Category Archives: eBooks

FBReader Now Available For Symbian and Harmattan

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FBReader - Day View

My favorite eBook reader is now available for Symbian 5th Ed. and later and MeeGo/Harmattan.  It’s FBReader, which I started using around 2005 on a Sharp Zaurus Linux PDA.  FBReader is open source software that runs on just about every Linux based portable platform including Android and Maemo as well as on Linux, Mac OS X and Windows PCs. The Symbian and MeeGo/Harmattan versions are labeled as Betas with the disclaimer that aren’t production quality. A  production release for both … Continue reading →

Albite – Free Java eBook Reader With Touch and ePub Support

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Albite Reader

I enjoy reading novels on my phones, particularly when traveling. I’m always on the lookout for new eBook readers particularly for Symbian^3 and Java feature phones where there aren’t many good options.  A reader pointed me to Albite, a new mobile Java eBook reading app that comes in several versions including one optimized for Symbian touchscreen devices. Albite reader is a free open source (Apache 2.0 license) app  by Svetlin Ankov. Download it from albite.vlexofree.com (mobile download site: m.albite.vlexofree.com).  The key feature of Albite … Continue reading →

Download Free Mobile eBooks From Project Gutenberg

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Project Gutenberg Mobile

Project Gutenberg now has its own mobile webapp at m.gutenberg.org.  The project, which is celebrating its 40th anniversary in 2011, creates free eBook editions of books that are out of copyright or were published under a license such as Creative Commons that allows them to be distributed freely. The catalog currently has over 36,000 titles. Dubbed “PG Mobile”, the mobile version carries the entire Gutenberg catalog.  Author, title and subject search makes it easy to find your favorite authors and books. … Continue reading →

The Best eBook Reader Apps For the Nokia N8

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eReader - Makers

The Nokia N8 makes a great book reader thanks to its excellent screen and easy pocket-ability.  Just as the best camera is the one you have with you, the best eBook is the one you have in your pocket.  Dedicated book readers like the Kindle are OK, but unlike a phone, too big to carry everywhere. Unfortunately it’s not easy to find book reading apps for the N8 and other Symbian^3 phones like the C7 and E7.  In fact I … Continue reading →

CellStories – Mobile Short Story Of The Day

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CellStories is a new mobile service offering a different short story every day. The stories, which average 1500 to 2000 words or about a 10 minute read, are free. They supplied by budding or established authors looking to increase their exposure. CellStories doesn’t pay for content but will link back to the author’s (hopefully mobile optimized) site or Amazon.com or other bookstore sales page. The design of CellStories is attractive but functional. I particularly like that the site opens directly … Continue reading →

Google Mobile Book Search

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Google continues to roll out new mobile products.  Monday it was Tasks, yesterday Latitude and today we have Google Mobile Book Search at books.google.com/m.  It’s an iPhonesque mobile interface into 1.5 million  public domain books that Google has scanned as part of its Book Search project. I heard about it first  from microflash on Twitter.  There’s an official announcement on the Inside Book Search blog. The new mobile interface lets you search  for and read any of  the 1.5 million … Continue reading →

eBooks in Your Phone

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Mobile eBooks are getting some attention this week with Amazon’s launch of the Kindle, a $399 eBook reader whose selling point is that wirelessly downloads books. I haven’t tried or seen the Kindle but other than the wireless connection it doesn’t seem much different than other dedicated eBook readers like Ebookwise and the Sony Reader. These reading devices are niche products with a core of loyal users but nothing like mass adoption. I expect the Kindle too will sell in … Continue reading →

How to Read eBooks on Almost Any Phone

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Read an eBook on my mobile phone? I’ll admit I was skeptical at first. Although I’ve been reading books on a Palm OS PDA for years it has a relatively large 3 inch screen. I thought downgrading to the mobile’s 1.9″ screen would make reading impossibly painful. I quickly discovered that I was wrong. I found that I could read just as fast and with as much enjoyment on the smaller screen as with the PDA or even a printed … Continue reading →