Screen Publishing

A Web PDF Book Converter

In the comments Stephen Duplantier pointed me to Issuu.com as a tool for PDFs. Here is what he said in email:

I live in Costa Rica and publish my oversize journal for Central America, Neotropica, using Issuu.com.

Issuu.com converts PDFs into page-turning (or static one-at-a-time) magazines or books. The page turning is theatrical, but elegant. Fancy page-turning isn’t necessary, and issuu has an option not to display the magazine that way. I suppose it substitutes for the feel of a magazine while we are in this transitional time.

The service is free, and they also have a for-pay version that has some advantages — mainly the removal of the sidebar ad listings of similar publications that are shown on the main site.

Issuu.jpg

E-books on issuu is mainly a web experience. But a WiFi iPad could display the issuu-converted magazines or books quite well. This is a good provisional hybrid solution: let issuu store and display the files (and absorb the high traffic “expense” of PDF downloads) yet you can embed them in a website optimized for display on an iPad. You would get the benefits of some limited interactivity and high-end feel (page turning, embedded links to youtube videos/music, and of course links to 3rd party sites) for no iPad development time/costs. It takes some people a little time to get used to using it, but once they have the knack, it is easy.

I believe Issuu.com is located somewhere in Scandanavia or maybe Holland. There uptime is near perfect and the response time never lags because of any server queuing.

 

Posted by Kevin Kelly on February 24, 2011 at 5:11 pm | comments



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