The two most popular eBook formats are ePub and KF8. ePub is used by Apple, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Sony, and many other retail channels. KF8 (formerly Mobi), on the other hand, is a proprietary format used only by Amazon. Vook makes it a snap to design eBooks in both ePub and KF8 formats, because you can quickly create an eBook in either format on the Preview page. ePub and KF8, though, support different settings in the Style editor. We’ve outlined them Read more…
We’re obviously grateful to Lerer Ventures for investing in Vook — but we personally love the benefits and support they extend to their portfolio companies. They’re often both useful and cool. This Tuesday, they one-upped themselves by gathering members of their start-ups at Citi Field to hear from New York’s Entrepreneur-in-Chief, Mike Bloomberg. We expected a polite overview on innovation, finance and the city’s CTO (to cover the tech angle)—but instead the Mayor delivered an impassioned, metrics driven talk focused Read more…
One in four Americans now owns an e-reader or tablet (Pew Research) and eBook users read 60% more books. That’s a powerful combination that’s changing the publishing industry as we know it. Just how much? See for yourself… Courtesy of: CreditDonkey Have you seen any other great eBook stats lately? Send them our way!
Jason Ashlock, President of Movable Type Management, is trying to perfect “just-in-time publishing.” Movable Type released a book about Linsanity within six days of him becoming a national sensation. Similarly, they quickly put together a book for opening day for the Mets and for the 5th anniversary of the Virginia Tech Massacre. They are developing expertise at working with authors to quickly put together timely and topical eBooks using Vook. We sat down with Jason to discuss how he does this: Read more…
With a little bit of smart tagging, Microsoft Word can become a Vook pre-production powerhouse. To create eBooks quickly and easily, use Microsoft Word’s Styles as you’re preparing your manuscript. 1. First, open the Styles Gallery. Usually, it’s in the Microsoft Word “ribbon” at the top of your page. You can also open a small Styles toolbox by going to View > Styles. 2. Then, apply the Title style to your chapter titles. To apply a style, just place your cursor inside Read more…
We were both nervous and excited to see Twitter user @AudryT live Tweet her first experience with Vook on Wednesday. Without any editorializing (except for removing some unrelated Tweets), below is her trip through Vook — the good and the bad (we’re working on the smart quotes now, Audry!). AudryT @AudryT Takin’ a look at the Vook Builder tool. Will it be easy drag and drop? Will it take the coding out of digital books? *fingers crossed* At first Read more…
The word “book” used to have a very clear meaning. You could pick it up and flip through the pages and you usually got it at a physical book store. Today, Kindles, iPads, Nooks and other devices are changing the way we read. They’re also pushing the publishing industry to discover more innovative ways to create and deliver books online. We wanted to give you a brief overview of what’s available right now: eBooks: These are the most common form of Read more…
If you’re a blogger, you’re already putting out great content on a regular basis. You have readers who care about what you write and maybe even respond with thoughtful comments. Why would you ever need a book when you have all that? Well, we’ll give you a few reasons… It increases your credibility. Lavie Margolin found that publishing a book helped establish her as an expert, saying “I have been in over 40 media outlets since my book was published including Read more…
Vook allows you to create eBooks quickly and easily. Just how quickly? In January, one of our production experts created an eBook on the Digital Book World stage in 5 minutes and 18 seconds. The secret is to already have a sense of how you want your eBook to look. (It also helps to have properly prepared your text, images, and video or audio files.) When I’m building eBooks, I use a trick called Creating a Stylesheet Template. Stylesheet templates Read more…
Ok, we might be biased, but eBooks are the greatest invention since . . . well, the book itself. . But, you don’t have to take our word for it. We highlighted some of the top stories in digital publishing this week so you could see for yourself: eBook users read 60% more books. Given that reading can make your smarter (seriously, check it out,) we think anything that encourages more reading is great. Yes, it may be that current eBook readers Read more…
