The Internet Archive has just unveiled their ambitious project called BookServer, which will allow users to find, buy, or borrow digital books from sources all across the web. The system, built on an open architecture and using open book formats, promises that the books housed there will work on any device whether that's a laptop, PC, smartphone, game console, or one of the myriad of e-Readers like Amazon's Kindle.
The project's lofty goal is to essentially create an open web of books where anyone can publish their books and make their content available via search.
This past weekend, public media enthusiasts, developers, and staffers from around the country met in Washington, D.C. for the first Public Media Camp. I was there on behalf of the Public Radio Exchange (PRX.org), where I produce EconomyStory.org, one of several new projects that fits neatly into public media's latest forays online.
While I'm willing to admit here that I went to yearbook camp and computer camp as a kid, this one might take the cake as far as camps that don't include S'mores and Kumbaya go.
At our ReadWrite Real-Time Web Summit in Mountain View last week, we came across Stinky Teddy, a new real-time meta-search engine developed by David Hardtke. Before starting this project, Hradtke worked as a physicist at the University of California Berkeley Space Sciences Lab. Hardtke named his new project after his daughter's "trusted (and abused) stuffed bear." Stinky Teddy, which Hardtke describes as "real-time gossip powered metasearch," combines search results from Bing, Yahoo, VideoSurf, Twitter and Collecta and reshuffles the search results to focus on topics that are trending right now.
Spring Design, a relatively unknown hardware design company, just announced that it will enter the eBook market with a dual-screen eReader based on the Android operating system. This device, the 'Alex,' will combine a 6-inch eInk display with a 3.5-inch color LCD touchscreen. According to Spring Design's press release, the company will use an 'enhanced' version of the Android OS that has been optimized to facilitate the integration between the two screens. Spring Design plans to release this device later this year.
Loopt, makers of a popular mobile social networking application of the same name, is introducing a new iPhone application today called Loopt Mix. Where their original app focuses on connecting you with your friends while you're out and about, Loopt Mix is more about introducing you to "the people you wish you knew." In other words, "people" like that attractive person giving you eye from the other end of the bar.
The new FTC guidelines for disclosure by bloggers have stirred up some anger among bloggers accustomed to getting free stuff and blogging about it without the heavy hand of governmental Big Brother yadda yadda - oh, you can finish the sentence yourself.
New from Sweb Apps, the company whose online service lets anyone create their own iPhone application - no coding required - is Sweb Apps 2.0, the next generation of the company's app builder product. Among a handful of new features, including a real-time WYSIWYG-style landing page builder and YouTube integration, is the ability to create an iPhone-based store where you can sell inventory within your app and take payments via PayPal.
At the ReadWrite Real-Time Web Summit last Thursday, Jason Shellen, a former Google engineer and current Thing Labs CEO, sat down to talk with us about filtration and discovery on the real-time web.
One of the greatest problems of this environment is said to be the capacity for information overload. At a Summit session, representatives of some of the most "filter-geeky" real-time startups debated the methods and merits of parsing data from the real-time web. Shellen's was one of the most authoritative voices in the session, and his one-on-one insights are well worth listening to.
Quite a bit ahead of schedule, Wolfram Alpha's iPhone app appeared in the iTunes App Store today. The app, which costs $49.99, gives users full access to Wolfram Alpha's capabilities and greatly improves on the speed and ergonomics of Wolfram Alpha's mobile site. The company is targeting this app at students and professionals and marketing it as a replacement for stand-alone graphing calculators, which is clearly reflected in the price.
Our mission at ReadWriteWeb is to explore the latest Web technology products and trends. We're fortunate to have a great group of sponsors who support this goal. So, once a week, we write a post about them; about who they are, what they do, and what they've been up to lately. Please pay them a visit or tweet them a "Thank you" (see link below each sponsor) to show your appreciation for their sponsorship of this site. You can also start following some or all of our sponsors on Twitter with a few clicks on this TweepML page.
Interested in being a ReadWriteWeb sponsor? ReadWriteWeb is one of the most popular blogs in the world and is read by a sophisticated audience of thought leaders and decision-makers. We have several innovative new features in our sponsor packages that we'd love to tell you about. Email our COO Bernard Lunn for all the details.
