>i didn't understand sufficiently at first, and
>others do not sufficiently understand yet,
>as represented by greg's autopilot response,
>but jim has already _done_ all of the work...

Again, a brief history of this whole episode was:

1) A couple years ago the first Kindle comes out

2) I say wow this is a better reading experience than I’ve experienced before

3) I check on the PG website and it has literally a couple MOBI files on it

4) I contact PG and say okay I am making MOBI files out of your books, how do I add them to your site?

5) PG responds Not Interested, Not Interested, Not Interested!

6) I say OK, I guess I will have to route around damage.

7) I spend two years converting PG books to MOBI format on my own website.

8) PG says, gosh,  we guess we are interested after all!

9) I say, gee, this is silly, we are duplicating work, and furthermore PG is better set up to do this work anyway.

10) I suggest, PG site doesn’t work worth a dang from Mobile devices, why not make a version of the site that is Mobile Device friendly – just like the big boys do?

11) And/Or make a Mobile Device friendly version of your “Landing Pads” so PG can at least get the donations and credits greatly due PG?

12) PG responds again Not Interested, Not Interested, Not Interested!

Again, how IS one supposed to read PG books? I mean this as a SERIOUS question!

Print them out?  -- Cheaper and more environmentally friendly to buy the paperback version at B&N

Read them on a laptop? – Too big fat and heavy to carry on the bus.

Read them on your cellphone? – Maybe, if you spend a couple hundred bucks on your cellphone plus maybe $100 a month for internet access from your local cellphone company. And if your style of reading is amenable to the “fortune cookie” problem – my style of reading ISN’T – I read bigger chunks than that.  I don’t disagree that there are readers out there that read “word at a time” or “line at a time” and to them maybe the “fortune cookie” program ISN’T a problem to them – but to me it is.  Not to mention that I don’t like spending big bucks on monthly cellphone bills!

Read them on a netbook?  -- Maybe, but I’m suspicious of the eventual eyestrain -- I will be trying this approach to make a “generic” reader. Also, netbooks won’t lie flat, and are kind of on the big fat and heavy side compared to a book.

Why do I like the Kindle?  -- It allows me to actually read books, and read books without eyestrain, and allows me to “get into” my reading just like I get into reading a paperback.  Its not that the Kindle is perfect, nor Amazon perfect – they both got some pretty big problems, including overly obnoxious DRM schemes.  But, in practice, “it works” where for me “it works” includes the idea that one doesn’t always have to run home and tether one’s ebook reader to a desktop every time you want to get a new book to read. Waiting to see the B&N reader in the bookstore to see how well it works – seems to me the B&N WiFi approach might be better than the Kindle Whispernet approach, but there are goofy aspects to the B&N reader too. And in the next year there is going to be about a dozen more interesting ebook readers coming out.  Why all this interest in ebook readers?  People like them.  People use them.  People buy them.  People buy books for them. People read books on them.  In short, because it works.  And technology where one can actually say “it works” is really a pretty rare thing!  That’s why I’m excited by ebook readers – because it actually makes projects like PG begin to make sense! [And they are really fun! Don’t really know why – they just are!]