E books

Arts & Sciences Arts & Entertainment
1

I just re-read Animal Farm last night.:moo:
gutenberg.net.au/ebooks01/0100011.txt

(Briliant novel. Bit depressing to read now as there is so much to recognize in today’s world, not to mention, in certain Forumosa posters…;-))

I printed it off from Project Gutenberg
gutenberg.net/

which currently has around 10,000 books available online. I tend to read a lot of books, plays, and poetry online or print them off and take away, so wondering if you guys know about this. It’s not as nice as having a lovely fresh smelling book to fondle, but since I’m reading documents all day long, it’s not a big deal to have an A4 book once in a while. It also saves lots of money if you use the office printer. :smiley:

There are other copyright-free literature sites too:
classicreader.com/
digital.library.upenn.edu/books/
bartleby.com/

Any thoughts?

2

You can get a PDA or e-book reader for about $4000+, so instead of carrying all that paper, you can read anywhere and anytime.

3

Really? Could I use I-POD in that respect? I’m on a Mac.
But since I spend my life gazing into a screen, I prefer something more tangible, hence the printouts, which I do on the blank side of recycled paper.
Here are a couple more sights:
web-books.com/Classics/Poetr … ntents.htm
online-literature.com/

4

Hey Alien,

Thanks for the links. I love books, but I still haven’t gotten into e-books as much. I guess I am old-fashioned, but after staring at a computer screen all day, I prefer to curl up with a book or magazine in my hands.

I know–you print out the books. But I still think that for a novel, a stack of laser printed paper has nothing on even the cheapest paperback.

Anyway, thanks for posting the links. I am glad to know that there are so many classics out there. But I don’t see myself ever giving up my stacks of books and magazines and newspapers (and trips to second-nad book stores) for a file on a PDA.

5

I can do more searching. But I found this link that has some kind of download for i-pod. I gather that Mac doesn’t support .txt documents on an i-pod. At any rate, there is some available software, but you’ll have to know which model i-pod to get it the right software.

6

Alien, you read the whole book, printing it out page by page, last night?
You must be a fast reader.

7

Hewlett-Packard Matsushita

I’ve always thought it would be cool to have a reader that shows two pages like a book. Just for familiarity I guess. There’s no logical reason to show more than a page at a time.

8

Does anyone know the cost (printing and paper) per page of printing a book like this. These copyright-free old books have pretty cheap editions to buy in book form. Just wondering. Is there any easy way to format so that the pages come out like two small pages on one A4 sheet (like a smallish open paperback)?

I might try some reading like this (eg the books on Cranky’s site).

Brian

9

Yes, Bri, It’s an option within Word. Just copy and paste text from a webpage into MS Word. Go two columns and then print landscape both sides.

A.

10

[quote=“Richardm”] Hewlett-Packard Matsushita

I’ve always thought it would be cool to have a reader that shows two pages like a book. Just for familiarity I guess. There’s no logical reason to show more than a page at a time.[/quote]

What’s the name of the HP reader?

11

The HP one is a prototype. You can read more here: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/3173835.stm.
The Matsushita is being market tested now I think. It is called Sigma Book. I think they use the greek letter for sigma.

12

In case anyone is starving for science fiction, Baen has a bunch of titles available free for download. These include current books by “hot” authors as well as classics.

baen.com/library/defaultTitles.htm