http://www.thebookdesigner.com/2013/01/ed-ditto-scrivener

$40 isnÕt bad at all. scrivener is worth every penny.

then again, sigil will do the same thing, and itÕs free.

and my tool is ready, if you want to see a preview.

>   http://zenmagiclove.com/zml/suite/jaguar.py

thatÕs a live sandbox. feel free to edit the text to
see how it works. (itÕd be nice to the next person
if you copied all the text out first, so that you could
so you could later paste that original text back in.
but i also regularly go back and restore it myself.)

my tool is free. but i am taking it to kickstarter,
so if you feel like contributing to such a projectÉ ;+)

-bowerbird








caimin said:
>   IÕve been using Scrivener for a few months
>   and am constantly recommending it to
>   anyone whoÕll listen. In fact, that may be
>   why several of my friends have moved to
>   far-off Asian countries.

you funny. :+)

but scrivener _is_ the type of program that
Ð if you like it Ñ you _love_love_love_ itÉ

it has many tools, and if you find Ôem useful,
you will probably find them _very_ useful and
come to be quite dependent on them to write.

and hey, anything that helps an author write
is a _good_ thing. so if it helps you, _great_.
keep on using it, with my _official_blessings!_

but if youÕre like me, and a lot of people are,
you like a Òno-distractionÓ writing environment.

that too-busy scrivener interface makes me run
far, far away, screaming. what i want instead
is a simple typing field that gets out of my way,
and lets me write. really, just get outta my way.

and i donÕt want to be bothered formatting either.
i wanna type in straight text, just like a typewriter,
and have the _program_ format it, so that it looks
all nice and pretty, works in e-readers, and so on.

simple, really. i type, and the app makes it nice.

so of course thatÕs the type of program i wroteÉ

write in a field on the left side of the screen, and
your text is formatted and shown on the right side.

then click the ÒeasyÓ button to save your edits and
have the text automatically converted to e-books.
(the output formats: .html, .mobi, .epub, and .pdf.)

seriously. thatÕs all you have to do. click a button.

i know, i know, you donÕt believe thatÕs even possible.
ok, i guess. but the proof is right there, sitting online.
you can go over there and click the button, or _not_É

the live sandbox, again, is here:
>   http://zenmagiclove.com/zml/suite/jaguar.py

but i shoulda pointed you first to this explanatory page:
>   http://zenmagiclove.com/january.html

-bowerbird














http://blogs.adobe.com/jnack/2012/06/adobe-introduces-brackets-a-free-open-source-code-editor-for-the-web.html#comment-62141

7 months later, and itÕs still not
actually mounted on the web yet.

you have to download it to try it.

-bowerbird













http://allthingsd.com/20130201/twitter-hacked-250000-user-accounts-compromised

> Ê Whatever the case, in its company blog post,Ê
> Ê Twitter took the occasion to urge its users toÊ
> Ê employ better security Òhygiene,ÓÊ
> Ê remembering to use long, complicated passwords

i was one of the users affected, and i thought it was
somewhat amusing -- and also highly ironic -- that
twitter would give us a lecture on "a secure password"
when it had just let a few hundred thousand get stolen.

-bowerbird


















http://www.hanselman.com/blog

great piece on an important topic.

but when you got to the meat of it
-- the paragraph that starts with
"the uncomfortable tension" --
you garbled the darn text!  oh no!

please rewrite it correctly.  thanks.

-bowerbird













http://davidgaughran.wordpress.com/2013/02/19/penguins-solution-for-authors-one-racket-to-rule-them-all

two-and-a-half years ago, i predicted the big6 would turn sleazy:

>   http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2010/08/a-bookfuturist-manifesto/61231

indeed, i made 7 specific predictions, and by my count, 5 of 'em
have already materialized.  the only 2 remaining are that b&n
will go down, just like borders did, and that then the big6 will fold
into perhaps a couple of "holding companies" licensing their i.p.

-bowerbird




















http://www.thebookdesigner.com/2010/10/pagination-styles-shall-we-kill-the-widows-orphans

michele said:
>   ReaderÕs wonÕt notice if some spreads run 
>   longer or shorter than others by a line, but they 
>   will notice bouncing page bottoms side by side.

in a print-book that's true.  because the memory of
where the previous spread bottomed out is vague.

but in an e-book, where each page overlays the last,
along with absolute certainty the book didn't "move",
it becomes totally obvious if your page-bottoms vary.


>   (3) force justify the page, which changes 
>   the line spacing and is almost always noticeable.

first, i'm not all that sure that it is that "noticeable".
especially if you look at pages in one-at-time-mode.

one _can_ spot different line-spacing on facing pages,
since the lines won't "line up" across from each other;
but i've seen zero evidence people consider that to be
a "flaw", not if both of the line-heights are reasonable.

and indeed, when you explain to them that you have
shifted the line-height a wee bit so the bottoms balance,
they agree it's a good solution to the worser problem
(of unbalanced bottoms) and the worst problem of all
(namely, the presence of pesky widows and orphans).

although, to be perfectly honest, some people even
view our concern against widows/orphans as evidence
we have a serious problem with obsession/compulsion.

-bowerbird









http://epubzero.blogspot.com/2013/02/spineless.html

dave, are you serious about moving forward on this?

if so, then do your goal some justice, and do it right.

if you really want "epub0", cut things back to this:

1.  all .html files are combined into _one._
(i'll pretend for the moment that we're still
using .html files.  but just for the moment.
eventually, light-markup will be even better.)

2.  anything in the .zip file is part of the book.
(we'll .zip the book to transport it.  but initially,
any file in the book's folder is part of the book.)

3.  now we have no need for a "nav" or a "spine".
(or, to use other terms, we ditch .ncx and .opf.)

4.  we can (should) require a "contents" section,
and i will suggest that it should be mandated as
the second section, after the cover-title section.
this inline table-of-contents would not be strictly
"necessary" for the e-book itself, as it _must_be_
an accurate reflection of the headers in the book.
that is, it serves as belt to the header suspenders,
and is thus, in a real sense, entirely _redundant._
but an explicit inline table-of-contents makes it
easier for our people to work with the e-book file,
and also make it simpler to create a chapter-catalog
for our online library containing millions of e-books,
because we won't have to load in every bit of the files.

5. any content files unaddressed directly by the .html
are understood to be "auxiliary", and will be tacked on
at the end when the book is displayed by an end-user.
i'd suggest they be ordered alphabetically by filename,
but we can also specify that the order will be arbitrary.
(because if the order is important, put it in the .html!)

there, now you have something closer to "zero"...

-bowerbird





luc said:
>   HTML rendering engine are not powerful enough to
>   compose the equivalent of hundreds of paper pages

of course they are powerful enough.  project gutenberg
has always had its html-books composed of a single file.

the 300k limitation of sony/adobe is simply ludicrous...

-bowerbird





dave said:
>   We have a novel with 1.4 million words; 
>   a text-only file is 7.7M.

no big deal; i can handle it.  if you doubt me,
change all the lowercase vowels to "x" and
send it to me. i'll send back a working app.


>   But I think the issue is more with textbooks, 
>   which may have hundreds of megabytes 
>   of text, images, and so on.

although i'm not sure what "and so on" means,
i can confidently say that i can handle that too.
unless you want those "hundreds of megabytes"
of pictures displayed on-screen simultaneously.
but i sincerely doubt you have a screen that big.


>   The books the company I work for publish
>   are but a tiny corner of a much larger world.

i can vouch that i'm familiar with the range of
books that reside in that "much larger world",
and i am confident that i can handle the bulk.

but i do love a challenge, so if there's something
you think that i cannot deal with, send it to me...

-bowerbird
















http://epubzero.blogspot.com/2013/02/epub-zero-radically-simpler-e-book.html

dave said:
>   But that caused problems for reading systems, 
>   which couldn't digest a 5MB html file all at once. 

actually, the limit is 300k.  not quite the same thing.
plus i doubt you actually have many 5mb .html files.

but it's plain stupid to let inferior coders hold us back.


>   Today, I think that having a single content file 
>   would be very limiting.

you'll need to justify that statement better than you have.

-bowerbird























http://benjamingilbert.net/imessage-should-have-a-dead-battery-auto-responder

i've always thought that my iphone should shut itself off
when it still had enough battery for a few phone-calls
-- so i could turn it back on and call anyone i needed,
if only to tell them that my battery was now expired --
rather than stay on until the juice was completely gone.

-bowerbird














http://epubzero.blogspot.com/2013/02/indexhtml-and-one-big-file.html

dave said:
>   having split hundreds of single-file e-books into 
>   chunks in 2007Ð2008, I don't want to do the reverse. 
>   But some books are not all the same thing.

you wasted your time splitting all those e-books
because of the requirement requiring an e-book
be split up so brain-dead viewer-programs could
process them, like chopping up a piece of steak so
your 92-year-old grandpa will be able to gum 'em.

and i don't buy your arguments, or hadrien's either
-- and in some cases i think they're _bad_ideas_ --
but if you're set on e-books with multiple .html files,
you can use the "prev/next rel" thing for navigation.

(plus you should be including real navigation anyway;
that is, _actual_links_ to the previous/next chapters.)

-bowerbird






dave said:
> I think using rel="next" would be
> harder than defining a reading order.

since you are typing everything by hand,
well then, yes, it might well be, dave. ;+)

i make tools to take care of the drudgery,
so that would be a piece of cake for me...

you're gonna give people an authoring-tool,
right? that's how you make stuff _simple_...

-bowerbird
























http://epubzero.blogspot.com/2013/02/indexhtml-and-one-big-file.html

hadrien said:
> but reading system developers 
> can probably provide more insights.

i put this out of of order because i _am_
just such a "reading system developer".

and the things i am telling you are things
that i know will work, because i've _made_
them work, time and time again, so the
f.u.d. you emit, i can see through easily.

and indeed, i am about to gear up with
a large campaign to roll out my work, so
you'll soon see the proof of the pudding.

which is why i really don't care whether
you choose to listen to me or ignore me.


> Using links in each file can be an alternative, but 
> isn't it better to know without parsing all of our files 
> what the structure of the publication will be?

it's no big deal to process "all of our files"
to determine the order of the files, since
we'd just have to read the first 2k of each.

but if it would make _you_ feel better to
have an explicit list, you could make one.

in the interest of simplicity, however, you
should not _require_ it from everyone else.

you could also have your packaging tool
create this file-order-list at compile time.


> In a dynamic world (the Web) I would 
> argue that link@rel="next" is better, 
> since content can change all the time 
> and this is more flexible than checking 
> and changing a centralized file all the time.

any workflow that relies on "checking and
changing a centralized file" -- even once,
let alone "all the time" -- is _badly_ flawed.

you guys really need to leave the "by hand"
mentality back in the 20th (12th?) century.


> In a packaged document (EPUB) 
> expressing things at a package 
> seems to be a more reasonable choice 
> since each individual document 
> won't evolve on its own, 
> the whole publication will.

just can't shake the multi-file mentality,
can you? meanwhile, project gutenberg
has always been able to make its e-books
using a single .html file. it's not that hard.

***

kjartan said:
> cramming everything into a "single book" 
> is not really the future of publishing anyway

the computer is extremely adept at splitting.
and joining. this is much ado about nothing.

-bowerbird












http://epubzero.blogspot.com/2013/02/war.html

this is how my system does it.

table of contents right after the title-page:

>   part 1 -- fear
>   part 2 -- killing
>   part 3 -- love

then each "part" starts with its own mini t.o.c.:

>   part 1
>
>   fear
>
>
>   chapter 1.1 -- new york city, six months later
>   chapter 1.2 -- korengal valley, afghanistan, spring 2007
>   chapter 1.3 -- give your chapters a title
>   chapter 1.4 -- just like you give your children a name


you could also do the "main" table of contents like so:

>   part 1 -- fear
>       chapter 1 -- new york city, six months later
>       chapter 2 -- korengal valley, spring 2007
>       chapter 3 -- give your chapters a title
>       chapter 4 -- just like you give kids a name
>   part 2 -- killing
>       chapter 5 -- give these chapters a title too
>       chapter 6 -- helps people "see" the structure
>   part 3 -- love
>       chapter 7 -- isn't love a wonderful thing?
>       chapter 8 -- love is what makes the birds sing

i suggest this last form _if_ it will fit on one page.
(i hate those elaborate t.o.c. that go on for 6 pages.)
if it won't fit, i suggest the main/mini split as above.

by the way, in my system, _the_headers_themselves_
are compared to this _listed_ table of contents, and,
if the belt doesn't match the suspenders, it squawks.

there's no such thing as a "nav" file.  because if you
already have belt and suspenders, who needs glue?

-bowerbird






















http://epubzero.blogspot.com/2013/02/spineless-part-two.html

you've lost the "simple" plot, dave.

here's my file-format for moby-dick:
>   http://zenmagiclove.com/zml/mobyd/mobyd.zml

if you're thinking that looks like
a simple text-file, you're right...

well, at least, you're mostly right.
it's actually a structured text-file,
because there is some zen markup
hiding in plain sight in the whitespace.

but that's what it means to be "simple".

we make the file-format simple, so that
the humans can produce e-books easily,
and we put the smarts in the viewer-app,
because that's where they're most efficient.

and yeah, we still have to deal with those
browsers, which are programmed to be
stupid rule-following robots who need to
be fed .html, so here's the .html file we'll
"back-convert" for your dumb browsers:

>   http://zenmagiclove.com/zml/mobyd/mobyd.html

and my .html might not strike your fancy,
but it's easy enough to recode it so it will,
if you just describe your preferred markup.

and yes, we can (and do) make an .epub,
and a .mobi, and a .pdf, and offline apps,
and online apps, heck, even a _slideshow_.
all of 'em high-quality, from the .zml file.

and nobody ever has to deal with an .ncx,
or an .opf, or any other stupid acronyms.

because we want e-books to be simple.

and ordinary people don't think that your
acronyms are simple...  they really don't...

-bowerbird








the silence is pretty loud in here...

-bowerbird








dave said:
>   The conversation is quite lively elsewhere, 
>   as was mentioned in the previous post.

that "conversation" has nothing to do with "simple".

indeed, it is so far removed, i won't even go there...
(the acronyms alone are enough to choke a horse!)

but as soon as y'all get your version worked out,
_my_ "simple" will be waiting to steal your lunch.

-bowerbird








hey dave-

i finally got around to testing some of your concerns
in my lab, so i thought i report back with my findings.

i've created a mac e-book app with a _lot_ of content
-- including a 12m text file, a 7m video, a .5m mp3,
and over 3000 images, summing to well over 100m.

further, as you probably know, a mac program is just
a _folder_, which means you can open it in the finder,
and burrow down to that content and replace it at will,
meaning you can not just verify the content i described,
but also substitute in your own, to make sure it's "real".
(you'll need to use the same filenames that i used, but
other than that, everything will continue to work nicely.)

as for "working", i just stuffed the text into a text-field,
so you can actually edit it live. and the video and mp3
do play normally, as you would expect. the cursor-keys
will thumb you through the paragraphs of the text-file
(it's moby dick), one by one, with each one summoning
one of the 3000+ graphic-files (the one which was used
as the "content" that created the image, as can be seen).

anyway, this app is 136m, but if you want me to send it
over some way so you can take a look, you let me know.

what you will see, if you do look at it, is that it remains
very snappy, even with the audio and the video playing,
and can slide through the paragraphs much faster than
you could read them, or even get a good view of them...

ergo, i've got an excellent handle on "container" issues.

-bowerbird







dave-

today's task is to program some download routines.

that way, i'll be able to send you the bare app itself,
and it will grab all the content from the web.  better.

-bowerbird










ok, coded it.  and already done with today's addition, too,
which only took minutes, but what a boost in capability!

my new feature, in this offline viewer-app, provides a link
for each displayed paragraph, which opens in your browser
the online version of the book at the very same paragraph.

so you can be instantly transported from the offline version
of the book to the very same spot in the online version of it.

this provides some synergy between the offline and online
versions, helping to jumpstart stuff like online annotations
and conversations that focus on specific parts of the book.

such synergy might be on .epub's drawing-boards, or not,
but i already have it, and it just "fell out of" my approach...

anyway, dave, send me your e-mail if you're interested in
taking a look at this.  if not, just consider this an f.y.i.  :+)

-bowerbird

























http://publishingperspectives.com/2013/02/did-amazon-just-kill-a-golden-goose

ok, you were gaming their system,
and they put an end to you. so what?

-bowerbird






















http://go-to-hellman.blogspot.ca/2013/02/anachronisms-and-dysfunctions-of-ebook.html

the world has been doing e-books for some time.

and eric, you've been involved yourself for a while.

so why are we still discussing basic building blocks?

why have we seemingly accomplished _nothing_?

when is everyone gonna finally step up the game?

-bowerbird



















http://swizec.com/blog/it-takes-about-two-months-to-write-a-technical-book/swizec/6076

gosh, thank you so much.

you made me laugh already today,
and it's only 8:36 in the morning...

yes, writing a book _is_ "easy",
if you mean just the first draft.

heck, that's not any "work" at all.

the hard part comes when you
come back to it, a bit later, and
realize that your first draft sucks.

that's a punch to the gut, dude.

what's that?, you say that you
already sent it to your publisher?

oh-oh. what a beginner's mistake.

now your editor has to be the one
who punches you in the gut, and
that means everyone in their office
will know they have to watch you
like a hawk, because you're suspect.

you're the type of author who makes
their job miserable, so they will makeÊ
sure they make _your_ life miserable.

damn sure. Êdamn miserable. damn it.

you will be sent a _long_ list of
things that need to be changed.

and, because, as you just said,
you're already "slightly sick of it",
forcing yourself to go back to it,
to rewrite it, and rewrite it again,
and again and again and again,
and then once more after that...

then come back and look at
this silly post, and how you
said that writing a book was
"easy", and you will be smarter.

and then, when you discover that
some of your examples don't work
with the newly-updated software,
so you're gonna have to re-do 'em,
you'll need more indigestion meds.

and then, when you realize that
you'll have to assess _every_one_
of your examples, to ensure that
they work, and probably generate
a number of new screenshots too,
then, my friend, you'll be smarter...

so, yeah, writing a book is "easy".

if you don't know any better...

-bowerbird









hey, you're a good sport. Êyou took that _very_ well.
and you're right -- all you will need is perseverance.
good luck, and i wish you all the best, into the future.

-bowerbird











http://www.magellanmediapartners.com/index.php/mmcp/article/the_future_at_hand

convince scott turow?

do you even understand
what you just wrote up?

-bowerbird









brian said:
>Ê Yes, I understand what I wrote. 
>Ê Mine was an offhand comment 
>Ê to a friend in my small public forum, 
>Ê intended to give him a laugh.

oh, i get it!Ê yes, that _is_ amusing!

-bowerbird

p.s.Ê but perhaps all of us could
use work on our sense of humor.
or hey, maybe only some of us are
allowed to be funny, i donÕt know.


















http://www.fastcodesign.com/1672260/editorially-wants-to-redesign-writing-for-the-web

if the service was as good as you say it is,
it would've been out of private beta by now.

-bowerbird













http://paidcontent.org/2013/04/09/the-empire-acquires-the-rebel-alliance-mendeley-users-revolt-against-elsevier-takeover

>   Disclosure: Reed Elsevier, 
>   the parent company of
>   science publisher Elsevier, 
>   is an investor in GigaOmniMedia, 
>   the company that publishes GigaOM.

why is gigom taking money from elsevier?

now i don't trust _you_.

-bowerbird















http://blogs.publishersweekly.com/blogs/PWxyz/2013/04/29/the-new-ones-horizon

peter said:
>   Except that he pretty much doesnÕt know anyone thatÕs been there.

that's quite all right. indeed, it is most definitely for the best.
because the vast majority of the people who have "been there"
have had their heads up their asses, if you'll pardon my french.
so they just woulda steered this young person the wrong way.

and, oh, there is so much more i could add to this comment...

because there is so much more that this grad student will learn.

he'll learn .epub is just silly.  why do all of that work to put a book
_into_ that format, when you just turn around and take it back out?
and even when the process is fully automated, what's the payoff for
storing a book as an .epub, instead of just storing its components,
so that each of them can be accessed individually when it's desired.

the bad news, of course, is that if a person is saturated in the web,
without a fundamental understanding of the core values of books
as their print foundation evolved over the past five hundred years,
the electronic-books that you create might well lack some features.

so i'd advise that young person to study some book-design books...

but other than that, the clean slate has a lot going for it.

and i would be lying if i didn't say that i've been waiting patiently
-- for far too many years -- for this type of development to occur.

-bowerbird









http://dashes.com/anil/2013/04/i-like-blogging-software.html

anil-

i would find this more useful if, instead of specifying
the tech you want used (e.g., markdown, json, bootstrap),
you described the functionalities you want, and why...

because rethinking the methodology is likely to be
one of the first -- and biggest -- steps to success.

and, for the purpose of evaluating possible contenders,
it would help to give us a substantial amount of content
(displaying a wide range of needs) to be used in demos.

-bowerbird














http://alistapart.com/column/wysiwtf

my word.  i've been waiting a very, very long time
to read something this intelligent on "a list apart".

looking at scans of old books (project gutenberg),
i learned that the best way to ascertain structure
is to examine presentation, since the _purpose_
of presentation is to communicate that structure.
in other words, the two were inextricably mixed...

so this insistence that we treat them as separate
-- heck, a notion that we _could_ do such a thing --
has always seemed to be ridiculous to an extreme.

even though there are some benefits -- but, chiefly,
those happen to be a matter of mere convenience --
the fact that it is fundamentally wrong is troubling.

-bowerbird

















http://ux.stackexchange.com/questions/3618/ideal-column-width-for-paragraphs-online

there is no "ideal". it varies from person to person.

and "online" has long ceased being a singular entity;  
it ranges from small cell-phones up to huge monitors.  
and all those situations are experienced differently.

so your best bet is to let the person resize at will;  
and control the font-size, margins, and leading too,  
because each of those factors can impact readability.

in the early days, "reflowability" was heralded, but  
nowadays it seems designers have reverted back to an  
outdated (and unrealistic) desire to control it all.

give people flexibility, and the ability to customize  
-- _easily_and_naturally_ -- and they will love you...

-bowerbird



















http://www.magellanmediapartners.com/index.php/mmcp/article/wrecking_ball

a community cannot be "dismantled".

it will reorganize itself spontaneously.

when it is a _true_ community, that is.

especially in a hyperconnected world.

then again, all the cars traveling south
on the 405 in the afternoon rush-hour
do _not_ constitute a "true" community.

they're just objects which happen to be
heading in the same general direction.

-bowerbird
















http://www.gullicksonlaboratories.com/the-future-is-written-in-javascript

why is it that only javascript is allowed to run in the browser?
and not python? or perl? or php?  that's what i'd like to know.
i learn it grudgingly, because i have absolutely no other choice.

-bowerbird















http://blogs.getty.edu/iris/open-content-an-idea-whose-time-has-come

awesome. great news.

-bowerbird















http://www.fastcolabs.com/3015344/jeff-bezos-bought-the-washington-post-for-one-thing-distribution

i'm not sure why people are befuddled by this.

mr. bezos purchased a propaganda machine 
in the capital of the most powerful nationÊon
the face of the entire planet, a machine that is
cheaper than any lobbyists he might employ,
because it'll _make_ money, not _cost_ money.

and when he gives a complimentary subscription
to everyone who owns a kindle, he'll sell kindles,
to everyone in the city, who will have to keep up
with the juggernaut that the paper will become,
once everyone has to keep up with it, and this
will allow him to collect information on the very
same n.s.a. people collecting information on us!

and when he starts delivering milk and diapers
and alcohol along with the daily newspaper, he
will know who drinks the booze, and how much.

and once you know where the weak points are...

-bowerbird













http://shkspr.mobi/blog/2013/08/how-to-crack-amazons-kindle-best-seller-list-sell-4-books

you said:
>   Top 10 lists are often used as 
>   a shortcut for purchasing decisions.

evidently not all _that_ often,
if your book is any indication.

-bowerbird

p.s. i debated whether to waste time
making any response to this at all,
but since i had already wasted time
reading this tripe, i decided i should.















http://pandodaily.com/2013/09/17/when-a-kickstarter-flop-isnt-actually-a-flop

maybe, as you say, "its a completely new thing" to you,
and "once its clearly explained", you will understand it,
but "its" and "it's" are _not_ freely-interchangeable...
-bowerbird





















http://www.thebookdesigner.com/2013/01/ed-ditto-scrivener/

wow.  this article really drew some interest!

127 comments...  (well, ok, maybe 100,
if you don't count the spammers. still...)

i guess lots of people want to know how to
publish your e-book from word to kindle
in under 10 minutes.  sounds miraculous.

and further, i know that, for me, it set the bar,
in terms of putting a stopwatch to my software.

if my authoring-tool couldn't beat 10 minutes,
it was going to lose the promotional arms-race.

fortunately, for me, i _was_ able to top that!

yay!

what was my time?  well, you're just going to
have to go over to my kickstarter to find outÉ

(see what i did there?)

oh, and while you're there, why don't you just
drop $11 in my bucket.  because time is money.

>   http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/bowerbird/jaguar-cub-a-simple-tool-for-great-e-books

-bowerbird











http://corlan.org/2013/11/05/brackets-sprint-33-is-out

why doesnÕt it exist as a web-app?

-bowerbird







2014!







http://rachelandrew.co.uk/archives/2014/01/07/html-epub-mobi-pdf-wtf-creating-an-ebook/

rachel said:
>   Something that I see as a huge benefit 
>   of self-publishing in digital only format 
>   it the ability to make corrections.

/it the ability/is the ability/

somewhat ironic, eh?

-bowerbird







http://gigaom.com/2014/07/02/if-you-love-books-then-you-should-be-rooting-for-amazon-not-hachette-or-the-big-five


bowerbird

if you love local brick-and-mortar bookstores, and big publishers,
then you should head out to those brick-and-mortar bookstores
and buy lots and lots and lots and lots of expensive paper-books.
because if you donÕt (and probably even if you _do_, but certainly
if you do not), your local bookstores will close, and those publishers
will find an exit from a marketplace which no longer provides them
with the obscene profits to which they have become accustomed.
so go! do it now! stop reading these websites, on your computers,
and go to your bookstores and buy those expensive paper-books.
or else itÕs all your own fault.
-bowerbird
Reply Share
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Robotech_Master
Thursday, July 3, 2014 

Oddly enough, as of late 2013 there were 20% more independent bookstores in business than there were in 2009. Seems like one way or another, AmazonÕs been good for them.

Reply Share 


	.	
	.	
bowerbird
Thursday, July 3, 2014 

amazon _did_ do good for independent bookstores,
by knocking borders clean off the face of the planet.
and amazon will do an even _bigger_ favor to those
independent bookstores when it kills barnes&noble.
nonetheless, few of those independent bookstores
will consider amazon to be their friend, nor will they
stock books being published by amazonÕs imprints.
so, you know, that was a nice _attempt_ at refutation.
-bowerbird