Blog Notes: Weekend eBook Project Note #1

I’ve gotten just ten authors done.

Ten!

I have ten ebook vendor search engines open in ten tabs at once.

I’ve already come to some preliminary conclusions:

1) Searching for ebooks sucks. Really, your sites suck. Your search engines suck. Your response times suck. You should be flayed alive, beaten with sticks, tarred and feathered. You are helping to destroy reading by making the discovery process sheer hell!

1a) Have any of you dopes heard of computers? Do you use them? Then why aren’t search results in alphabetical order by book title? Is this a new freaking thought to you?! What bizarre notions are you living under that tell you such ordering would be unhelpful?!!? (Update for clarity: When searching by author name. Hello, McFly. What did you think I meant? Eejit.)

1b) See 1: You all suck!

2) Some of the prices I’ve seen are downright criminally confiscatory. There is just no excuse for an e edition costing more than a p edition. These publishers should be taken out and shot! You are sand in the gears of progress and must be washed away. I hope you all die die die.

3) Amazon’s Kindle is kicking all of your asses. I mean, it’s not even close. Your asses are being beaten as if you were little girls. Little autistic girls. Little deaf dumb and blind autistic girls who have been bound head to toe in duct tape. Again, see 1: You suck!

4) Apple is the only company that can come in and clean all of this up with great ease of discovery and sane pricing. No ebook should cost more than five dollars, period. There is no excuse for any ebook costing more than. Listen, you pack of short-sighted eejits. There are going to be ten million iPhones out there!! Do you want to make money or spitefully smother your authors as a by-product of your atavistic suicidal monopolistic tendencies? Deduct the cost of paper, deduct the cost of ink, deduct the shipping and warehousing costs, deduct the price of returns and five bucks is a damn good wad to make a profit from. You can’t tell me otherwise, so shut the hell up.

5) This is not simply a weekend project. This is a multi-day project. Because see 1: They suck!

More notes of anger and frustration tomorrow and things progress through this slog of digital mud!

Apple, save us!!

Note to David Rothman of Teleread: This is why ebooks have gone nowhere. See 1: They suck!

Previously here:

Blog Notes: Weekend eBook Project

Reference: Stanza eBook Reader For iPhone

I had no idea this existed or was coming. What happens when I miss checking Teleread every day!

Here is a QuickTime demo video.

Blog Notes: Weekend eBook Project

Now that the iPhone 3G and apps apps apps are out, it’s time for me to investigate ebooks in a serious manner.

I’ve made a big fat list of books and authors I must have in e form (because I can no longer buy in p form) and I’m going to go about searching for them on the major ebook vendor sites.

One of the things I intend to do is list the prices on each site to see if there is any true competition.

You lot can participate too: Tell me how many ebooks you’ve bought (don’t count the free ones — and do not mention the Dark Net ones!) and how much money you’ve spent. Leave Comment. Much Comment. Good Comment.

Hey, Apple! I want my ebooks with Coverflow!!

Mister Snitch!

Has a very, very odd blog.

Is he in Hoboken? He posts about it a lot.

I lived there just after the Yuppies Invade My House At Dinnertime phase … before that, I lived on the hill of Jersey City and was treated to the sight of repeated train lootings. It brought out the latent sniper in me. Too bad I didn’t have the necessary tool for the job!

He’s correct here: this is the best Dark Knight poster! Wow!

Reference: iPhone 3G Yellowishness

iPhone 3G Yellow Screen Issue

Ah, If Only It Was So, Allah Be Merciful!

This cannot be seen as good in the eyes of Allah, via email:

Dear Friend,

As you read this, I don’t want you to feel sorry for me, because I believe everyone will die someday. My name is ALH. Hassan Muhammad a crude oil merchant in Iran, I have been diagnosed with esophageal cancer. It has defied all forms of medical treatment, and right now I have only about a few months to live, according to medical experts.

I have not particularly lived my life so well, as I never really cared for anyone (not even myself) but my business. Though I am very rich, I was never generous, I was always hostile to people and only focused on my business as that was the only thing I cared for. But now I regret all this as I now know that there is more to life than just wanting to have or make all the money in the world. I believe when Allah gives me a second chance to come to this world I would live my life a different way from how I have lived it.

Now that Allah has called me, I have willed and given most of my property and assets to my immediate and extended family members as well as a few close friends. I want Allah to be merciful to me and accept my soul. I have decided to give the rest of my wealth to charity organizations as I want this to be one of the last good deeds I do on earth. So far I have distributed money to some charity organizations in Austria, Cameroon, Liberia, Algeria and Malaysia. Now that my health has deteriorated so badly I cannot do this myself anymore. I once asked members of my family to close one of my accounts and distribute the money which I have there to charity organization in Bulgaria and Pakistan; they refused and kept the money to themselves. Hence! I do not trust them anymore as they seem not to be contended with what I have left for them.

The last of my money which no one knows of is the huge cash deposit of eight million USA dollars ($8, 000, 000, 00) that I have with a finance/security company abroad. I will want you to help me collect this deposit and dispatched it to charity organizations.

I have set aside 10% for you and for your time.

Allah is with you.

ALH. Hassan Muhammad

And trust me, I would put US$800,000 to good use!

Shame on you!

I Knew It! Kendrick Bought An iPhone 3G!

I thought so!

He wantonly brays about it here.

Why did he do it?

For the Apple goodness?

For the smartphonery?

No.

To taunt, torment, and torture me!

All his tech buys are about me.

Once you understand that, it puts everything in perspective.

And where is your pathetic crybaby HTC Advantage now, Kendrick?!

Ha! Ha! and Ha!

iDay 2008 + 1 = LONG Lines!!!

This is why I didn’t get to fondle an iPhone 3G this morning at the Apple Soho Store — there were two hundred people lined up to get in!!

This is 9:15AM this morning, Saturday, July 12, 2008!

Approaching Apple Store Soho. WTF?!

Line stretches to the corner …

… then around it …

… and uppppp the block …

… has a short break at one point (driveway entry) …

… and finally ends just short of the next corner!

The view from the back!

When I deserted my quest for some iPhone 3G heavy tech molestation, I walked down Broadway and the AT&T near Spring Street had fifty people lined up outside! One maniac had a ginormous MacBook Pro balanced on his right forearm while he typed on it with his left hand!

Photos taken with the Philips crapcam; which is why they’re crappy. (So don’t curse that iPhone camera!)

Previously here:

Southern NYC iDay 2007 In 56 Photos!

Photo Album: Smart Car In Manhattan

Photos taken Saturday, July 12, 2008:

That Mini Cooper has four seats in it, believe it or not. The Smart Car only has two. Look at the difference between the Mini and the Smart at the front: the Mini’s hood is just about half the length of the Smart car!

From the Smart car FAQ:

The smart fortwo pure coupe starts at $11,590*, the smart fortwo passion coupe starts at $13,590* and the smart fortwo passion cabriolet starts at $16,590*.

* For 2008 models. Excludes tax, title, registration, destination charge, options and other dealer fees.

Believe it or not — it made my jaw drop — this Smart car had A/C in it!

Photos taken with the Philips crapcam; which is why they’re crappy.

Nimbus: Banned From Comments

You committed a mortal sin against this blog: You left a Smiley Nazi Comment. Fuck you. You’re gone.