The Columnless Column

Many of you may have noticed there was no column this Monday morning. (Hey, I gave ya two last week...) I had an idea all ready to go, but halfway through the writing of it, I realized it still needs to simmer a bit. So lemme ask yous guys something. The column is called "Author Up or Author Down," and it's about reversing the current business model and putting authors in the driver's seat rather than the publishers.

So my question is this. What role do you think publishers should have in the 21st century? Are they still valid "gatekeepers"? Is there any reason why publishing wouldn't work as a service to the writers, rather than the writers essentially working for the publishers? Let me know.

Everyone's Still Gonna Call It "Ubook"...

There's a new book reader out there for Pocket PC users. µBook (pronounced "microbook") is a freeware reader that's chock full of features. According to the website:

µBook is a simple and lean, yet powerful ebook reader for Windows and Pocket PCs that can read HTML, TXT, RTF, PDB and PRC (not secure) ebook files. It can read directly from inside ZIP or RAR files, and supports BMP, GIF and JPG images. It offers many customization options including: Portrait and Landscape display, Choice of font type, color and size, etc.... It Also has a resizable/skinnable User Interface. µBook is improving on a regular basis and best of all it's free!

While it supports font smoothing, it does not support ClearType. It also seems limited to internal fonts rather than using Windows TrueType fonts. But if you're looking for a good looking, full featured alternative to Microsoft Reader or Palm Reader, this could just do the trick.