Green Credentials

Tuesday, May 13, 2008 | Labels: , , | 1 comments |

For a long time now I have been wondering about the green-ness of e-books. The basic concept is "look at how much paper we will save", but there is still the nagging thought that the e-reading device will create more damage to the environment in the long term, and I am sure there are people out there who have already tried to use this argument.

It is with some relief that I have read an article online from the Environmental Science and Technology journal that reaffirms my long held belief that e-readers are better for the environment.

It really boils down to this view quoted in the article from research done in to replacing university textbooks with e-readers.

over its life cycle, a paper textbook created 4 times the greenhouse gas emissions of an e-book reader and several times more ozone-depleting substances and chemicals associated with acid rain. Conventional books also required more than 3 times more raw materials and 78 times more water consumption than e-books.
So get your green credentials sorted and buy an e-book reader today.

The Big Value Added Tax Problem

Wednesday, April 30, 2008 | Labels: , , | 0 comments |

I will get back to comments about the London Book Fair later, right now I want to post about the biggest obstacle to e-publishing in Ireland, the UK and most of Europe.

When we address the VAT issue on books we have to look at what the tax authorities consider to be a book. To qualify for the zero rate of VAT a book must be printed and bound, or as the Irish Revenue Commissioners say on their website:

In order to qualify for the zero rate, a publication must
meet the four requirements listed hereunder:-

  • it must consist essentially of textual or pictorial matter,
  • it must have a distinctive cover, that is at least the outside of the front cover must be devoid of text,
  • it must comprise not less than four leaves (eight pages) exclusive of the cover, and
  • it must be bound (loose-leaf or otherwise), or stitched or stapled.

The European Union is involved as point six of Annex III of the Council Directive 2006/112/EC of 28 November 2006 on the common system of Value Added Tax says:

supply, including on loan by libraries, of books (including brochures, leaflets and similar printed matter, children's picture, drawing or colouring books, music printed or in manuscript form, maps and hydrographic or similar charts), newspapers and periodicals, other than material wholly or predominantly devoted to advertising;

So it is not enough for us to get our own tax authorities to change their mind about what a 'book' is; we need to work on Europe as well (but who thought this was going to be easy ;-)).

Sweden is engaged in this battle already in relation to audio books and the matter will probably end up in the European court.

We need to fight this battle for the e-book, and we need to find allies who have louder voices than we do.

Environmentalists please take note, if you want to save the planet buy an e-book, after all the paperless world is just around the corner.

Digitising old books.

Monday, April 28, 2008 | Labels: , , | 1 comments |

There is a book on the shelves at work (we're a publishing company, so no suprise there) that I have always looked at and said when we have a way to digitise that book without having to type the whole thing in again we will be able to do pretty much anythiong in the digital arena.


The book I am talking about is actually part of a three volume set last published in the early 1970's, so no computer files to work from like we might have if the book was published in the late eighties.
 

Now before someone starts talking about book scanning, I know it exists but until recently I had not seen a device that would give you the book back undamaged. A scanner that does not require you to destroy the book in the digitisation process is a real boost to the digitisation og the printed word. What we need is a book scanner that works like a human, turns a page at a time and 'reads' it.
 

I saw a machine like the one I have described above at the London Book Fair. It was being showcased by the Book Scan Bureau and was developed by Kirtas Technologies.
 
It used suction to turn a page, a process which is no harder on the paper than the feed of most printing presses and more gentle that most human contact. It also had clear plastic tabs for applying pressure at the edge of the page beside the spine ensuring as flat a surface as possible is presented to the 16 mega pixel cameras for imaging.
 
While this is of more use to libraries and archives as they pursue digitisation. spare a thought for the books that were last printed before the computer become common in our field that may have a new lease of life thanks to this technology.

Books, more books and a little bit of digital content.

Thursday, April 17, 2008 | Labels: , | 3 comments |

The 2008 London Book Fair is over, and it was an interesting event.

I met briefly with Eoin Purcell (he was delayed getting to the book fair by this unfortunate incident), we will meet up again when he is next in Dublin.

While I was slightly disappointed with the amount of digital at the fair while I was there, looking back, I have enough information to drive several blog posts over the next week.

My next few posts will cover the following:

  • One noticeable absentee was Google, I had a pleasant chat with Microsoft but I would really have liked to talk with someone from Google.
  • The non destructive book scanner was an amazing piece of kit, kind of like a reverse printing press.
  • After living in Thailand for seven years, it was interesting to find a Thai company with an e-book product.
  • And of course there was the company in my last post, interesting product but their sales technique left me gagging.
  • I mustn't forget the free whisky either.

DRM scaremongering @ London Book Fair

Tuesday, April 15, 2008 | | 0 comments |

Using the threat of Internet piracy to push yet another e-book format. I will blog more on this later.

Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)
 
Glossy Blue by N.Design Studio
Blogger Templates by Blogcrowds