Anybody Know How The "Battle Of The Ebooks" Will Play Out?...

[Magnus]

I'm not really up to speed on everything ebook/ereader/kindle/et al ...but I have had a Sony eReader for almost two years now (would have had one a year before, but they just didn't seem to be advanced enough then).

I don't read what could be termed "mainstream" books. A lot of the stuff I read on my eReader is in PDF format (which is one of the reasons I chose the one I've got - I knew it could read PDFs).

I've just started researching for a new project and started looking for a number of books online (in downloadable format as I'm travelling around just now and taking tangible books with me would be a real pain); but it' not what I expected...

It seems that Amazon is only providing books for the Kindle - which, as far as I understand, will not work on my Sony (or any others - but if that's not the case, then the information has been well hidden!).

So, I take a trip to the Sony online bookstore, but can't find any of the books I'm after.

I find the 'Kobo' (which I think is also an eReader) website which has one of the books I'm after (and actually looks like it might work on my Sony) - but it's "not available in your country" (I'm currently in NZ right now by the way).

I think it's possible to remove 'DRM' (I'm assuming this is some sort of protection) from Amazon/Kindle ebooks and then transfer to my Sony. I'd have to get hold of the software to do it.

This is more of a rant really... I'm sittng here (literally), ready to throw my hard-earned (well, earned at least) at a stack of books, and there currently seems to be no one out there ready to take my money and deliver the goods!

Unless I...

#1 - Just be done with it and buy the Kindle (if it doesn't support PDF then it's almost not an option for me).

or

#2 - Find and use the software that removes DRM.

or

#3 - Use, say, the Kobo site, through a proxy-server and hope that it works all the way to the download stage (and even then, they only had one or two of the books I was after).


Okay, maybe I've missed a simple solution to all this, but it doesn't say much for the whole ebook thing even if I have.

Surely they should be jumping-up-and-down trying to get my attention.

Is this the VHS/Betamax things all over again (I'm too young to remember it - and only have a rough idea of how it went).

No answers required - just letting a little frustration out!

Have a great weekend, Magnus.

[Clinton]

Sony and Amazon have different DRM setups and that ain't going to change in the near future.

What about a Kindle app for your ipad/android phone?

[tke71709]

Kindle supports PDF (as far as I know as I don't have one yet).

PDF and Personal Documents
Email personal documents and PDFs direct to your Kindle to read and annotate on-the-go.

Content Formats SupportedKindle (AZW), TXT, PDF, unprotected MOBI, PRC natively; HTML, DOC, DOCX, JPEG, GIF, PNG, BMP through conversion.

[Magnus]

Sony and Amazon have different DRM setups and that ain't going to change in the near future.

What about a Kindle app for your ipad/android phone?

In this case it seems that Sony has already lost.

Don't have an iphone [almost] purely for the reason that I would have to charge it [almost] every day*.

Didn't realise there was a Kindle app for Android. Thinking of a tablet PC soon (but the battery life is relatively poor on them**).


*in truth, I do actually have an iphone, but it won't work as a normal phone, and I only use it for checking email via wi-fi while wandering around the house. It's never really been outdoors. I got it very cheap on ebay (by setting-up Opera browser to auto-refresh on a specific eBay search criteria for 'buy-it-now's).

**I have issues with devices having poor battery life.

[Magnus]

Kindle supports PDF (as far as I know as I don't have one yet).

Cheers tke.

A few years ago I'd have loved the idea of cracking DRMs/converting/et al (because at heart I'm a true cheapskate).

But rather reluctant to do it these days. Would rather just pay my way over this hurdle.

[aneil4lom]

PDFs on Kindles are difficult to read. There's something called Calibre that changes other formats to mobi. One of my friends with a Kobo told me about it when I wanted one of his books for my Kindle.