Amazing World of E-Books

Tired of lugging around those big backpacks full of books? Well, my friend, here is the new wave of the future, introducing the amazing world of e-books. It is the new generation of books that will elevate our reading habit to a higher level. While it is true that nothing compares to the experience of sitting by the corner while reading that favorite book of yours, it sure is convenient and comforting to carry just one gadget rather than stuff a number of books in your pack.

E-book is the digital or electronic version of our traditional printed book. Basically, it is a digital book which contains text, diagrams, tables, drawing, and illustrations. This can be read through a personal computer or a device called an e-book reader. Before the proliferation of various e-books in the web, the main purpose and objective of those who created this is to provide documentation for selected and limited specialized and technical areas only, such as their specifications and manuals. However, because of its popularity among the growing community, it has now become an essential tool for the general public.

What is amazing about an e-book is that it has features far more superior than our conventional printed books. Some of these are:

-          No shipping charger as well as handling charges when purchased from the Internet.

-          It may be downloaded quickly at the comfort of our own house.

-          It has dictionary software for look-up words.

-          It can have plenty of books in one package.

-          Easy highlight or annotation for texts

-          It can include multimedia materials like audio and video tutorials.

-          It can be easily customizable depending on the user’s preference.

-          It can have easy access to multiple e-book links.

-          It reduces environmental impacts such as saving thousands of trees and reduction of pollution.

While there are advantages why people and professionals today prefer to use e-books instead of the printed ones, there are also drawbacks. These are discussed below:

Advantages

-          Some educational textbooks have lower distribution cost per student in comparison to the printed one.

-          Printing of e-books has a lesser price than the conventional one.

-          Searching and cross-referencing of texts is easy because of the use of hyperlinks.

-          E-book readers provide capabilities for font size enlarging, annotations, and highlighting.

-          Animated images and multimedia can be embedded in e-books.

-          E-books can be opened in the last read page.

-          Authors can easily publish e-books.

-          E-books require only little space.

-          E-books are readable in low-lights or dark areas.

-          Some e-book websites provide language translations.

-          E-books can be portable and mobile.

-          Low-cost in productions

Disadvantages

-          Reading e-books requires an additional device such as the e-book reader.

-          It requires additional and updated software for reading.

-          When on travel, e-book reader may have a low-battery charging thus reading is not feasible in comparison to a printed page that doesn’t go offline.

-          Printed books are good for presents in comparison to an e-book.

-          Some e-book readers are heavier than some good old printed books.

-          E-books are not applicable to remote areas without electricity.

-          Some e-books will not last forever because of technology changes.

-          It cannot be easily stored and backed up.

-          Percentage of e-book readers is small in comparison to the good old reliable printed books.

Stated above are just some of the advantages and disadvantages of using an e-book. Reading an e-book can be very difficult sometimes when a user doesn’t have the right software in his computer. E-books, when first released, came in different formats. Some of them are in PDF, HTML, and other text formats. However, in the later development of e-books, publishers have agreed to use the PDF format for all e-books in order to have a standard as well as not dividing the e-book market. Three companies have created three popular e-book readers sold in the market today. These are the Amazon’s Kindle, Sony’s PRS-500 and Bookeen’s Cybook Gen3.

Now, the questions would be: Will e-book change the way we read and disseminate information in the future? Will it replace the conventional printed books? We don’t know the answer yet, but maybe soon our next generation will eventually embrace the technology and forever forget the good old reliable books. Perhaps someday, we may find everyone carrying with them an e-reader just like the era when cellular phones amazed people.