Over the last month, our product and engineering staff have worked an ungodly number of hours on MotherVook 2.0, the next generation of our digital printing press. Bravo to the Vook tech team for delivering MotherVook on time with only a few bugs. We have business requirements for MotherVook 3.0 and the specs are being written. Our goal with 3.0 is the Wordpress of ebooks.

But first, what does MotherVook 2.0 offer? This cloud-based platform offers several important features including file conversion, simple drag-and-drop authoring tools, a quick-and-easy epub and android app creator, a straightforward method for publishing to multiple platforms and a content management system.

The internal Vook creation team will be trained on the new platform on Tuesday and it is being rolled out to partners later this summer.

We have considered renaming the platform, but we all love MotherVook too much.

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Beet.TV founder and digital guru Andy Plesser caught up with our very own Matthew Cavnar who explains how quickly Vook can create new mixed-media experiences. Books may have an 18-month creation cycle but not Vooks. Click here.

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“Every so often, something comes along that changes the rulebook.”

It’s no secret that technology is radically changing our lives. Some of these changes are gradual and influence our personal lives. Others are huge, shaking up entire industries and the way we do business.

ZMOT, or the Zero Moment of Truth, is in the latter group. Six years ago, Proctor and Gamble coined a term called FMOT, or the the First Moment of Truth, to describe a shopper’s first interaction with a product on a shelf. For years, this was considered the most important moment for customer engagement.

Now, the game has changed. The widespread use of search engines has dramatically altered consumer behavior so that instead of FMOT, we’ve got ZMOT.

So what exactly is ZMOT?

“ZMOT is that moment when you grab your laptop, mobile phone or some other wired device and start learning about a product or service (or boyfriend) you’re thinking about trying or buying.”

In other words, consumers have made their buying decisions long before they see a product on the shelf, or even enter a store.

Fortunately, Google collected all its search data on these behaviors into a comprehensive Vook called Winning the Moment of Truth: ZMOT. ZMOT uses text, expansive charts, and engaging videos to reveal the ins and outs of consumer behavior – and share the essential components of a winning strategy.

Vook was thrilled that Google chose it to create Winning the Zero Moment of Truth – ZMOT and help spread the word about this important marketing concept.

Start learning the new rules now – download ZMOT for the iPhone or iPad here.

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Want to use Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn to connect with your customers, build your brand, and grow your profits?

Of course you do! It’s clear that a vibrant social media presence is essential to your company’s success, but if you’re like many others, you haven’t nailed down the perfect strategy.

Don’t believe naysayers who claim that social media success is a mystery – there are clear best practices that will launch your company to the next level – and you can find them all in our latest Vook, Groundswell.

Groundswell, the best-selling definitive guide to a researched, winning social media strategy, has been updated, enhanced, and is chock-full of new tools that will catapult your business into success.

New features include:

• Updated data on how customers use and perceive new media
• Two new chapters demystifying Twitter and determining where your organization needs to go next
• Two PowerPoint presentations you can download, customize and share
• Live hyperlinks to blogs, tweets, videos, and other media mentioned in the Vook to show you the strategies that work – and those that don’t
• Great video examples

New media moves fast – and so should you! Download Groundswell now – available as an iPad app or in iBooks.

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ABC News and Vook have partnered up again to bring you Target: Bin Laden, a comprehensive video/text mash-up detailing Osama bin Laden’s life – and gripping capture.

Target Bin Laden: The Life and Death of Public Enemy Number One, by a powerhouse team at ABC News, features the very best of ABC News’ coverage of the terrorist mastermind, bringing readers in to the early days of bin Laden and al Qaeda, September 11, 2024, the war in Afghanistan, and the massive manhunt for Osama bin Laden.  This special video enhanced eBook features a heart-stopping account of the 40 minutes that changed the world, delving into how an elite Navy Seals team — and one warrior dog — took down bin Ladin in his compound.

Target: Bin Laden also features a gripping account of the white-knuckle moments inside the White House Situation Room as President Obama and his security team wached the operation from Washington, and sheds light of the mother lode of intelligence found in bin Laden’s lair. This groundbreaking ABC Video Book is packed with original reporting exclusives: ABC News footage from inside bin Laden’s compound, excerpts from an exclusive ABC last-of-its kind interview with bin Laden, first person accounts, and gripping photos and videos.

Target: Bin Laden provides the details and reporting only ABC News can deliver – put together in a gorgeous, dynamic Vook.

Download it now – click here to get it from the iBookstore.

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After a walk through Sausalito tonight, I stopped to examine the books in the window of our local bookshop, not many left around here. A quote from page 100 of Anthony Cronin’s Yeats is Dead was posted on the window

“I think books are wonderful. If they had never been invented and somebody thought of them now, they would be the greatest things ever. I can’t think of anything that had given so much happiness to humanity. No batteries, no wires, no earphones. Absolutely silent, don’t interfere with anybody else, you can take them anywhere with you, in bed, into the bath. And they can’t be broken. You can lie on them, sit on them, prop the door or window sash open and you still can’t damage them.”

Several thoughts rolled around in my head. The quote is factually correct and it captures the sentimentality most of us feel about our physical books. Also, the book store owner is probably feeling defensive as the world changes around her.

I had a final competing thought as I walked home, technology is like fire and water, it goes where it wants and not much can stop it.

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A few months ago, I left my iPad in the back of a New York City taxi-cab. My reaction was not the same as losing a cell phone or a stolen laptop. Losing those devices is an inconvenience. But I grieved the loss of my iPad as I do when losing a half-finished book. My emotional connection to a book and my tablet are the same.

Books are perfectly suited for the post-PC world. Tablets are a back-to-the-future experience reinventing a familiar and intimate media experience, they will revive reading and save the book.

Summarizing a new report by Forrester Research, Sarah Rotman Epps wrote that the post-PC world was characterized by:

Stationary to ubiquitous. Contrast the experience of computing on a desktop PC, in one place with a clear start and finish time, to that of the anytime/anywhere computing done on a smartphone or tablet.

Formal to casual. In contrast to PC interactions with a formal start and finish time marked by booting up and shutting down, instant-on/always-on computing on smartphones and tablets fills in-between moments like standing in line or watching TV.

Abstracted to physical. The mouse/keyboard paradigm relies on an abstracted interaction with content. Touchscreens like those on smartphones and tablets enable direct physical manipulation of content in two-dimensional s

The PC and the Internet did not change reading, but they did compete with reading. Even the most passionate readers spent time away from books as we browsed the Internet, sent email and searched for the answer to every imaginable question.

Now the book has an ally. The tablet renders books in ways that are familiar, fun and accessible. And readers are willing to pay for the privilege of reading stories, something they generally did not do on the desktop.

The far-reaching computing shift from desktops to tablets from browser searching and surfing to apps and a curated rich media experience are profound and lasting for books and book readers. The revolution in miniaturization is finally engulfing the reading experience in a promising way.

The rich-media tablet soon to be in the hands of 178 million people enables people to read in a way that they are comfortable and even enchanting like the stories we read.

-Brad Inman, Founder and Ceo, Vook

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Greetings Vook Fans,

I am really excited here in Vook New York City as I start gearing up for Digital Book 2024 and Book Expo America — the largest publishing trade show in North America — next week down the street at the Javits Convention Center, which is guaranteed to be a great time. Don’t be shy and make sure you stop by Kiosk 2311 in the Digital Zone to say “hi” and pick up some special download cards from me. Also, you’ll want to follow my live Tweeting by reading the @vooktv stream.

Be sure to mark your calendars to check out our Vook speakers at the conferences:

Monday, May 23
Digital Book 2024 at the Javits Convention Center
Rooms 1e02-04
4:30 – 5:15 pm
The Future of Digital Reading and the Business of Digital Publishing

Vook founder and CEO Brad Inman will be speaking on a panel along with Peter Balis of John Wiley & Sons and Masaaki Hagino and Daihei Shiohama of Voyager Japan.

About: Interactivity and rich-media enhanced eBooks are increasingly expected. Social reading and transmedia “storytelling” are emerging trends. Borders between books and periodicals are breaking down as content gets liberated from the constraints of traditional packagings. What are the business implications?

See you next week,

Jules
Social Media Marketing Manager
jules@vook.tv

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Dr. Vook, Ph.D is happy to announce his animated arrival in the NOOKbooks Store. You can check him out strolling through astronomy, reliving the American Revolutionary War and thoroughly examining classic art. We’ll let you know when more of his genius arrives.

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