Glassbook

by Rose Blessing How many e-book content distributors should a publisher partner with? Which books should be made into e-books? How should the process be managed? What are the pitfalls? If it's your job to figure that out at your company, take a tip from Kate Tentler, a publisher at Simon & Schuster Online in New York City who has been arranging to make Simon & Schuster books available digitally for about a year. Tentler's approach is to keep things simple, with an eye to the long term. For example: how are online distributors chosen? Simple: They are evaluated one by one. Among the

by Rose Blessing "E-books are more than hype right now. E-books are definitely here," asserted Victor McCrary, group leader, Information Storage and Integrated Systems Group, National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). McCrary was speaking at the Electronic Book 1999 conference held in Gaithersburg, MD, in September, the second such conference sponsored by NIST; he chaired the event. McCrary and many other speakers--including the reading-device makers--agreed that improved displays, lowered device weights and decreased power requirements are desired. "A lot of work still needs to be done in terms of (creating) a thriving electronic book industry," added McCrary. He credited SoftBook Press and NuvoMedia