The Wizardry of E-books

Harry took his PDA out of the black-and-green striped cover Ron's mother had knitted for him last Christmas and started the Mobipocket Reader. He had already downloaded all 30 e-books he needed for his assignments this term, and the memory card from Professor McG., with the material he needed for the exam, arrived this morning. His 2-hour train journey would give him an opportunity look up some useful definitions and entries for his essay.

He started browsing through the index of the Dictionary of Superstitions and linked parts of definitions to relevant entries in the Dictionary of Psychology. He annotated parts of text he wanted to use in his paper. When he came across unfamiliar terms, he highlighted and looked them up directly in the Dictionary of English set up as his default look-up dictionary. His mobile phone rang " it was Hermione saying that she has just received an-email with a link to a new reference e-book from a major university publisher, which she thought would be useful in his research. "I am on the local beach and thanks to Peer-to-Peer have just finished downloading it to my Bluetooth-armed mobile phone", she said. Harry smiled to himself. "She is always ahead of the game...," he thought.

Oxford University Press plagiarizing a best-selling fantasy book? Far from it – Harry from London and Hermione from Brighton are a couple of friends studying psychology in Edinburgh and taking advantage of the latest technology, best suited to accessing reference material. All names (including dictionary titles) and technical details are real.

E-books are here – in fact, with the ever increasing number of 'public hotspots' offering wireless Internet connection in various public places, such as airports, cafés, hotel lobbies and recently, even beaches – they are everywhere.

What are e-books?

An e-book is an electronic version of a traditional print book, which can be downloaded to and read on a personal computer or a handheld device using an e-book reader. They are quick to download, light, intuitive with various search and navigation, bookmarking, cross-referencing and annotation facilities, portable and convenient (a handheld with 64MB memory can store around 50 average size paperback books or 15-20 average-size dictionaries). They can be purchased from a huge number of on-line e-books retailers (Barnes & Noble.com, Amazon.com, Taylor & Francis eBookstore, Mobipocket.com, eBooks.com, just to name a few). Some of these stores operate a subscription scheme allowing users to borrow an e-book for a limited period, or even to create an e-book from selected pages or chapters of one or more titles. Most academic libraries offer access to e-books either from their catalogue or through an online library supplier. Some online e-book libraries (for example netLibrary) offer access to personal subscribers too.

How can they benefit you?

Students, journalists, professionals such as doctors and lawyers, and, in fact, anyone in need of a quick and continuous access to information will find that a handheld device or desktop computer with a carefully selected range of e-books can revolutionize the way they work, learn, collect, and disseminate material.

We at Oxford University Press have converted nearly 60 dictionaries, including English and bilingual as well as subject reference titles, to Mobipocket Reader format, particularly well suited to reference material. 20 of these titles are also available in Microsoft and Palm Reader formats. Our e-book list is continuously expanded with new groups of titles.