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Something is missing from the iBookstore–most of the small, independent imprints. There just wasn’t enough time for Apple to get the smaller houses on line. But that isn’t a problem for iPulpFiction.com – Where the Short Story Lives. iPulpFiction.com is a browser-based publisher of short genre fiction by a mix of best selling authors such as Ben Bova, J. A. Jance, and Pete Hautman, as well as new talent. Because iPulp’s growing catalog of more than 300 titles can be viewed in any modern browser, the iPad, with its high-resolution 9.5″ screen, is the perfect device for reading iPulp stories.
“Cheap short fiction–it’s the lifeblood of literature.” — Orson Scott Card, the Hugo Award-winning author of Ender’s Game.
One of the more impressive demonstrations at Google I/O yesterday was the digital edition of Sports Illustrated done completely in HTML5. The benefits of HTML5 are clear here. Instead of building an iPad app, an Android app, a desktop app, etc, developers build it once and users can view it anywhere. It can be cached for offline viewing as well.
O’Reilly announced the immediate availability of iPad: The Missing Manual on Wednesday. The 320 page book by J.D. Biersdorfer explains how to use your iPad for work and fun, how to add videos and music to your iPad, and more.
The book explains how to manage your iTunes library for your iPad, how to add ebooks, using your iPad’s Wi-Fi and 3G data connections, how to effectively navigate Apple’s iTunes Store and App Store, includes undocumented tips and tricks, and more.
In the week following the launch of the iPad, six of the top ten selling business-related paperbacks saw a significant spike in unauthorized downloads on BitTorrent, according to BitTorrent news blog TorrentFreak. This cohort saw average increases of 78 percent over the week prior to the iPad launch. While this data may suggest the onset of an eBook piracy revolution, such a coup is still a long ways away.
The study initially sought to track pre- and post-iPad unauthorized downloads of the top ten selling books on Amazon.com. However, that proved a difficult task, as none of them were available on public BitTorrent trackers, other P2P services, and Usenet.
The next logical step for TorrentFreak, then, was to track unauthorized downloads of the top ten business-related paperbacks from Amazon.com. Such books, according to TorrentFreak, "fit well with the demographics of iPad buyers." And of these ten, only six could be found. If this was the case with piracy of music and movies, the record companies and movie studios would be partying as if their business models were more like they were in 1999; it’s relatively easy to find the current top ten songs or movies on P2P networks.
Ray Zone’s 3D Jungle Adventures (US$0.99) is native iPad comic book that took me back to when I was ten and my parents brought me to a flea market. There I picked up a ten year old copy of The House of Terror published by the now defunct St. John’s Publishing Company. It was in gloriously gory anaglyph 3D requiring the use of red-cyan glasses. The first page displayed a scary devil’s head that seemed like it was going to jump off the page and grab me, giving me nightmares for weeks.
Now in light of the current 3D craze, a new audience can experience this sort of dimensional schlock-fest in Jungle Adventure, a reprint of a 1953 Jay Disbrow comic. The story is as pulpy as it gets. Nianda, a jungle princess is captured by the evil Stang who wants to make a trade with the chief of the village for a big red ape. Jahka, who must be Tarzan’s twin brother, comes to the rescue and fights a drooling Sabre-toothed tiger to win her back, but no one told that to the big red ape.
If you ask me, the iPad‘s prowess as an e-book reader lies not in pulp fiction, but in kids’ books. Think about it: the latest Grisham novel is just raw text, which any old Kindle can deliver. But children’s books are all about big, splashy pictures and wild colors–elements perfectly suited to iPad screens.
And needless to say, the iPad can do a lot more than just display static pages. It can read stories aloud; it can enrich a classic tale with touch-powered extras; and it can even render pages in 3D. Let’s take a look at five dazzling e-books for kids, starting with an eye-popping rendition of "Alice in Wonderland."
1. "Alice for the iPad" This lavishly illustrated 52-page abridgment of the classic tale incorporates animation like no other e-book to date. Readers can tilt the iPad to make Alice grow and shrink; shake it to watch the Mad Hatter’s bobblehead bobble; and so on. The frantically paced demo video (above) is a little over-the-top, but there’s no question this is a showpiece iPad app. Thankfully, there’s a free Lite version you can try before splurging on the $8.99 full version.
O’Reilly announced the immediate availability of iPad: The Missing Manual on Wednesday. The 320 page book by J.D. Biersdorfer explains how to use your iPad for work and fun, how to add videos and music to your iPad, and more.
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