior, and the bullet passed through his back pocket and then lodged on page 450 of his novel.
Ebooks can't do that. But here are some beneficial features of electronic publications that make ebooks an invaluable supplement to the paper-based books we know and love.
1. Ebooks promote reading. People are spending more time in front of screens and less time in front of printed books.
2. Ebooks, faster to produce than paper books, allow readers to read books about current issues and events.
3. Ebooks are easily updateable, for correcting errors and adding information.
4. Ebooks are searchable. Quickly you can find anything inside the book. Ebooks are globally searchable: you can find information in many ebooks.
5. Ebooks are portable. You can carry an entire library on one DVD.
6. Ebooks preserve books. The library of Alexandria was burned and the collection ruined. Richard Burton's wife, after his death and against his wishes, destroyed a book he had been working on for ten years. The original manuscript of Carlyle's The French Revolution was lost when a friend's servant tossed it into the fire. Ebooks are ageless: they do not burn, mildew, crumble, rot, or fall apart. Ebooks ensure that literature will endure.
7. Ebooks are good for the environment. Ebooks save trees. Ebooks eliminate the need for filling up landfills with old books. Ebooks save transportation costs and the pollution associated with shipping books across the country and the world.
8. Ebooks can be printable: and thereby give a reader most or all of the advantages of a paper-based book.
9. Ebooks defy time: they can be delivered almost instantly.
10. Ebooks defy space: ebooks online can be read simultaneously by thousands of people at once.
11. Ebooks are cheaper to produce and to purchase.
12. Ebooks are free. The magnificent work of Project Gutenberg, and other online public libraries, allow readers to read the classics at no cost.
13. Ebooks can be annotated without harming the original work.
14. Ebooks make reading accessible to persons with disabilities. Text can be resized for the visually impaired. Screens can be lit for reading in the dark.
15. Ebooks can be hyper-linked, for easier access to additional information.
16. Ebooks -- with additional software and hardware -- can read aloud to you.
17. Ebooks let you tweak the style. Many ebooks allow readers to change the font style, font size, page size, margin size, colors, and more.
18. Ebooks may allow the option for the addition of multimedia: still images, moving images, and sound.
19. Ebooks, with their capacity for storage, encourage the publishing of books with many pages, books that might be too expensive to produce (and purchase) in paperback.
20. Ebooks are evolving. As technology develops, ebooks may contain new features. For example, a book of recipes may contain a recipe calculator to figure how much maple syrup is needed to bake 200 cookies. An ebook that prepares you for the GRE could include an interactive test. An ebook about politics might allow you to click a link and register to vote, or send an email to a Presidential candidate that tells him he is not a good environmental steward.
21. Ebooks empower individuals to write and to publish, and in this way help to challenge "the crushing power of big publishing", that excludes so many authors from the New York City publishing circus. Publishing can move from the impersonal and profitable, to the personal and pleasurable.
22. Ebooks allow publishers to publish (and readers to read) works by a larger number of authors, and works on a wider variety of topics. Critics of traditional book publishing (such as Jason Epstein and Andre Schriffin) state that economic pressures have reduced and limited the number of authors and topics that traditional publishers will now produce.
23. Ebooks defeat attempts at censorship. All these works were banned: Analects by Confucius. Lysistrata by Aristophanes. Ars Amorata by Ovid. Pro Populo Anglicano Defensio by John Milton. The Scarlet Letter by Hawthorne. Wonder Stories by H.C. Anderson. Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman. The Kreutzer Sonata by Leo Tolstoy. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, and Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain. Ulysses by James Joyce. ... Many of these books were confiscated, burned, or denied availability in libraries, bookstores and schools. Ebooks guarantee that readers maintain their right to read.
24. Ebooks -- thanks to the simplicity and speed of publication and feedback -- allow authors to experiment in many themes and styles.
25. Ebooks help paperbook publishers to sell paperbooks. Cory Doctorow has explained that the giving away of ebooks, for free, has helped to sell the paperback editions of his stories and novels.
26. Ebooks are good for paperbook publishing. By setting an example for diversity and freedom of expression, ebooks may motivate the stagnant book publishing industry towards the renewal of small presses, the end of the blockbuster-bestseller publishing mentality, and a healthier balance between the needs of commerce and culture.
Note: this article, 26 Benefits of Ebooks, is excerpted from the forthcoming ebook: Epublishers Weekly Guide to Ebooks and Electronic Publishing.
![[Valid Atom]](http://www.publisherscafe.com/blog/bimages/valid-atom.png "Validate my Atom feed"){kind=small}