Continuity of E-Library

Hello,

Classic books have been reprinted and reprinted for centuries. The paper
books on the shelves wear out and disappear. But the content of that book
remains permanent because it is printed over and over again. What matters
is the content. Users change their computers every 3-5 years. But they keep
the personal content they have created. They carry their documents and
music to their new computers. They are permanent. It is continuous. E-Book
Readers get old like paper books on the shelf. But their content needs to
be preserved. Readers may want or even have to change their devices every
now and then. And of course, they will want to move the content their
e-books to the new device. They use Adobe Digital Editions to send the
books to the new device.

You are developing EPUB, the universal book format. EPUB becomes the e-book
standard. So it can be read on any e-book reader that supports that
standard. Now that it has become a standard, it brings to mind MP3s, which
can be listened to on almost every computer, music player. But perhaps
something is missing.

What makes a book valuable are the parts that the reader likes. They
highlight their favorite texts. Maybe they take notes on the page. With
effort, they create their personal content. Of course, they will hope for
the permanence of this content. New books are archived in the library after
they have been read. But most of the books in the library will never be
reread from beginning to end. Instead, only notes taken and texts
highlighted are reviewed. Personal libraries last for decades. But devices,
unfortunately, only last a few years. EBooks are superior because they
don't wear out, because their data never disappears. But does the e-library
really never disappear when it needs to be moved to a new e-reader!

When a note is made on a book, the note is not actually saved in the book.
It is saved in a note file linked to the book. Later, when the book is
opened, the relevant parts of the note file are parsed and displayed on the
book again. But different devices have different ways of saving notes.
There is no harmony. E-books can be moved to the new device, but notes
cannot be transferred to the new device. On the new device, the book is as
if the cover has never been opened. All the notes taken are gone!

For text highlighting to be more than a momentary technological
entertainment, it must be permanent. It would be a waste of time to
underline an important text while reading it if it cannot be permanent.

This is why notes can also be saved in a universal format. It can be a note
file with the same name in the same folder as the book. W3C could set
standards for saving notes. Perhaps this could be the EPUBNotes file type.

The device settings can now offer the following options: Notes can be saved
according to the device's own note standard, or they can be saved according
to the EPUB note standard. If the reader chooses to save according to the
EPUB standard, the notes will be saved according to the rules you set.

Imagine a future reader replacing his e-book reader: He sends the old EPUB
books he bought to the device. But the device recognizes these books as
new. There are no more notes. But when the reader copies the note files of
the books from the old device to the new device will he get his notes back.
Any device that supports the universal EPUB format will also support these
note files. EBook reader devices are ephemeral. The e-library and the
personal content that the reader creates in the book must be sustained.

In fact, a perfect solution would be for you to develop a standard to save
book notes on top of the Epub file. Notes taken on PDF files are saved in
the PDF file. This ensures the permanence of the notes. This is how the
notes for Epub books should be! Perhaps you could collaborate with Adobe on
this.

Publishers who are members of W3C would like to improve the design of the
e-book. But why should they care about the quality of the reader generated
content? Why should they ask W3C to improve that too? The reader gets more
out of the book with the content they create. It is the reader's favorite
parts that make the book valuable. They underline their favorite texts.
They remember more parts of the book. So he can talk about the book at
length to his friends. He can often bring up different parts of it. The
reader will, of course, be advertising the book! The more the reader
remembers about the book, the longer he/she will keep it on the agenda.
Some of their friends will want to own the book. Then they will advertise
it to their friends. The process starts to work. Now we can hope that the
sales of that book will increase. It will make the publisher of the book
happy.

In fact, this also makes it easier for e-reader manufacturers. They don't
have to design new software algorithms for taking notes on the book. The
standard rules are already in place. Manufacturers just need to write the
appropriate program.

Best Regards...