Starting with your last comment first: What DRM is put on PG files? I thought the DRM was in the reader program, not the files. In general: you said you had hands on experience with and iPad, but couldn't find anything that looked good, gave Stanza example. Here is my suggestion: The next time you get your hands on an iPad, or even ask friends to try it for you, just do the little search they have and try a few obvious things like "books" "ebooks" and similar things. You'll get a handful of free or "lite" ereaders programs, and in some cases they will be for the iPad, some for the iPod, and you can compare them yourself to your heart's content, and give your conclusions here, please. My own conclusions were that all the iPad programs are readable. Black on white, or white on black. If the "Accessibility" black and white reversal doesn't work, that means the program has that under control via it's own commands. You also complained about not getting directly from PG and DRM. As I have said so many times, I don't care who redistributes PG, from Tea Party people to Sarah Palin or Tina Fey. . .period. If they put our books on their sites, or go the other way, great difference from my POV, unless they censor out some books, but I am not sure that is a valid reason even then to stop them. There are right and left wing physical libraries. . .who cares? More below: On Mon, 19 Apr 2010, Jim Adcock wrote:
Was there are typo in "friend has bought an iPod" where you meant "iPad"?, or did I miss something else that indicated changes from iPod to iPad?
Yes Typo Sorry iPad iPod sometimes (always?) Apple is too clever for its own good.
So are some of the people who post here. . . .
I didn't mention Stanza at all, so how can you be asking me "a serious question: Are you saying you are actually running Stanza on an iPad?"
You still haven't made any point about Stanza, nor answered my question. You say you are serious, and then you are all bent out of shape in both your questions and your answers, and then you blame me and Apple. . . . "The fault lies not the stars, the fault lies in ourselves."
You trashed me for playing mind games
No, you trashed yourself, if you insist on calling it that, by writing something that was very incomplete, inconclusive and confusing. . . . The solution is just to lighten up and try again, not to accuse worlds of "flaming" and "trashing" you. Just make your point[s] as best you can, and move on. An apology for when you have been confusing is also appropriate, with no need to blame me or Apple.
whereas I was actually describing my actual experience with an iPad.
Let's just say your "actual experience with an iPad" could have used a little more explanation, perhaps a little more experience. I just searched for "ebook" downloaded programs, and searched in those for "Project Gutenberg." I didn't expect to find a list of 30,000 titles on first try, any more than I expect to get the books at pglaf.org or gutenberg.org or .cc on the first try, even after lots of practice, certainly NOT first time.
I bragged to my friend who had bought an iPad how you could get these wonderful PG books on the iPad for free and then proceeded to try to show him "all I know" about the subject -- and of course nothing I tried to show him about reading these wonderful PG books on the iPad actually worked in
It worked for me, but then I gave it a few tries. However, the first two both worked, as did all the others made for iPad, though I have not tried each one in great detail, but enough to bring up books I know I typed in. Keep trying. . . . I really hate to say this, as you'll probably accuse me of flame/trashing but it sounds as if you have spent more time complaining here than in the actual testing of the product. I'm sure you know that Apple wants to control how files get to iPads. However, it certainly appears that at least several of the programs I was testing have their own ways of getting our "Alice in Wonderland" example. [Big Snip, will address later, if we get a few requests for it]
Is that because I asked if you didn't try iBooks and Wattpad?
How would I try these things without sending my $500 to Jobs for the privilege of *testing* his offering?
My apologies, perhaps I have this all backwards, as I thought I had it backwards when you swapped "iPad" for "iPod" or vice versa: I thought you already had managed to "try these things without sending my $500 to Jobs for the privilege of *testing* his offering. . . . Did you, or did you not, make that trial run with an iPad? If you did, then I made suggestions for how to get what you want. Or at least what you SAY you want, but I'm not sure any longer. If you did not take a test drive. . . . Well, in either case I suggest more test driving, and searching for "ebook" and "book" and the like and downloading their programs.
You can't download this stuff at the Apple Store.
Then how did I manage to download them from the store? I just tapped on "Apps" and did my little searches. . . . Isn't that the way you're supposed to? Am I really missing something here about your experience??? If so, I apologize, and am willing to start again, but I strongly suggest a visit to where you can play with an iPad again and try, hopefully successfully, some of the suggestions I already made.
What I really need to know is if any PG person has succeeding in directly transferring books of their choice from an internet site of their choice using wifi.
You can do this with Goodreader. There is a free Goodreader Lite for the iPad/iPhone, that let's grab 5 books at a time. . .I tried it. . .it works.
Personally, I don't care where anyone gets our books from, just as long as we get them out to people.
I care because I would like to be able to use iPad or whatever to read books in development, say for example SR from DP or my own efforts. And I don't want to wait an extra year or two for PG to make a new DVD distribution to go out to Apple or whoever so that they can stick their own DRM scheme on that PG effort or reduce it all down to txt before turning it back into HTML and from there into ePub or MOBI -- to choose a few common examples.
I agree that it's a pain to have to wait for books in progress. However, Goodreader should let you download those if you find them.
In a very real sense Apple, Amazon, et al, work for Project Gutenberg.
I would certainly disagree with this statement if they stick DRM on a PG effort, or if they work to prevent redistribution of PG books among friends. If they do these things then they are working AGAINST PG -- and using your own books to do so.
You insist on saying that someone who is filling this glass has left it half empty just because it is not overflowing to the whole world. Anything that gets more people to read more books is a positive even if it is a little too high on the hog for most or is not into files- sharing on your scale. However, Wattpad, Goodreader, iBooks, and other do provide relief. Times will change, people will jailbreak iPads and all. . . .
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