To start the day with: you can have a free download of 1/3 million eBooks. This is the offer you can find today on the page of the World eBook Fair. This is the future home of the World eBook Fair, soon to be the largest showcase for eBooks, eBook publishers, editors, and others working in the new world of eBooks. The World eBook Fair is sponsored amongst others by the project Gutenberg and World eBook Library.
July 4th to August 4, 2006 marks a month long celebration of the 35th anniversary of the first step taken towards today's eBooks, when the United States Declaration of Independence was the first file placed online in capitals (!) for downloading in what was destined to be an electronic library of the Internet. Today's eBook library has a total of over 100 languages represented.
The World eBook Fair welcomes you to absolutely free access to a variety of eBook unparalleled by any other source. 1/3 million eBooks await you, all free of charge for the month from July 4 - August 4, 2006, and then 1/2 million eBooks in 2007, 3/4 million in 2008, and ONE million in 2009.
Ten times as many eBooks are available from private eBook sources. The World eBook Fair has created a library of wide ranging sample of these eBooks, totaling 1/3 million. Here are eBooks from nearly every classic author on the varieties of subjects previously only available through the largest library collections in the world. Now these books are yours for the taking, free of charge, to keep for the rest of your lives.
This event is brought to you by the oldest and largest free eBook source on the Internet, Project Gutenberg, with the assistance of the World eBook Library, the providers of the largest collection, and a number of other eBook efforts around the world.
iLiad
The offer comes in a week that iRex Technologies, a manufacturer of the digital paper reader iLiad starts shipping in Europe. With the reader the e-Books can be downloaded and stored for reading.
The iLiad is a multi-functional reader for electronic newspapers, technical manuals and e-books. It distinguishes itself from the earlier, second wave e-book readers by its display, which simulate the conditions of paper. It has a white background with 12 grey tones for texts and pictures. It is conserving energy as you can turn 10.000 pages on just two penlight batteries. And you can link it not only to your PC, but also to the wireless net.
The iLiad should give the e-Book business as well as the newspaper business a new boost as reading pleasure and connectivity have improved dramatically.
Mini-series
At the occasion of the Month of free downloading of e-Books and the initial shipping of the iLiad, I will start a mini-series telling about the history of the electronic books and digital paper. It will start with an introduction, pay attention to the Project Gutenberg, move along the first encyclopedia online and offline, tell about the hijack of the name Electronic Book by Sony and go into the three industrial waves, until the digital paper development came along. I guess there will be ten or more instalments.
Tags: e-Books. digital paper
Blog Posting Number: 430
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