From: Thomas Winzig
To: ask_tim@oreilly.com
Subject: SoftBook, Rocket eBook, or ... ?
Hello Tim,
Long time reader, first time caller.
Quite a few months ago, I read an article in Wired magazine regarding electronic books which would be able to download books from the net, and store them in memory. Some would let you annotate the books, bookmark pages, etc. Most notably, SoftBook and NuvoMedia's Rocket eBook look like they will be very good ebooks. They're both going to be on sale within the next 3-6 months, according to their salespeople.
As an avid user of O'Reilly computer books, I am very curious to hear what plans O'Reilly has, if any, to work with these companies. Before I shell out $300 or more dollars for one of these things, I'd like to be assured that O'Reilly will be publishing for them. :-)
I'll miss your paperbacks-that-can-be-laid-flat, smooth white pages, and cool animal covers, but it'd be worth it to fit all my Java/Perl books into one trim book!
If you do have plans with one or more of these companies, I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts on "book conversion" plans. I have around 15-20 O'Reilly books, and I'd hate to have to pay full price to convert them over to ebooks.
Thanks,
Thomas
Linda Walsh, our Director of Product Marketing, will answer this one:
Thomas,
I'm delighted to see that you and other O'Reilly readers are interested in the new hand-held book readers. Yes, we are working with the Rocket eBook people to develop titles for them. Unfortunately, the early models of the Rocket eBook do not yet support HTML tables and lists. Because technical materials tends to contain a heavy dose of tables and lists, there are formidable conversion problems. Nevertheless, we currently do have one book available for this product: Exploring Java, Second Edition.
We're also talking with the Softbooks people, although we haven't yet inked a deal.
Please keep an eye on our web site. We'll be announcing our plans soon.
Thanks for writing.
Linda
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