eBookAnoid and I
A bit about me:
I have been told I should put a short sort of Bio here as apparently this is customary.
Well, I am British by birth, and later became a Dutch citizen as that seemed sensible after living for about 20 years in Holland. So far I have lived in 10 different countries, and currently live in Malaysia and before this in a place called Cebu City which is on one of the thousands of islands that constitute the Philippines.
Whilst there, when not writing posts for this blog, I was normally to be found about 30 meters under the sea, happily passing time with the fish as I scuba dive as often as possible.
At various times in my life I have worked as a Rock and Roll roadie, theatre production manager, paintball field owner, computer um… well I looked after computers in a school in Angola, a model maker, running the sound and lighting department in a large International school in Beijing and a load of other things. Now at the ripe old age of 71, I am more or less retired.
My only qualification to write about eReaders and so on is that I use them, as does my wife, we both read eBooks and paper books voraciously and I have the time to research what I write…. And I seriously believe they are a wonderful invention, with all manner of possible uses in the world, not simply for relatively wealthy Westerners such as I am. Oh, and I enjoy writing too.
Now when I am not here in Malaysia, I am busy near a small town just outside Brisbane in Australia, where we are currently building a house with our son and his family…. I mean literally building it, not simply employing builders to do it, but we are doing it with our own hands, and extremely hard work it is too!
One nice by-products of this blog has been the contact I have made with people all over the world who have sent me emails about one or other post…. This I enjoy no end!
So. what else? Well, I am married – obviously from what I said above, – I have a son, a charming and superb French/Australian Daughter in Law and currently two delightful grandsons, all living happily in Australia.
Me on the roof of a pleasant cafe called the Bookworm (a literary cafe obviously) in Beijing where we lived for three enjoyable and interesting years, and below, about to descend happily into the clear warm Philippines sea- the fish love my beard!
Now to the purpose of this Blog…….. Read on…………..
The war of the eReaders:
Since I was given my first Sony eReader a few years ago I have become a fanatical user of these amazing little machines and have spent many happy hours wandering around the internet looking for copyright free books to download for my reading pleasure, and also watching the rather entertaining battle that is developing between the increasingly numerous eReaders that are coming on the market as well as the inevitable war of formats that is happening.
This struggle, and the curious sales situation (where can one buy an eReader or a particular book?) make the present situation very complex for anyone who is wanting to leap into this wonderful form of mobile library, so I thought I would start a blog which would review all the various eReaders that are out there, and locate interesting sources of free, cheap or full price online eBooks in the various formats and publish them on this Blog in the hope that it will help others to enjoy this new form of reading and creating libraries.
Where can I buy them?
I shall also try and give useful hints about buying eReaders, as I have found the sales policy of the main manufacturers completely impossible to understand. One can buy one make of eReader in Britain but not in Australia for example, or attempting to buy one if you live (as I did) in the Philippines online was impossible for no obvious reason. It is all very strange. Thus I shall trying to find out where you can buy a particular model of eReader and posting this information if and when I get it.
Where can I buy books?
I shall be doing much the same with the numerous online bookshops, who also often have curious sales restrictions based on one’s location in the world (Publisher’s copyright rules I gather). It is a jungle out there, Folks!
I also hope very much that as the Blog develops, other people will post comments here with useful links and thoughts on this subject, and thus help people to buy eReaders that are suitable for them, and to locate eBooks that will give them the same amount of pleasure as I have had through my eReader.
Earning money through my blog:
As it costs me money to run this blog (internet charges and so on) I make use of a number of affiliate programs, which means that should you click on any links here and then buy something, I get a small percentage of what you spend… Which helps!!! One of them I use currently is called Skimlinks, which highlights any links I have in a post, and if you click on it, it takes you to the relevant product page.. where I hope you will then spend loads of money, and help defray my costs by this means…..
So, watch this space!!!!!!!!!!!