How many ebooks do you have?

[Jereboam]

Just wondering...in a moment of dire boredom I cooked up a spreadsheet of all my books, mainly to keep track of different formats, but came up with the astonishing number of 61 ebooks, not including at least ten Baen ebooks I lost when my PC last crashed.

I am an uber-reader or have some of you got similar amounts?

J

[yvilla]

Yep!

[szamot]

I love reading more than anything else. My current count is 137 and still wanting more, but I only have about 60 on my ppc.

[Steven Cedrone]

Almost 100, and all on my SD card!!!

Steve

[Janak Parekh]

I think I'm in the 50+ category, but what about 20-50? ;)

This is a very good poll idea, though. I'll see about either frontpaging this one or writing up a whole new one on the frontpage. If I do the latter, say a week later, it'll be interesting to compare -- the people who would read this thread are the everyday PPCT forum readers, as opposed to the broader frontpage population.

--janak

[mv]

I don´t know... about 5.000.

[bjornkeizers]

I don't usually keep any Ebooks on my PPC or PC. I make my own Ebooks from files I get on a certain IRC channel. I make the books, and when I'm done, I delete them.

If I had to guesstimate the number of books I've made, read, deleted, and distributed where legal, the number would come to 250 different titles at the very least.

[Jereboam]

I think I'm in the 50+ category, but what about 20-50? ;)

This is a very good poll idea, though. I'll see about either frontpaging this one or writing up a whole new one on the frontpage. If I do the latter, say a week later, it'll be interesting to compare -- the people who would read this thread are the everyday PPCT forum readers, as opposed to the broader frontpage population.

--janak

That's be great...with this sort of feedback I wonder if we can't get some of the publishers/vendors to come and hang out here...

J

[Rudism]

5.3GB

Mostly public domain... All downloaded back when I was younger and willing to program web scrapers to download thousands of urls over night in a hearty defiance of netiquette.

[Crystal Eitle]

Just counting the ones on my PPC, I have somewhere close to a hundred. However, I have dozens more on my PC's hard drive. I regularly troll Blackmask.com to see what's new and download books into my computer to maybe read later.

[KH]

My goal is to convert several decades of library building into electronic format. I keep everything and re-read much of it - eBooks RULE!

>750 (Don't tell my husband!) This is getting to be a major investment. Very little of it is public domain. Most have been purchased from Peanut Press/Palm Digital Media, Fictionwise and BAEN Books ( http://www.webscriptions.net ). A few come from small outfits and strange formats. I have lost a few others because the makers of strange formats did not endure.

Not one of them is encrypted MS Reader format - I just don't want to spend my money on a technology that locks books to a device, no matter how many activations they have added. I was already an eBook fan before they even came out with their reader, and in its early days it was quite limited and even more problem-ridden. They appear to have tried to accomodate user concerns and maybe even have some desireable improvements in the works - moving their licensing is one I have seen suggested as a possibility. It just doesn't work for me in any form though, and I have put my money (quite a bit of it!) into technologies I do support.

[Janak Parekh]

>750 (Don't tell my husband!) This is getting to be a major investment.
8O You are singlehandedly supporting Palm Digital Media, aren't you? :lol:

Seriously: the publishers and authors should realize that people like us exist, that will and have spent large amounts of money on this medium -- that it's a sustainable business if they make it easy and worth our while.

--janak

[Sslixtis]

This is getting to be a major investment. Very little of it is public domain. Most have been purchased from Peanut Press/Palm Digital Media, Fictionwise and BAEN Books ( http://www.webscriptions.net ). A few come from small outfits and strange formats. I have lost a few others because the makers of strange formats did not endure.

Not one of them is encrypted MS Reader format - I just don't want to spend my money on a technology that locks books to a device, no matter how many activations they have added. I was already an eBook fan before they even came out with their reader, and in its early days it was quite limited and even more problem-ridden. They appear to have tried to accomodate user concerns and maybe even have some desireable improvements in the works - moving their licensing is one I have seen suggested as a possibility. It just doesn't work for me in any form though, and I have put my money (quite a bit of it!) into technologies I do support.

Amen

I love Palm Digital Media format, I purchased the Palm eBook Studio so I could convert everything to .PDB :ppclove: They also have a free version called Palm DropBook (http://www.palmdigitalmedia.com/S=9a906dd8e9dee46c03ba71e71c012a81P2ShQsCoACMAAETeFtM7576047/makebook/index.cgi)!
I just can't support any format that has Hardware related DRM :pukeface2:

[disconnected]

Another poll would be interesting, maybe with some more options. Like --

How many do you actually buy, and in what format.

Do you download every free book available, just in case you ever want to read them (if these are included in the total number, they aren't numbers that publishers would care much about).

Would you buy more if -- unencrypted, lower price, standard format, different features, or some other reason.

I took a couple of online surveys about ebooks, but that was at least a year ago. I'm not sure if publishers read the surveys, or if they just got lost in the general deflation of the ebook balloon. Maybe if the PPCThoughts poll show large numbers of buyers, or prospective buyers, it could be sent to some publishers.

[Jereboam]

I think Janak was planning to maybe put a new poll on the front page, so maybe he can include different options for that...

A format poll would be interesting...

I'm feeling left behind...I thought I was bad with eBooks, now I can see that I'm just an amateur... 8O

J'bm

[Janak Parekh]

I think Janak was planning to maybe put a new poll on the front page, so maybe he can include different options for that...
Yeah, I think I'll do so, but I'll wait a few days. ;)

A format poll would be interesting...
Hmm, sounds like we need a few polls. I'll see about that.

I'm feeling left behind...I thought I was bad with eBooks, now I can see that I'm just an amateur... 8O
Me too! I thought I was a heavy ebook reader, but I'm glad to see there are more hardcore readers than me out there. :)

--janak

[KH]

Actually I didn't really PLAN to spend a fortune - it just happened a few books here and there every month spread over the last few years. Okay there were a few PEAK months here and there. But my physical book purchases have really dwindled to almost nothing, so other than the hit for migrating my existing library the costs have probably balanced. The real change is my buying patterns, so some authors and publishers have benefited at the expense of others.

[ajf]

What I really like about ebooks is that fact that I can immediately pull them off peanut press (Palm digial media) when I read a good review - no waiting required. Plus I typically load the book up on multiple machines (my iPAQ, Clie, if only I had a nice smart phone too...) so I can read whenever I have a few spare minutes. Having some way of synchronizing where exactly I am in a book across multiple devices would be a really nice tool! :idea:

The only books I read with MS Reader are the free books this summer or books that I create myself with the free Word add-in.

However, I find that I still enjoy browsing book stores and even
buy the odd physical book. Having the ability to buy ebooks at brick and mortar stores would be nice. (I know I could use T-Mobile's hot spots at Borders but I don't want to fork out for yet another access method).

Adrian.

[Jereboam]

Being able to synchronise bookmarks, regardless of page number, across devices would be great.

Having lived in Moscow for years, and a little lacking in good English language bookshops (there's one) ebooks for me are a lifesaver. Any expat reader should be target numero uno for ebook publishers...plus hoenstly I'm getting tired of lugging boxes of books around, they're damn heavy!!!

J'bm

[KH]

Aha - they ARE heavy. And they take up space! That is of course the reason for wanting to convert my physical library. Also I moved frequently when I was a kid, and some of those boxes didn't make it to the next hop. (When I think of some of the comics I lost! At least all of my X-Men survived...)

eBooks are having a few growing pains, but there really has been a lot of progress over the last few years. I just hope some of the companies that want to do this can make enough money to help them over the hurdle. I am currently exchanging emails with a company that has a private e-reader and some VERY good books - but can't afford to port to the Pocket PC. I really like what they are doing - but won't buy a Palm just to read their books. They have some legitimate reasons for offering their own format, but it certainly seems like a difficult chasm to cross!

[beq]

Almost 250, but admittedly many are short stories vs. full novels... And I haven't even read a good portion...