Monday, November 26, 2007

Say the Word and You're Free

Just like to point out that Baen Books is offering a whole pile of fine works of science fiction, fantasy and more in their Free Library. Just in case you think Amazon has invented the world of electronic books. (And while you're at it, surf past the media hype and also look at Project Gutenberg, Memoware, Manybooks and other folks who have been on the frontier far longer than the Amazon effort. Heck, I recall downloading Project Gutenberg works for my Apple Newton!)

(There's no reason, by the way, to spend several hundred dollars on a poorly designed, hard to hold comfortably, overpriced, DRM-crippled reader. Some smart shopping in second-hand outlets can get you a perfectly capable laptop, eBook reader or PDA for far less.)

Addendum (December 4, 2007): Charles Stross has some thoughts on the Kindle. I especially like this: We have a technical term for any business plan that relies on making life difficult for customers and easy for non-customers: we call it "circling the drain". Mark Pilgrim on the Kindle.

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