Jules Verne Forum

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Re: Jules Verne E-Book Editions -- Nook

From: Richard Gombert <rgombert~at~yahoo.com>
Date: Mon, 23 May 2011 08:43:59 -0700 (PDT)
To: Jules Verne Forum <jvf~at~gilead.org.il>

I purchased a NookColor over the Holidays and have been working/playing with it. Two things that I have found help greatly are Sigil (http://code.google.com/p/sigil/) and Calibre (http://calibre-ebook.com/). Sigil is an editor for various ebook formats. I find this especially useful in converting PDFs to ePub format for my Nook. Calibre is an eBook library management tool that manages the ebooks you have on you eReader and your computer. I agree that there are errors in the eBooks, but I have not found them any more numerous that errors in print versions. In fact I compared the e-version of "Coyote" by Allan Steele with the print version, and they both had the same typos and mis-prints (so no additional editing was done to prepare either version).   Richard Gombert Yahoo Mail Account rgombert_AT_yahoo_DOT_com ========================================================================= It's such a cloudy day                     I can see myself tomorrow Seems we'll never see the sun,             a little further down the road and still the day has possibilities           - Dave Cousins  - With apologies to Neal Peart                 "Further Down the Road"   good friends help you move books!   Rusted and ropy. Dog-eared old copy.   Vintage and classic, or just plain Jurassic:   all words to describe me.    - Ian Anderson "The Dog-ear Years" ========================================================================= READ CAREFULLY. By reading this email, you agree, on behalf of your employer, to release me from all obligations and waivers arising from any and all NON-NEGOTIATED agreements, licenses, terms-of-service, shrinkwrap, clickwrap, browsewrap, confidentiality, non-disclosure, non-compete and acceptable use policies ("BOGUS AGREEMENTS") that I have entered into with your employer, its partners, licensors, agents and assigns, in perpetuity, without prejudice to my ongoing rights and privileges. You further represent that you have the authority to release me from any BOGUS AGREEMENTS on behalf of your employer. ========================================================================= ________________________________ From: Raymond Macon <maconr~at~speakeasy.net> To: 'Jules Verne Forum' <jvf~at~Gilead.org.il> Sent: Monday, May 23, 2011 11:13 AM Subject: Re: Jules Verne E-Book Editions -- Nook Hello James,   Thank you for an excellent synopsis of the “beauty and the beast” of e-books.  My own very limited experience with the NOOK so far has taught me that the “free” editions of public domain titles are riddled with OCRs.  They also lack diacritical markings and italicized words which are present in the original text.  So I have tended to avoid those now and instead make a real purchase of the titles I am interested in.  However, just because one pays for a book doesn’t mean that the text is error-free.  Even if there are no OCRs in the text, the diacritics and italics may well be absent.   The booksellers are aware of these problems and others.  I do not know how they will eventually be resolved, nor do I know if this is a problem with contemporary works.  Presumably, their conversion to the digital format has been done in a much more rigorous fashion than what has been done with classical titles.  I will be buying these books as well, so I should be able to make a cursory comparison for myself.  There are problems with the digital format, but I believe that efforts will be made to correct them, particularly as they apply to classical titles.  Maybe that is wishful thinking on my part, but we are talking about a massive undertaking that will take many years to complete.  In the meantime, I am simply happy that I can take my favorite books with me anywhere in the world without packing them in an extra case or leaving behind other items just so I can have good reading with me.  That convenience alone makes the e-book worthwhile.   Best, Raymond   From:owner-jvf@Gilead.org.il [mailto:owner-jvf@Gilead.org.il] On Behalf Of James Keeline Sent: Monday, 23 May, 2011 08:46 To: Jules Verne Forum Subject: Re: Jules Verne E-Book Editions -- Nook   I have the software for the nook and Kindle on my iPhone but don't really have any books purchased for them yet.  I might think differently if I had an iPad, a good but expensive way to have access to all of the eBook formats.  It appears that both nook and Kindle rely heavily on public domain "sales".  Last year Amazon has posted articles about the sales of eBooks exceeding those of hardcovers: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-07-19/amazon-com-says-kindle-sales-accelerated-last-quarter-e-books-pass-print.html However, they do not indicate how many of those "purchases" are free public domain content which users download to fill their nook with books they may never read in the same way that people have purchased the Britannica Great Books to put on a shelf and once a year glance at the bookcase and say to themselves:  "yes, they're still there." My mother in law recently purchased a nook and has been reading a lot on it as a replacement for paperbacks.  She obtains some books from the local public library through some kind of lending program.  However, after downloading some favorite Dickens titles she complained to us about gibberish characters in the texts.  When we saw them it was clear that these were optical character recognition (OCR) errors which had not been caught in proofreading. This reminded us of our project to reissue the first five Tom Swift books from 1910 for a 100th anniversary edition through Lulu.  We obtained the texts from Project Gutenberg but were surprised to find, after all of the time they have been available, that there were still so many errors remaining.  My wife and I read through the texts and found dozens of errors in each one when compared with the vintage copies. Project Gutenberg does have a Distributed Proofreaders project where people can volunteer to edit books.  However, this is probably done for newer releases rather than the ones that have been available for years. For Verne this likely means that there are not only the bad translations rampant but also additional errors which may harm the author's stature in the eyes of casual readers who are not aware of these issues. It is interesting that the offerings for Kindle vs. nook may vary so much in terms of the modern translations of Verne.  One has to wonder how much this carries over to other books.  It certainly could be a factor in deciding which reader platform to buy.  It's not just price but whether the books you want are (or will be) available for it.  Of course, with the iPhone/iPad/Android option of installing nook and Kindle software then you have all (or most) options open to you. James D. Keeline
Received on Mon 23 May 2011 - 18:44:06 IDT

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