Thursday, September 13, 2007

A Big Boost For E-Books

Today's Publishers Weekly reported:

E-book publishing took a big step toward format standardization and device interoperability after members of the International Digital Publishing Forum [IDPF] voted overwhelmingly to accept the Open Publication Structure 2.0 [OPS 2.0] e-book specification as an official industry standard.

The OPS 2.0 standardization allows the creation of one digital book file instead of the six to ten formats now out there. One file means lower costs and greater flexibility.

It remains to be seen whether all the IDPF members will decide to adopt the standards themselves. These would include Adobe, Sony, and Amazon (which owns Mobipocket).

Nick Bogaty, executive director of IDPF, said, "Publishers are starting to do their conversions and technology companies are implementing the standard into their software...I encourage our community to continue to promote .epub. Doing so will significantly grow our industry."

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