The ePub eBooks Metadata Mess

The subject is metadata.

Metadata is the information that is supposed to accompany each eBook so that things such as — but not limited to — arranging them by Writer or Genre or Publisher or Date Published is possible.

If you’re going on vacation, for example, and want to take along a mystery, how could you quickly find one in an eBook library comprised of several hundred editions?

Such sorting is why we have computers. They do the grunt work.

But they can only do it based on data. When the data — the metadata — isn’t there, all hell breaks loose and life is rotten for everybody.

The world runs on metadata. This financial mess we’re in? It’s all metadata — information abstracted from its original source. Metadata is derivative, abstracted data.

So if you think metadata is some little thing the world can do without, you are wrong.

iTunes ePub eBooks: Display Options

OK, I could kick myself across the room for not seeing this sooner.

In my lame defense, I plead for mercy in that I did not expect to be doing any of this sort of testing/investigating until later. Also, I do not use iTunes except for peeking into the App Store every now and then.

Anyway, see what I finally tripped over after the break.

Note: iTunes experts will not find anything here new. This will be of interest for those who haven’t used iTunes much. I hope.

Wait. Worry. Who Cares?

iTunes ePub eBooks: More Cover Tests

This is a follow-up to: iTunes ePub eBooks: Cover Display Problems

Continuing to test the compatibility of so-called “industry-standard” ePub eBooks with iTunes.

These are the kind of tests I expected to run on an iPad itself. So all of this stuff is ahead of what I had expected.

I downloaded six more ePub eBooks.

Results after the break.

iTunes ePub eBooks: Cover Display Problems

Update: There is now a second part with additional information. See end of this post.

Click = big

I did some more testing of ePub eBooks with iTunes.

Some unhappiness resulted.

iTunes 9.1.0: Add But Not Read ePub eBooks

iTunes 9.1.0 is out. I expected it — just not for today!

There are two key changes:

1) Category in the right sidebar
2) The ability to add ePub eBooks to the Library

See changes and testing via screensnaps after the break.

Transclusion/TransCopyright Experiment 2

Transcopyright: Pre-Permission for Virtual Republishing

The standard question has been, “How do we prevent infringement?” If we re-frame the question as “How can we allow re-use?”, the solution may be simpler and more powerful than everyone thinks, with benefits for everyone.

Theodor (Ted) Nelson is the only person to approach networked machines from the viewpoint of their content.

His book, Literary Machines, was like an explosion in my brain when I read it back in the early 1980s.

His ideas still remain ahead of everyone. And with the iPad coming up, those ideas will become even more vital. Nelson’s ideas should not remain fallow, unused, ignored.

If there are any Copyright/IP specialists out there, read Nelson’s works. You can help shape the future for the better.

(I know I’m not doing the TransCopyright thing correctly here, because there is no Permission Page/Link for the above quote. But I was interested to see if I could play with the HTML and use the Trans© graphic to link back to the original without using its title for that.)

Transclusion/TransCopyright Experiment

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WordPress Woes Part 3

Near two hours later, it looks like everything is fixed.

WordPress Woes Part 2

There’s some sort of problem in the route from my PC to WordPress. Someone on Twitter suggested running Trace and I did. I get a brick wall of a timeout in the route! Don’t expect Comments to be modded or new posts until this is sorted out. Somewhere in the Internets, one of the main cats who acts as a server or gateway or Flux Capacitor has gotten sick. Probably digital hairballs again. This is what the blog looks like for me when it finally materializes: TwitPic. This posted via the mobile interface.