Amazon announced Kindle Format 8 and the Kindle Gen 2 platform today. It’s the first file format announcement that has me as excited as the launch of a new tablet device.

Why?

Mobi needed an update to match the level of design you can achieve in ePub. Vook lets users create uniquely styled eBooks with our styling tool—but until KF8, many of those grace notes were lost in Mobi. For everyone who wants to read better looking books, this new standard is going to raise the bar everywhere. It’s like color coming to television—once people see what digital books can be, they won’t be satisfied with the old way of doing things.

And we’re perfectly positioned to take advantage of the new format. Vook already lets you design the sharp, great looking ebooks that KF8 will support. Though there’s no mention of video in the features, the fact that you can display embedded fonts, drop caps, various CSS styling, color and borders syncs perfectly with what we can help you design.

I asked our VP of engineering Rob Guttman what he thought KF8 meant for Vook. He said, “We’re that much more valuable because we can take advantage of all the styling offered in the new format and we can do the translation to the KF8 file type immediately. All you have to do is design. You worry about the content and making your content look great—we’ll handle the technical details.”

As ever, sign up for the beta, and get ready to produce some eye-catching eBooks for for Kindle.