Turn Your iPad Into a Bookshelf

Chris Pirillo — Fri, 02 Apr 2010 22:42:12 +0000

The iBook app is a free download, and does something that I think is pretty cool. When opened on your iPad, a bookshelf will appear. They built the app in a way that truly makes your book collection appear to be sitting on a bookshelf in your living room. In the upper left corner of the screen you will find the Store button. Tap that and watch your bookshelf turn around like the ones on Scooby Doo used to do! After the shelf turns around, the iBookstore will appear automagically.

The iBookstore lets you browse through popular titles (and some not-so-popular ones) in a variety of ways: by genre, by author and by keyword. Once you see something that interests you, you can tap to read a preview or review – or read a small excerpt from the story itself. As soon as you purchase the lexicon, it will appear on your bookshelf so that you can read it whenever you like.

Reading a book on the iPad is better in some ways than when you have a hard copy. You’re still going to turn pages and hold the device with your hands. However, you can adjust the brightness and contrast on your screen to adjust it to work with your eyes. Not all of us have perfect vision, and changing the settings on the display can bring you an entirely new reading experience. You can also adjust the font size – or the font itself.

I enjoy reading a good book when I have the time. Having an iPad may make it quite a bit easier for me. Instead of watching a movie when I am on the airplane (or listening to music as I stand in line), I can pick up where I left off with my latest tome. Since the iPad bookmarks the spot where I left off, it only takes a few seconds to dive right back in.

The only question now is… what books do you recommend I check out first?

Turn Your iPad Into a Bookshelf

What are eBooks?

Chris Pirillo — Wed, 25 Jul 2007 16:01:05 +0000

What are eBooks?

http://live.pirillo.com/ – An eBook is a book, or text put into a book format, that is in an electronic format which you can read on a mobile device or on your computer. Most eBooks nowadays are in the Portable Document Format (PDF), although some of them are still distributed as executable files.

If you're looking for free eBooks, you'll want to check out the Gutenberg project.

Why would you want to use an eBook as opposed to a physical book? Generally, it's much easier to search for information in an eBook format than searching through a bunch of index pages.

Is the eBook going to overtake the old physical book? Well, that remains to be seen: current eReaders are flawed in many ways and that will only help slow the adoption of eBooks.

What do you think? Will eBooks take over the world?

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What are eBooks?

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Turn Your iPad Into a Bookshelf

What are eBooks?