Our new eBook "Android Une Fois" is now on amazon.com. It's ok, the only problem being that it's written in French and I'd like to better reach French speaking customers...

So I have been thinking about other distribution mechanisms.

One of them would be to send the ePub by email after someone has paid me (BE money transfer).

But than, once it is send, how to avoid that the mail gets forwarded everywhere ?

I have been investigating a bit ePub protection. It seems there are several scenarios

• Plain DRM : find an eBookstore that provides plain DRM on ePub files (like Adobe DRM)
  
• Watermark (visible and invisible) an image (the cover or all images) in the ePub with the email of the customer. Easy to remove.
  
• Watermark the text (visible and invisible) with the email of the customer (also easy to remove)
  
• Digitally sign a file within the ePub
  

To be continued....

Any more ideas ?

On my poll : who will win the Ballon d'Or I had a comment in Indonesian today !

"karena messi lebih banyak mencetak gol, dan penentu kemenangan. memiliki skill dan kemampuan diatas kedua kandidat lainnya."

Which Google translates as

"because messi scored more, and decisive victory. have the skill and ability over the two other candidates."

Thank you Lius Pongoh for teaching me Indonesian...

Vu qu'il y avait de la neige, le train a mis 2 heures au lieu de 1H20. On a alors décidé de dessiner...

In response to this post on ZDNet: CES : Why Windows Tabkets Will Fail,

where the author James Kendrick seems to say that Microsoft has got it all wrong, I posted the following comment:

Hello,

When there were rumors of a windows Tablet (the courier, if you remember) I thought that Microsoft could offer a strong alternative to the iPad. What we see here is the collision between two kind of systems: Desktop OS Vs Mobile OS.

As usual, Microsoft starts from far but in the end they finally get somewhere. Look at IE, at
Axapta (CRM), at Sharepoint...

What you should ask is not: “what is good to Microsoft ?”, but “what is good for the user ?”

My answer is: it depends.

It depends on the needs and the kind of applications that make that person productive. If all his productivity applications are based on "Windows Servers" or MS Office or Outlook, or any other WIN32 the windows tablet might be the best for this person.

Before deciding I suggest everyone to make an analysis on the 4 Tiers of what I call the eReading Reference Architecture : eReader (ePaper or Tablet), Desktop, Internet and
Entreprise. See http://erra.appepaper.com/the-4-tiers-of-the-ereading-architecture

It's only when you look at the complete lifecycle of your digital contents that you can choose the right tablet for you.

In the case of ebooks, a Kindle is even nicer...

Have a great 2011 !!

J-F