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January
6, 1999 Dear Open eBook participant: Greetings! It ’s been an eventful few months since we gathered for the Electronic Book ’98 conference and Open eBook announcement in October. We want to take this chance to let you know what has been happening and look ahead to what you can expect in 1999.We ’re pleased to report that we will release a draft of the Open eBook Publication Structure Specification within the next two weeks. If you’re interested in learning about how you can receive a copy of the specification draft, please send your mailing address to the people listed near the bottom of this letter. We’ve also been working hard to lay the groundwork for an open specification review process and are looking forward to your involvement in that process starting this month. We want to ensure that you have the opportunity to ask questions and comment on the specification as it evolves from first draft to final version.Further details about how you can provide feedback on the specification will be available from this Web site once the specification is released. A major reason that more than forty organizations have expressed support for Open eBook is that one of its goals is to make eBook titles available on a wide variety of reading devices, as well as to quickly create a critical mass of important content. SoftBook Press, NuvoMedia, and Microsoft are developing the Open eBook Publication Structure Specification to be a subset of the existing W3C standards, the standards of the World Wide Web, building on existing tools and knowledge. We think this is a good start towards our goal of broad content availability. Publishers, pioneers, retailers and manufacturers all agree that Open eBook is a positive step for the emerging eBook industry. In the short time since October, there has been much additional interest in Open eBook:
In addition to Open eBook, there have been other exciting developments in the eBook arena since October. Two electronic reading devices are now available, the Rocket eBook™ from NuvoMedia and the SoftBook ョ from SoftBook Press. Other eBook companies, including Librius Inc. and Everybook Inc., expect to release eBook devices before mid 1999.In November, Microsoft unveiled ClearType™ font technology. As you may have read, ClearType dramatically improves font display resolution and greatly enhances the electronic reading experience. This development will make electronic reading devices more compelling and allow us to provide a much better product with existing displays. If you would like information about how to receive a draft of the Open eBook Publication Structure Specification, please send an e-mail message with your contact information (Name, Title, Company, Street, City, State, ZIP, Country if outside U.S., E-mail Address and Phone Number) to all of the following people: Ellen Levy, SoftBook Press Many thanks for your interest and consideration. Best wishes for the New Year! Sincerely, Martin Eberhard Jim Sachs Dick Brass Victor McCrary |
(C) 1999 Open eBook Authoring Group
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