Pete

A Crowdfunded Approach To Setting E-Books Free

Paidcontent.org story on one idea to make ebooks more readily available to libraries and readers,

“What do To Kill A Mockingbird, A Wrinkle in Time and Little House on the Prairie series have in common, besides being beloved? None of them are available legally as e-books. A new site aims to make these and other e-books available to the public (and in libraries), as DRM-free Creative Commons works, via crowdfunding.

The newly launched Unglue.it, now in alpha, is a place for individuals and institutions to join together to liberate specific e-books and other types of digital content by paying rights holders to relicense their works under Creative Commons licenses.”

February 1, 2012 by Books EBooks Legal Issues Libraries

Study says humans now use the internet as our main ‘memory’

“In the age of Google, our minds are adapting so that we are experts at knowing where to find information even though we don’t recall what it is.
The researchers found that when we want to know something we use the Internet as an ‘external memory’ just as computers use an external hard drive.
Nowadays we are so reliant on our smart phones and laptops that we go into ‘withdrawal when we can’t find out something immediately’.”

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2091127/Google-boggling-brains-Study-says-humans-use-internet-main-memory.html#ixzz1kfLn3UXX

January 27, 2012 by Google Internet

Milwaukee budget proposal for 2012 would roll back library cuts

In a rare bit of good news, Milwaukee appears poised to restore some funding to the public library system,

“Milwaukee Public Libraries would be open longer hours and expand their educational programs for children, under the 2012 city budget that Mayor Tom Barrett will unveil Tuesday.

Barrett said he’s seeking to roll back the library service cuts of previous years, in recognition of the libraries’ importance in helping residents improve their lives.

As recent statistics show increasing poverty in Milwaukee, Barrett said, “I remain convinced that education, and access to education, and access to books, is one of the best things we can do to combat that. We’re trying to foster a positive learning environment.””

September 26, 2011 by Internet Librarians Libraries

Amazon’s Future Is So Much Bigger Than a Tablet

Wired’s Epicenter blog takes a look at Amazon.com and how it’s rumored tablet device may position Amazon as the dominant e-tailer in just about everything.

“A few years ago, people laughed at Amazon’s Kindle, especially its clunky hardware design and CEO Jeff Bezos’ breathless rhetoric about how it would change how customers bought and experienced media. Now that we’re getting closer to the unveiling of Amazon’s long-rumored, slickly designed multimedia tablet, nobody’s laughing any more.

Amazon has swiftly become the most disruptive company in the media and technology industries. Its potential in this space is simply off the charts: bigger than Apple’s, bigger than Google’s or Microsoft’s. It’s becoming a purer version of all three.”

September 8, 2011 by Amazon Google

PEW Internet: E-reader ownership doubles in six months

According to the Pew Internet & Amercan Life Project, e-reader ownership outpaces tablets:

“The share of adults in the United States who own an e-book reader doubled to 12% in May, 2011 from 6% in November 2010. E-readers, such as a Kindle or Nook, are portable devices designed to allow readers to download and read books and periodicals. This is the first time since the Pew Internet Project began measuring e-reader use in April 2009 that ownership of this device has reached double digits among U.S. adults.

Tablet computers—portable devices similar to e-readers but designed for more interactive web functions—have not seen the same level of growth in recent months.”

June 27, 2011 by EBooks Internet

Another Ranganathan

I saw the name and had to share. From the NY Times. Microprocessors are close to reaching the limit on how small they can get and a new approach is needed. Enter Ranganathan:

“Parthasarathy Ranganathan, a Hewlett-Packard electrical engineer, offers a radical alternative to today’s computer designs that would permit new designs for consumer electronics products as well as the next generation of supercomputers, known as exascale processors.”

March 1, 2011 by Uncategorized

Mr. Edison’s Kindle

Technologizer takes a fun look back at some ideas and inventions that were ahead of their time.

“Thanks to Google Books’ archives of Popular Science, Popular Mechanics, LIFE, and other magazines that frequently reported on futuristic gizmos, we have a readily accessible record of technology that failed to live up to the initial hype–including random notions that never got off the drawing board, startlingly advanced products that didn’t find a market, and very rough drafts of concepts that eventually became a big deal. The best of them are fascinating, even when it’s not the least bit surprising that they flopped.”

February 25, 2011 by Google

Are libraries finished? Five arguments for and against

The BBC News Magazine asks the question and provides both yea and nay answers.

“But no matter how eloquently Poet Laureate Carol Ann Duffy or author Colin Dexter extol their virtues, the fact is library visitor numbers – like their budgets – are falling.

So what can the internet provide that a library can’t, and when is there simply no online substitute for a trip to your local library? Here are five examples on either side”

February 4, 2011 by Internet Libraries

iRex Iliad E-Book Reader AND Writer

We’ve all heard of the Kindle and other ebooks, but the folks over at Technovelgy have a story on the iRex iLiad ebook that you can write in.

“The iLiad ebook reader from iRex Technologies is more than just a reader, like the Amazon Kindle. It also lets you use a stylus to write in the margins, underline and otherwise annotate your ebooks. ”

Arstechnica also has a review here.

March 11, 2008 by Books EBooks

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