How green is the iPad? Ask Mike Daisey

Although Mike Daisey describes himself as a lifelong Apple super fan, he'll probably say not so much, at least when it comes to the social impact of the iPad (as well as other Apple products). Why? Listen to the opening episode of the year of This American Life (see below) and receive the answer.

I also wrote about it today on Triple Pundit. Here's a paragraph from the article:

Mike Daisey describes himself as a lifelong Apple super fan. One day he saw some photos from a new iPhone, taken by workers at the factory where it was made and started wondering who makes his Apple gadgets. He decided to investigate and traveled to Shenzhen, where the main factory of Foxconn is located. Foxconn is the largest contract electronics manufacturer in the world with clients including Apple, HP and Microsoft. The manufacturer’s factories were also home to at least 12 workers suicides last year. Daisey wasn’t the first one to investigate what happens in Foxconn, yet his report is different and will probably trouble you more profoundly than written reports.

For more information on how green is the iPad visit our iPad webpage at http://www.ecolibris.net/ipad.asp

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: Plant a tree for every book you read!

Top 100 book apps - Weird But True by National Geographic Society

Since we believe in the digital future of books as a way to reduce eventually the footprint of books, we also believe in apps. Book apps are integral part of the digital age of books and we want to share with you some great book apps we find and thus we are assembling a list of the top 100 book apps.

In order to get into our list apps need to both book/ebook related and affordable - we choose only apps that are either free or cost less than $2.

So every Monday we will update you with a new app on out list of top book apps. Today we're happy to introduce you the first iPad book app to redefine the experience of reading 19th century poetry. Our app today is Weird But True by National Geographic Society. This app is for iPhone and iPad and it costs $1.99.

Here are more details about the Weird But True app:
The first offering from digital book studio, Honeybee Labs, "Chasing Fireflies" is an interactive poetry experience, featuring over 150 classic Japanese haiku, complemented by elegant collage-style artwork and a cinematic original score. Readers can interact with the backgrounds, calling lightning in a storm, or conjuring fireflies at night. Readers can also share their favorite passages with friends via Facebook or Twitter.

Features:
* Over 150 hand-selected haiku poems by Basho, Buson, Kikaku, Issa and others
* Cinematic original score by composer Colin Wambsgans
* Book’s cover changes through time to display a new landscape each week
* Every page can be rotated to give four different perspectives
* Easily post your favorite passages to Twitter and Facebook
* Foreward by Caley Vickerman, founder of the Guerrilla Haiku movement

Last week's book app - Chasing Fireflies: A Haiku Collection

You can check top 100 book apps at http://www.ecolibris.net/bookapps.asp. As you'll see, this list is in work, but we promise to update it every week until we'll have all 100 book apps.

You're also welcome to check our list of 100 green apps.

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: Plant a tree for every book you read!

Where print books still beat ebooks?

Apparently at the public library. Washington Post reported on Saturday on the growing lines (e-lines?) for ebooks in libraries, where the supply is far from meeting the demand.

"Want to take out the new John Grisham? Get in line. As of Friday morning, 288 people were ahead of you in the Fairfax County Public Library system, waiting for one of 43 copies. You’d be the 268th person waiting for “The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo,” with 47 copies. And the Steve Jobs biography? Forget it. The publisher, Simon & Schuster, doesn’t make any of its digital titles available to libraries."

Another problem is that publishers still don't make many books available to libraries. Why? The article explains that "wary of piracy and the devastation it has caused the music and film industries, Penguin recently put its new e-book titles off-limits. Like Simon & Schuster, Macmillan doesn’t make its e-book content available to libraries. And last year, HarperCollins announced that it would require libraries to renew licenses for e-books after 26 checkouts, outraging some librarians."

I guess this balance of power will change eventually, but at least for now, the print book is still the king of the public library!

To read more of this interesting article, click here -As demand for e-books soars, libraries struggle to stock their virtual shelves.

To read more news and updates on ebook lending please visit our ebook lending webpage.

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: Plant a tree for every book you read!

Top 100 green apps - The Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch: Your Guide to Sustainable Seafood

We are creating a list of the top 100 apps that will help you go green as part of our effort to promote a more sustainable lifestyle. Apps become an integral part of our life and a valuable tool and we believe we should also take advantage of them when it comes go greening up our life.

Every Friday we update you with a new app on the list, and today we're happy to introduce you with an app for seafood lovers, which helps you choose ocean-friendly seafood at your favorite restaurants and stores.

Our app is Seafood Watch from Monterey Bay Aquarium. This app is for iPhone, iPad and android and it is free.

Here are more details about Seafood Watch App:

Description
Seafood Watch recommendations help you choose ocean-friendly seafood at your favorite restaurants and stores. Our app brings you the most current recommendations for seafood and sushi along with complete information about how each item should be fished or farmed. Our new Project FishMap feature lets you contribute to the app, adding the names of restaurants and stores in the U.S. where you’ve found sustainable seafood and locating what other users have found at businesses near you.

Features:
• Provides free, up-to-date recommendations at your fingertips with detailed seafood information
• Uses your phone’s GPS to load the right regional guide for your location
• Enables you to search for seafood quickly and easily by common market name
• Allows you to sort seafood by "Best Choice," "Good Alternative" or "Avoid" rankings
• Sushi guide lists fish by Japanese name as well as common market name
• Provides alternatives to seafood on the “Avoid” list
• New Project FishMap feature lets you contribute to the app by adding the names of restaurants and stores where you've found ocean-friendly seafood and locate businesses where others have found sustainable seafood
• Highlights our list of “Super Green” seafood that’s good for you and the oceans

You can check top 100 green apps at http://www.ecolibris.net/greenapps.asp. As you'll see, this list is in work, but we promise to update it every week until we'll have all 100 green apps.

Last week's green app - Green Power Free battery saver.

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: Plant a tree for every book you read!

Don't be an iPhoney, buy where you shop!

Here's Harvard Bookstore's reply to Amazon's evil app (thanks to GalleyCat for the link):



Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: Promoting sustainable reading!

A new report find that kids prefer ebooks on print books - should parents encourage that?

I just saw an update on eBookNewser about a new report from the Joan Ganz Cooney Center at Sesame Workshop that found that kids prefer to eBooks to print books.

"The Center observed 24 families with children ages 3-6 for this “QuickStudy” in the summer and fall of 2011. The kids were given both print and eBooks to read and according to the research children preferred reading an eBook to a print book though comprehension was equal."

The sample group used by the center was relatively small - only 24 families, but if you have kids in this age you would probably a similar conclusion. Yet, at least from my personal experience, these findings would probably be more accurate looking 5 or more years ahead. Many kids kids right now still enjoy and prefer print books, but they will probably switch in some point in the near future to e-books because they grow up with so much exposure to digital formats and its easier for them to do it compared to older generations.

One thing I'm not sure I understand is the following quote from the original report on Digital Book World - “If we can encourage kids to engage in books through an iPad, that’s a win already,” said Carly Shuler, senior consultant for industry studies at the Joan Ganz Cooney Center. Why do we need to encourage kids to engage in books through an iPad and not through print book? They'll have enough time when they grow older to engage with digital formats, but in the meantime they could lose some valuable lessons from converting too early to ebooks.

I'd just like to quote Junko Yokota, a professor and director of the Center for Teaching Through Children’s Books at National Louis University in Chicago, who explained on the New York Times last November what is lost by taking a picture book and converting it to an e-book. She said that the shape and size of the book are often part of the reading experience. For example, wider pages might be used to convey broad landscapes, or a taller format might be chosen for stories about skyscrapers. "Size and shape “become part of the emotional experience, the intellectual experience. There’s a lot you can’t standardize and stick into an electronic format,” she said.

What do you think? What does your kid prefer? Are you happy with his or her choice? Drop us a comment and join the discussion.

Image credit: Tundra Books, Flickr Creative Commons

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: Promoting sustainable reading!

Top 100 book apps - Chasing Fireflies: A Haiku Collection

Since we believe in the digital future of books as a way to reduce eventually the footprint of books, we also believe in apps. Book apps are integral part of the digital age of books and we want to share with you some great book apps we find and thus we are assembling a list of the top 100 book apps.

In order to get into our list apps need to both book/ebook related and affordable - we choose only apps that are either free or cost less than $2.

So every Monday we will update you with a new app on out list of top book apps. Today we're happy to introduce you the first iPad book app to redefine the experience of reading 19th century poetry. Our app today is Chasing Fireflies: A Haiku Collection by HoneyBee Labs. This app is for the iPad and it costs $1.99 (regularly it is priced $3.99, but it will be available for $1.99 on the App Store through January 31st, 2012).

Here are more details about the Chasing Fireflies: A Haiku Collection app:

The first offering from digital book studio, Honeybee Labs, "Chasing Fireflies" is an interactive poetry experience, featuring over 150 classic Japanese haiku, complemented by elegant collage-style artwork and a cinematic original score. Readers can interact with the backgrounds, calling lightning in a storm, or conjuring fireflies at night. Readers can also share their favorite passages with friends via Facebook or Twitter.

Features:
* Over 150 hand-selected haiku poems by Basho, Buson, Kikaku, Issa and others
* Cinematic original score by composer Colin Wambsgans
* Book’s cover changes through time to display a new landscape each week
* Every page can be rotated to give four different perspectives
* Easily post your favorite passages to Twitter and Facebook
* Foreward by Caley Vickerman, founder of the Guerrilla Haiku movement



Last week's book app - Subtext

You can check top 100 book apps at http://www.ecolibris.net/bookapps.asp. As you'll see, this list is in work, but we promise to update it every week until we'll have all 100 book apps.

You're also welcome to check our list of 100 green apps.

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: Plant a tree for every book you read!