The Rumpus.net » ebooks http://therumpus.net Books, Music, Movies, Art, Politics, Sex, Other Fri, 24 May 2013 22:16:07 +0000 en-US hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.5.1 How to Look Like You’re Reading Something Smart on the Bus http://therumpus.net/2013/02/how-to-look-like-youre-reading-something-smart-on-the-bus/ http://therumpus.net/2013/02/how-to-look-like-youre-reading-something-smart-on-the-bus/#comments Tue, 12 Feb 2013 18:00:42 +0000 Lauren ONeal http://therumpus.net/?p=111011 You’re a reasonable reader. You like the aesthetics of an old-fashioned paper-and-glue book, but you’re not averse to turning the virtual pages of an e-reader either.

If that description sounds like you, here’s a DIY project you might like: making an old book into a Kindle case.

]]> You’re a reasonable reader. You like the aesthetics of an old-fashioned paper-and-glue book, but you’re not averse to turning the virtual pages of an e-reader either.

If that description sounds like you, here’s a DIY project you might like: making an old book into a Kindle case.

(Physical-book purists, do NOT click the link. You will find only literary carcasses and lasting horror.)

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]]> http://therumpus.net/2013/02/how-to-look-like-youre-reading-something-smart-on-the-bus/feed/ 0 The Millions Is Publishing Books Now! http://therumpus.net/2013/01/the-millions-is-publishing-books-now/ http://therumpus.net/2013/01/the-millions-is-publishing-books-now/#comments Thu, 24 Jan 2013 16:00:43 +0000 Lauren ONeal http://therumpus.net/?p=110185 Our friends over at The Millions are branching out: in addition to the features on their fantastic website, they’re starting to publish ebooks.

The inaugural volume is called Epic Fail: Bad Art, Viral Fame, and the History of the Worst Thing Ever, but judging by the excerpt they’ve posted, there’s nothing fail about it.

]]> Our friends over at The Millions are branching out: in addition to the features on their fantastic website, they’re starting to publish ebooks.

The inaugural volume is called Epic Fail: Bad Art, Viral Fame, and the History of the Worst Thing Ever, but judging by the excerpt they’ve posted, there’s nothing fail about it.

We’re excited both to read the whole thing and to see what The Millions can do with their new publishing model in the future.

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]]> http://therumpus.net/2013/01/the-millions-is-publishing-books-now/feed/ 0 Ebook Bundles Sneak New Authors to Readers http://therumpus.net/2012/10/ebook-bundles-sneak-new-authors-to-readers/ http://therumpus.net/2012/10/ebook-bundles-sneak-new-authors-to-readers/#comments Tue, 30 Oct 2012 13:00:02 +0000 Caroline Kangas http://therumpus.net/?p=107147 Or, at least, they could if the “humble indie bundle” scheme gains momentum.

The Guardian reports on a new method of pay-what-you-can — bundled ebooks that are advertised to “support authors.” But so far the developers have only included well established writers and have not yet caught on to the grab bag style of other media.

]]> Or, at least, they could if the “humble indie bundle” scheme gains momentum.

The Guardian reports on a new method of pay-what-you-can — bundled ebooks that are advertised to “support authors.” But so far the developers have only included well established writers and have not yet caught on to the grab bag style of other media. Remember blind buying ten CDs for $1? Each black plastic bag held a cocktail of genres varying from Bruce Springsteen live EP to tribal music of East Africa or soundtracks to movies like Grandma’s Boy.

The exposure to new music may not have caused you to run out and buy the discography of Kool Keith & Kutmasta Kurt but it was certainly fun to let fate choose the purchases for a day. Might ebook readers agree?

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]]> http://therumpus.net/2012/10/ebook-bundles-sneak-new-authors-to-readers/feed/ 1 FUNNY WOMEN #79: Books Outselling Mine in the Amazon Kindle Sales Rank http://therumpus.net/2012/06/funny-women-79-short-stories-and-collections-outselling-mine-in-the-amazon-kindle-sales-rank/ http://therumpus.net/2012/06/funny-women-79-short-stories-and-collections-outselling-mine-in-the-amazon-kindle-sales-rank/#comments Tue, 05 Jun 2012 18:30:46 +0000 Caitlin Horrocks http://therumpus.net/?p=101453 …on the day my book reaches its highest-ever ranking:

Angelo’s Journey: A Border Collie’s Quest for Home
By Angelo Dirks (Author and Border Collie)
Price: $2.99
Customer Review: “You’re taken on a ride by this black and white dog, and you want to know what happens.

]]> …on the day my book reaches its highest-ever ranking:

Angelo’s Journey: A Border Collie’s Quest for Home
By Angelo Dirks (Author and Border Collie)
Price: $2.99
Customer Review: “You’re taken on a ride by this black and white dog, and you want to know what happens. There are some interesting inclusions in the book, which I won’t give away, but I thought them innovative. Nice chapter headings. Well formatted.”

The Complete Works of Edgar Allen Poe
Price: $0.89
Customer Review: “I was excited to be able to get the complete works of Poe for just .89 cents – unfortunately you get what you pay for. How did the Lady Mary die in Metzengerstein? You don’t know – because the paragraphs aren’t there. Horribly disappointing, especially since I bought this edition for school.”

The Complete Works of Edgar Allen Poe (Illustrated)
Price: $2.99
Customer Review: “the spacing of the poems is great. it is worth the few dollars to get this one.”

Hot and Steamy: Sizzling Sex Stories
Price: 3.99
Customer Review: “Ohhh Yeeeah”

She Loves Her (A Lesbian Adventure Romance)
Price: $0.99
Customer Review: “she tells you about her sex stories on facebook, only to delete you. she’s using the name jane jilling on facebook. loser!”

DATING MY VIBRATOR (and other true fiction)
Price: $0.99
Customer Review: “It seems impossible that one woman has had such misfortune in the world of online dating, but Suzanne’s bad luck is our reading enjoyment.”

Edging Past Reality – a collection of short stories
Price: $0.00
Customer Review: “Don’t even try to imagine what leads an author to such a deranged imagination. But as a professional hypnotist, I have to warn you. Suggestion can be dangerous. The shaman points the hexed bone at someone’s face and they drop dead. Could it happen to you? Is your mind strong enough to resist the possibilities these stories suggest? Do you really think you can to repel the Fingerman strain of voodoo?”

Anna, Wake Up
Price: $0.99
Customer Review: “Just wasn’t that impressed with the book at all and it was extremely short.”

Christmas in High Heels (High Heels Mysteries)
Price: $0.99
Customer Review: “Save your money and buy a piece of gum.”

The Complete Works of Mark Twain
Price: $1.99
Customer Review: “I have a hard copy collection of Twain that I seldom used — because the thing is so bulky the pages have to be held open lest the book fan itself shut and lose my place. The Kindle experience with collections is FAR more pleasant.”

***

Please submit your own funny writing to funnywomen AT therumpus dot net. See first: Funny Women Submission Guidelines.

To read other Funny Women pieces and interviews, see the archives.

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]]> http://therumpus.net/2012/06/funny-women-79-short-stories-and-collections-outselling-mine-in-the-amazon-kindle-sales-rank/feed/ 2 The Latest in Amazon Ventures http://therumpus.net/2011/09/the-latest-in-amazon-ventures/ http://therumpus.net/2011/09/the-latest-in-amazon-ventures/#comments Tue, 13 Sep 2011 14:00:40 +0000 Sam Riley http://therumpus.net/?p=87237 Amazon is introducing a new service that presents a noncommittal book-buying option for customers. The company is considering a Netflix-like rental service for ebooks, which unfortunately, only provides more opportunity to devalue books. And this devaluing has only caused publishers to be skeptical of this rental-based selling point for ebooks.

]]> Amazon is introducing a new service that presents a noncommittal book-buying option for customers. The company is considering a Netflix-like rental service for ebooks, which unfortunately, only provides more opportunity to devalue books. And this devaluing has only caused publishers to be skeptical of this rental-based selling point for ebooks. Let’s hope it doesn’t do to booksellers what Netflix did to the video store.

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]]> http://therumpus.net/2011/09/the-latest-in-amazon-ventures/feed/ 1 Better Faster Stronger… Flexier: eBooks dEvolved http://therumpus.net/2010/07/better-faster-stronger-flexier-ebooks-devloved/ http://therumpus.net/2010/07/better-faster-stronger-flexier-ebooks-devloved/#comments Wed, 07 Jul 2010 23:59:39 +0000 Zach Koehn http://therumpus.net/?p=56145 “Some computer developers envision tablet computers so flexible that you will literally be able to roll them up and slip them in your bag or pocket — just as you would do with a newspaper or magazine today — and then unfurl them on the train.”

eBooks are devolving in the best of ways.

]]> “Some computer developers envision tablet computers so flexible that you will literally be able to roll them up and slip them in your bag or pocket — just as you would do with a newspaper or magazine today — and then unfurl them on the train.”

eBooks are devolving in the best of ways. Colored displays are being developed using a material  just like paper, the catch being that it isn’t paper. Check out what Nick Bilton has to say about e-books and more.

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]]> http://therumpus.net/2010/07/better-faster-stronger-flexier-ebooks-devloved/feed/ 0 The Rumpus Sunday Book Blog Roundup http://therumpus.net/2009/09/the-rumpus-sunday-book-blog-roundup-9/ http://therumpus.net/2009/09/the-rumpus-sunday-book-blog-roundup-9/#comments Sun, 13 Sep 2009 15:02:50 +0000 Seth Fischer http://therumpus.net/?p=32090 Your humble Rumpus Sunday Editor is smitten. Over the last couple weeks, the book blogs have been in form, publishing intelligent, hilarious, insightful, and riveting posts. In a word, they’ve been brilliant. Some, but most certainly not all, of my evidence is below.

]]> Your humble Rumpus Sunday Editor is smitten. Over the last couple weeks, the book blogs have been in form, publishing intelligent, hilarious, insightful, and riveting posts. In a word, they’ve been brilliant. Some, but most certainly not all, of my evidence is below.

Maud Newton takes on the way we see E-books.

The Hate Mail Dramatic Reading Project (Peter Lorre impression included). (via)

“There are places where the historical record has gaps. That’s what art is there for.” — Toni Morrison quoted by Jane Ciabattari over at Critical Mass.

Eileen Miles on Can Xue. ”Can Xue’s doing this surrealism of the body. It’s a surrealism that comes like a hallucination out of suffering and deprivation and loss.”

Slaughterhouse90210: Snapshots of bad TV with literary captions. Brilliant. (via)

Sam Pink at <HTMLGIANT> on relatability.

And in the world of book news, how will Zappos, with its famously “upbeat, sometimes goofy corporate culture” that occasionally includes “shots of vodka at Claim Jumpers,” influence Amazon now that they are owned by the e-retail giant? In a sidenote, does anyone else think vodka shots at Claim Jumpers sound like a terrible, terrible punishment?

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]]> http://therumpus.net/2009/09/the-rumpus-sunday-book-blog-roundup-9/feed/ 0 The Price of Electronic Publishing http://therumpus.net/2009/02/how-much-should-an-ebook-cost/ http://therumpus.net/2009/02/how-much-should-an-ebook-cost/#comments Wed, 18 Feb 2009 19:30:26 +0000 Stephen Elliott http://therumpus.net/?p=8166 Harper Studio- “We still pay for the author advance, the editing, the copyediting, the proofreading, the cover and interior design, the illustrations, the sales kit, the marketing efforts, the publicity, and the staff that needs to coordinate all of the details that make books possible in these stages.”

Conversational Reading- “No publisher has yet made the leap to publishing a sizable fraction of its books as electronic-only; in other words they’re going to pay these upfront costs whether or not they publish the ebook version.”

Three Percent- “What strikes me about this bit is that most people who are critical of the commercial publishing model are critical of both huge advances, and the amount of redundancy and waste that goes into producing a book—all of which is still included in Miller’s model.

]]> Harper Studio- “We still pay for the author advance, the editing, the copyediting, the proofreading, the cover and interior design, the illustrations, the sales kit, the marketing efforts, the publicity, and the staff that needs to coordinate all of the details that make books possible in these stages.”

Conversational Reading- “No publisher has yet made the leap to publishing a sizable fraction of its books as electronic-only; in other words they’re going to pay these upfront costs whether or not they publish the ebook version.”

Three Percent- “What strikes me about this bit is that most people who are critical of the commercial publishing model are critical of both huge advances, and the amount of redundancy and waste that goes into producing a book—all of which is still included in Miller’s model. So, rather than find a publishing model that’s sleek, efficient, keeps costs down, and makes ebooks available to readers everywhere, Harper Studio is trying to invent a new publishing model that’s a lot like the old publishing model, but replaces overpriced hardcovers with overpriced ebooks.”

Conversational Reading, Three Percent, and Harper Studio Blog, weigh in on what an eBook should cost.

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]]> http://therumpus.net/2009/02/how-much-should-an-ebook-cost/feed/ 0 Susie Bright is Krazy for Kindle http://therumpus.net/2008/12/suzie-bright-is-krazy-for-kindle/ http://therumpus.net/2008/12/suzie-bright-is-krazy-for-kindle/#comments Tue, 30 Dec 2008 01:16:11 +0000 Stephen Elliott http://therumpus.net/?p=2774 Since purchasing a Kindle a few months ago Susie Bright has bought, and read, more books than she has all year.

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]]> Since purchasing a Kindle a few months ago Susie Bright has bought, and read, more books than she has all year.

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]]> http://therumpus.net/2008/12/suzie-bright-is-krazy-for-kindle/feed/ 0 Phone or Book? http://therumpus.net/2008/12/phone-or-book/ http://therumpus.net/2008/12/phone-or-book/#comments Tue, 23 Dec 2008 15:51:11 +0000 Stephen Elliott http://therumpus.net/?p=2165 ScrollMotion has signed deals with several major publishers to produce best-selling and new books as eBooks for the iPhone. ScrollMotion is different from other eReaders in that it covers newer titles and each book is a stand alone application. Karen Templer at Readerville is not feeling it.

]]> ScrollMotion has signed deals with several major publishers to produce best-selling and new books as eBooks for the iPhone. ScrollMotion is different from other eReaders in that it covers newer titles and each book is a stand alone application. Karen Templer at Readerville is not feeling it. Maud Newton’s on board.

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]]> http://therumpus.net/2008/12/phone-or-book/feed/ 0