Scribd provides digests of nonfiction books for readers who have subscription

Boyue Likebook Mimas e-reader/writing tablet

Scribd is an online ebook service that lets people read as many books as they have time to (certain restrictions apply)after they have paid a monthly subscription fee. The difference between this service and many other book subscription services is that Scribd has more than one million paying customers and … Read >

Paywall business model for news doesn’t match readers’ expectations in the long run

Reuters Institute, Oxford Unversity: newspaper paywall study
A report titled Pay Models for Online News in the US and Europe: 2019 Update published in April 2019 by the Reuters Institute indicates that the number of newspapers that charge for access to their online news is slowly increasing. The study, conducted in association with the Oxford University, features … Read >

Plagiarism in self-publishing is an older problem than CopyPasteCris case

person holding stack of books in hands
Plagiarism is a nasty problem that hides in the dark corners of self-publishing. In essence, it is a shortcut where a wannabe writer steals authors’ published works, and labels the result as their own work. An advanced plagiarism scheme where a person produced a number of books by mixing real … Read >

Ebook reading, travel, and other mobile apps may be leaking private data to Facebook

Writers, ebook lovers, travelers, and anyone who is using downloaded applications on their mobile phones or tablets are silently leaking their personal data to Facebook. A research organization has published a study that shows how apps, including popular travel applications like TripAdvisor, Kayak, Yelp and Skyscanner continuously transmitted users’ private … Read >

5 travel and tourism megatrends reflect the rise of new technologies, businesses and prospering nations

Travel and tourism is already one of the largest, yet also one of the fastest growing global industries. It was estimated to account for about 10% of global GDP in 2017. Entire regions depend on the arrival of tourists, like Bali or Southern Portugal. Since the world is changing, … Read >

Is reading on an e-reader considered screen time?

Many parents restrict the time their children (or parents themselves) can access phones, tablets or any electronic devices with a screen. But what about an ereader? Kindle, Kobo, Nook or another device that is designed for reading ebooks has a screen. The difference is that these products have a black-and-white … Read >

The best tools that can replace Google services for privacy-minded people

I don’t know about you, but I find it extremely annoying when I’m researching, say, New Zealand for an article or a book, and suddenly I’m bombarded with ads of hotels in the destination. Privacy is an important factor why many colleagues have given up Google products, whereas frequent travelersRead >

What is all this noise about WordPress 5 and Gutenberg?

There is a moment in every author’s life when the question of having a web site becomes a hot topic. Most book publishing marketers recommend authors to have a dedicated personal or book related web site.

When it comes to online publications – blogs, personal web pages, business sites, news … Read >

This is why it is so damn difficult to find the right note taking application – but it is possible

Writers, editors, readers, freelancers, actually all people who do creative work that requires thinking and planning need to take notes. No one wants to lose that billion dollar product idea, solution to a programming problem that presents itself on a mountainbike trail, or perfect plan for backyard plant arrangement. In … Read >

The nostalgic lure of old, beautiful mechanical typewriters

Electronic typewriters that mimic the look and feel – and to a certain extent – the functionality of old mechanical typewriters are wanted products. Many typewriter-like devices have been introduced lately, such as Rymek, Freewrite and Penna, targeted at distraction-free writing. How does the original product – a … Read >