NewMedia On the Go » Format

ePublisher: an interview

Katherine W. Prawl — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 01:52:37 +0000

Today I spoke with Clark Sneed, the national sales manager from Dirxion, LLC, a major eBook publisher. I’d contacted them after receiving a link to an online tourism guide they publish, the 2009 Virginia Guide and being very impressed with its quality and beauty. This example really shows some of the multimedia possibilities of eBooks. As well as a plethora of gorgeous photos, there are embedded videos, links to related eBooks and other websites, a search engine and a way to add bookmarks and notes to your own copy that look like little sticky-notes. When you create a note and go to another page, the note becomes a tab at the edge of the book with the page number, that you can click on to go directly back to that page. The navigation menu (Table of Contents and Search) can be hidden behind a tab on the edge of the page, allowing the flip book to expand to almost the full width of the browser window, and clicking on any page will zoom in or out. You turn pages in a very analog-like manner, by clicking on the corner of the page to go forward or back, or you can specify a page number to jump to in the toolbar, or of course use the navigation menu.

part of a page from the 2009 Virginia Guide at Dirxion

Dirxion eBook webpages include space for banner ads or badges, if you like, so it’s possible to generate revenues on top of book sales. Your eBook can be published on CD-ROM as well as (or instead of) the Web, too, so your sales aren’t limited only to those readers with good internet connections. Dirxion doesn’t handle sales — you need your own ecommerce site, or list your eBook with distributors like Ingram and OverDrive, or distributor-retailers such as Lulu or Ebooks.com, but they can encrypt your eBook for security. They do offer some marketing services, including listing your page with major search engines like Google, Yahoo, MSN in such a way that search results link directly to your eBook page. Also, one of their blogs is all about marketing your eBooks. They offer tracking reports of your site’s traffic and even direct mail or telemarketing services.

Clark told me Dirxion was the first company to do electronic “flip books” like this, starting back when the four founders were working at AT&T, when they published the phone book on CD-ROM. In 1996 they left AT&T to form this company, and have since then grown to 85 employees and over 3000 eBooks annually. Clark agreed with me that ePublishing is still a growth industry, in spite of general economic trends. The founders are still active in this privately-held company, and they are still hiring.

So, how does a prospective eBook writer get their book published at Dirxion? Technically, it’s quite simple. Just provide camera-ready copy in PDF format, and Dirxion does the rest. They put the finished product, with visual navigation menu and flip page eBook, in a directory on their website, using a subdomain for your name with their domain name, or using your own chosen domain name (virtually hosted, still on their website). They handle all the coding and hosting, so there is no worry about bandwidth overruns on your own website, and your eBook is updated automatically whenever they revise their software. Or, as mentioned earlier, you can get your eBook on CD-ROM. All of this comes at a cost, of course, but I don’t have information on that yet, and naturally pricing depends on the number of pages, platform (Web or CD-ROM), extra services, and so on. Clark said he would get back to me with a rough estimate for the project I’m working on right now, but we are still in the planning stages so don’t even know how many pages we’ll be dealing with. I gave him a ballpark figure, and we will use that in our discussions over which publishing service to use.

eBook publishers need to make sure they retain their copyrights, regardless of who they use to “manufacture” their self-published eBooks, and it is not unreasonable to consider publishing in a number of different formats. When my company published Chris Andrews’ book, The Education of a CD-ROM Publisher: An Insider’s History of Electronic Publishing back in 1998, we did it in five different formats (hardback, paperback, CD-ROM, Website and Palm Pilot versions). Once the content is written and edited, it is frequently not too much extra effort to put it out in different ways for greater audience penetration, especially if you plan for that strategy ahead of time, and use appropriate publishing software that can export in various formats.

I’ll be talking with people from other companies in the epublishing industry, and will write about them here, so bookmark or subscribe to our RSS feed to keep up with the latest research and commentary. If you represent such a company, please feel free to contact me, too.

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Virtual Machine = Real $$

Katherine W. Prawl — Sun, 01 Mar 2009 21:03:43 +0000

We have moved to a different RV park, which has a different WISP (Wireless Internet Service Provider), one that offers unlimited bandwidth. That’s the way life ought to be! But there’s a catch.

One of the things that frustrated me most about the 360MB/48 hours limitations imposed by NomadISP at Beaudry RV was that I couldn’t download software and updates, much less audio books or podcasts or Adobe Acrobat to work on some ebook projects, I had to order it on CD-ROM instead of getting it immediately via download.

I wanted to start figuring out how to use the new features in version 9, so it was frustrating to have to wait for phyical delivery. Besides, we weren’t even 100% certain we would stay at this resort long enough for it to arrive! I went ahead and ordered it anyway, but after getting here and discovering the WiFi is decent, and that they won’t throttle our bandwidth (or so they advertise), I decided to get the 30-day trial. Well, that is only available for Windows™, and while I do have Parallels Desktop for Mac OS, and it is on the same computer, to the ISP it looks like a second machine, with its own IP and MAC addresses. I was able to log in long enough to update my copy of WinXP Pro to SP2, thank goodness, but when I tried to download the Acrobat 9 trial version, I got an error message saying my username and password weren’t accepted. So, I sent a query to Tengo’s support, explaining my situation, and will wait to see what they say. Meanwhile, though, because Parallels allows me to access a “shared” folder from Windows, I downloaded the installer from the Mac side, and copied it over to the Windows desktop. That worked!

I will not be happy (nor will I do it) if I have to buy yet another “card” to use the local WiFi on each virtual machine. That could really run into money, at $29.95/month per VM! If I absolutely must use the ‘net from a VM, I’ll switch over to our Verizon AirCard, but it is limited, too, and I don’t want to overdo it in case we need that bandwidth later on.

If President Obama really wanted to stimulate American productivity and commerce, he’d consider upgrading the country’s internet infrastructure, perhaps using WiMax, to make sure everyone, everywhere can get online to do what they need to do. Think of all the thousands of ebook and independent music publishers out there who could supplement their faltering personal economies by selling their wares online, if only they could!

Update on Local WISP

4 March 2009 — After I posted this blog, I got a reply from TengoInternet. Apparently I do not have to buy another account to use with my virtual machines. Sometimes switching between them lags slightly, but the same account does work on both MacOS and WinXP (and presumably Linux) on the same hardware. So my rant was unnecessary, but it’s possible that just after informing tech support of what I was doing they flagged my account to allow the strange-looking behavior. I got a reply to my email to tech support, and although they didn’t say so explicitly, I haven’t had any problems with it since then.
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The App Store

Katherine W. Prawl — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 02:49:58 +0000

OK, I confess. I’m having way too much fun with the iTunes iPhone App Store. So far I have no fewer than 85 apps (mini applications that are free or cost just a few dollars) on my phone. That does not include the four or five I’ve decided are simply lame and have deleted.

Here’s my list (not complete):

Stitcher, a podcast streamer
Facebook Mobile, for updating and reading the social networking site on the go. My name on the site is Katherine W. Prawl if you want to follow or friend me there.
WordPress Mobile, which I’m using to post this blog entry since we are on the road and I refuse to pay the local highway robbery prices for slow, spotty WiFi when I can do most online stuff with my iPhone for no more than I already pay for AT&T mobile data service
Mobile NOAA, for top-drawer, complete local weather info while we’re traveling
Mobile Finder, which lets me access my desktop computer’s files as long as we’re on the same local network. While we are away from our own home router, I just use MacOS X’s “create a network” function on my computer’s built-in Airport card and connect to it from the iphone. Yes, I do use a password when we are in RV parks or rest areas. You never know who might be in the next vehicle! Anyway, with this app I can copy small files to my iPhone and even edit some formats, such as text, spreadsheets, PDF, graphics, audio and video. It’s great for annotated maps.
Last.fm, an Internet radio provider that works even on the EDGE network when WiFi isn’t available. It uses AI to serve up songs you might be expected to like based on artists, titles or genres you request
SpeakEasy, a sound clip recording app that uses the iPhone’s mic
three different eBook readers, including the top-rated Bookshelf. They each will read different formats and offer various features.
a slew of location-sensitive travel aids such as Taxi for displaying the names and phone numbers of cab companies available in my current location
three or four games
a number of reference apps, like Mobile Wikipedia and a copy of the Quran in translation
several tools that use the iPhone’s screen, such as a level (which also uses the built-in accelerometer to sense the phone’s position), a flashlight and a ruler

So, you can see that I really do get a lot of use out of this marvelous toy. Thank goodness fir the 12-volt outlet and power inverter at the passenger’s seat in the RV for plugging in the wall recharger!

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Virtual Progress

Katherine W. Prawl — Sun, 18 May 2008 07:31:03 +0000

Since my last post here, a lot has been accomplished.

Last time I wrote, I was downloading the OpenSim server software to my external hard disk via SVN. That went well, but I have to admit that the instructions for compiling and running it on MacOS 1.5 were so daunting that I deferred that until after I’d tried out the binary under WindowsXP.

It worked! I installed and ran the binary version of the open source server on WinXP, which was installed on a virtual machine running in Parallels Desktop for Mac on my early 2006 20″ Intel Core Duo iMac, and while I couldn’t do much except look around with the camera tools (since I had not configured any of the other servers — asset, inventory and avatar databases), it was quite a thrill to know that I could have my own little world running on even a laptop unconnected to the internet if I wished. (The reason I use an external disk for my virtual machines is so I can access them using my husband’s 17″ MacBook Pro or any other Mac with Parallels Desktop installed.) I logged in using a copy of the SecondLife viewer, just editing the target definition in the shortcut’s general properties window, and using the default login ID and password of “Test User” and “Password”. The target I specified in Properties, of course, was the localhost URI, http://127.0.0.1 plus the designated port, in this case “:9000″.

Other VW Developments

In an already-running OpenSim grid (OpenLife), a week or two ago I met the person who started that system, Sakai OpenLife (OL name). It was interesting chatting with him, and he gave me a tip I’ve followed up on for porting content among VWs. He said many people have had good luck with Second Inventory, an application that creates a backup on your own hard disk of objects, textures, bodyparts, etc. as long as you have full permissions for those assets. I discovered that there is a multi-avatar version available, so while it’s a bit pricey (29 Euros, vs 14 Euros for the single-avatar version), I went ahead and bought it. It does indeed work as promised, although it is a bit slow to copy a large inventory since the “folder copy” function isn’t yet enabled and items must be backed up and restored one at a time. Folder actions are promised for the next version, though.

I ran a few tests, and I was able to back up and “restore” copies of simple and linked objects from both my primary and alt accounts in SecondLife to accounts in Open Life and OS Grid. It isn’t perfect; embedded scripts don’t always make it, and when they do they must be recompiled since not all LSL functions are available in the OpenSim VWs yet, and animations also don’t seem to come across when embedded in an object. Presumably those might be uploaded and added to objects if one has the .bvh files for them, though. My coffee mugs came through with their handles and “coffee” intact and didn’t require relinking, but the “drink” animation and script aren’t there, and the little “ring” piece used for the rim of the cup wasn’t linked. I just threw away the rings since they aren’t critical, and copied the particle steam script I used in SL, recompiled it and added it to the “steam” prim, but I haven’t done anything about the animation yet.

Interestingly, once I had the backups made, I could restore inventory items from my SL alt account as well as my main account to either SecondLife or another VW with impunity. The owner’s name didn’t make any difference to the software. When an asset is “restored” to an inventory, whether it came from that account or not, the owners name becomes that of the account that it’s being restored to, not the source inventory owner’s. There is certainly some potential for mischief here, especially since I was also able to “back up” some full-permission assets that I did not create, and when they were restored my avatar’s name showed up as the creator.

Copyrights and DMCA Issues

The ability to “rebrand” items that I owned full permission copies of, but had not created, made me wonder what the attitude of some of the content creators in SecondLife were toward these brave new virtual worlds. Would I be able to legally use copies of fulll-perms textures I’d bought in SecondLife in other worlds? I sent that question to one of the texture store owners I’ve patronized extensively, LilyBeth Filth, owner of Textures-R-Us. Predictably, she said, “No.” Here’s a direct quote from her IM, which I think explains her reasoning and the problem very well:

Hi, Our User License does not allow customers to use them in any other virtual world including SL open source clients. The reason for this is because they would be uploaded in your name and not that of the creator. In time people will share these textures with friends (as they always have) and before we know it people are selling work created by the original artist but uploaded by other people and it creates a nightmare of a DMCA issue. We create & sell textures for SL only. Sorry. LillyBeth 2008/5/17

So, it sounds like there could well be a whole new round of rights issues to hash out, even when the dream of a mostly seamless metaverse becomes a reality. The technology is not the only thing that needs to be mastered.

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Metaverse U, continued 8

Katherine W. Prawl — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 22:57:12 +0000

Someone in the SecondLife audience at the Stanford Metaverse U conference, listening to the presentation by Jon Brouchard about Wikitecture said Jon has blogged about this at http://archsl.wordpress.com.

One of the points in Brouchard’s talk was something about people always asking if they can import their content from other 3D worlds into SecondLife. He said, not at the moment, but the wisdom of crowdsourcing won — an avatar mentioned the 3PointD.com article about doing that, published back in 2006. However, the Blender object import tool created really, really messy objects made of hundreds if not thousands of primative pieces, using far too many resources. So, a true format conversion is a much better solution, but one that so far is not available.

Now, after another long break an my computer crashing (thunderstorms in the area), we’re back. The panel on the stage now consists of Raph Koster, a game designer, Cory Ondrejka, former CTO of Linden Lab, Inc., and Howard Rheingold, a noted futurist.

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Metaverse U, continued 6

Katherine W. Prawl — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 22:01:23 +0000

The current speaker at the Stanford Metaverse U conference, Toni Parisi, is one of the principals in the X3D format development. I’ve written a bit about that in this blog, since Sun Microsystem’s Project Wonderland specifies that for creating content in their virtual world, which I’m presently researching and hope to implement on my desktop shortly. One of the purposes of this blog is to document my attempts to learn about all the required software and specifications for the virtual worlds I’m investigating.

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3DXchange

Katherine W. Prawl — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 01:42:58 +0000

One step forward, two steps back. Both iClone2 and 3DXchange are easy to use, and have lots of useful features. But their export formats are pretty limited, at least they don’t export into x3d which is what I am looking for right now. iClone2 uses 2D formats, while 3DXchange only outputs to .vns format, which is used by 3D Studio Max. Oh, goodie, yet another package to investigate. Actually, I used to have 3D Studio Max, but that was a decade ago, and I didn’t have any purpose to use it for then, so let it lapse. Now apparently it also belongs to Autodesk.

In the meantime, I did try importing a model into 3DXchange from the Google 3D Warehouse. Here’s a screenshot of the Lambourgheni I found there in the 3DXchange window.

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iClone2

Katherine W. Prawl — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 00:44:43 +0000

Before starting on Project Wonderland, I thought I’d boot up WindowsXP (on my Mac’s Parallels virtual machine) to look at iClone2 and see if I can find out what kinds of formats it exports things to. Here’s what I’ve discovered so far.

bmp
- 24 bit
- 32 bit
jpg
- sliding scale 0-100% quality
tga
- 24 bit
- 32 bit
gif
- transparency

Obviously, these are 2D formats, not 3D. Maybe for 3D I need to look at 3DXchange2 instead? iClone is really intended for creating machinima rather than 3D models for virtual worlds, after all. The right tool for the job…

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X3D-Edit

Katherine W. Prawl — Mon, 11 Feb 2008 23:16:34 +0000

While I’m at it, here’s a link to a tool for creating and testing x3d files, from the Web3D Consortium. It’s free.

Click the logo at the left to go to the page about it.

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x3d

Katherine W. Prawl — Mon, 11 Feb 2008 23:02:50 +0000

It appears that iClone2 doesn’t export to x3d. Rats! I could be wrong, though. I’ll look more closely. But first, what exactly is x3d? I’m doing a Web search on the subject now.

Wolfram Mathematica’s page says x3d is:

Web3D geometry format
Used for distributing 3D models on the web and in media applications.
XML format.
Can store multiple geometries.
Introduced in 2003, maintained by the Web3D Consortium.
Successor of the VRML format.

Another site, X3D Info, says:

x3d stands for “Extensible 3D”, is the new open standard (still under development) for 3D content on the internet/web. In essence X3D is intended to be the new format or language that is used/required for 3D interactive worlds on the web (replacing/extending the existing VRML97 standard).
X3D is a file format specification with requirements on how that file is to be displayed. It will be the ISO standard for 3D graphics. The language is very robust and supports generalized 3D content for interactive web and other broadcast media.
Because the file is encoded in XML, it can be extended, making X3D more flexible than its predecessors. Efforts are underway for cross-support with MPEG (ie. make X3D the 3D component of the MPEG standard etc), SVG, CML, and MathML.

That’s the trouble with all these wonderful software projects and tools. Get started and it’s an almost infinite path to research all the specifications and tools associated with them. Well, I can’t say I didn’t know what I was getting into, so I’ll slog on.

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