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Emergence of e-booksThe idea of e-books is not new, ever since there have been computers. People have envisioned using them to store and access individual titles or vast libraries. Over the last two decades, a number of important factors have influenced the need for and development of e-books:
Recently e-books caught the popular imagination and showed real promise of succeeding in the consumer marketplace. Several factors have converged to make this happen:
The Web has made publishers realize that they need not choose between print and electronic publishing. Publishers are increasingly re-purposing the electronic files used in the production of print, and some are re-engineering their editorial and production processes to produce files better suited to electronic products in the first place. Currently, several modes of electronic publishing are available. Many journals are delivered by subscription over the Web; reference, legal and medical books are on CD-ROM or DVD-ROM and are becoming more Web savvy. In the context of e-books, they are more often referred to as a single volume, such as a trade book that can be bought over the Web and read in a laptop, a desktop computer, a PDA, or a dedicated e-book reading device. Definition of an e-book Some confusion persists about what the term e-book refers to: is it a piece of book shaped hardware, or the words and images on a piece of hardware, or both. The term book denotes both the message (words and images) and the medium (bound paper). The one without the other is not a book. The select definitions of an e-book include:
From the above definitions, a more comprehensive definition for an e-book could be derived: text in digital form, or a book converted into digital form, or digital reading material, or a book in a computer file format, or an electronic file of words and images displayed on a desktop, note-book computer, or portable device, or formatted for display on dedicated e-book readers. Types of e-books The e-book arena is in a state of flux and the concept of an e-book is not attached to one single medium in the way that DVDs or CDs are. Therefore, it is appropriate to introduce a classification of the various types of e-books. Hawkins (2000) and Crawford (2000) have attempted to identify the various concepts, products and models. Hawkins has identified four types based on content availability and access, while Crawford identified nine types based on proprietary formats, standards, media form, length of contents and access. These are listed at Table I with their characteristics and major players in the market. Date: 2014-12-22; view: 1272
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