So I've been looking at the wikipedia page for ebook formats and I think we're going to have to know some kind of computer language to even create this thing. That's slightly daunting. I mean, we could just create a PDF but then that isn't dynamic as we want it to be. I wonder if there's a site out there that is like blogger for people who want their own blog type webpage, but for ebooks.
It brings in questions again about scope*. Can we really complete this project within three weeks? Do any of us know any web markup languages? I was thinking just creating the content for my "chapter" and trying to tie it into a legitimate theme with the rest of the ebook for a legitimate stakeholding audience was going to be time consuming.
As for authenticity I don't think it'd be that difficult to make our book like a collection of essays about digital literary research and to have the essays track our journey in researching each individual book and learning to use the new tools that we've been becoming accustomed to. I don't think writing such an essay (each of us write one) is outside the scope of a 3 (really only 2) week project. I think this definitely lies within the focus and scope of the class in preparing us for "additional literary study and for life-long learning". If we could figure out the ebook format (something I'm a little afraid is beyond us), it'd be a really valuable project to show to future employers.
I'm presenting a problem without coming up with a solution but I'm just not informed enough to know what that solution is. I've sent out feelers into my "networks" to see if anyone has any ideas, but in the meantime ... what do you guys think?
*bolded terms refer to the parameters of the project that Dr. Burton outlined in yesterday's post
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Post Script (added after publishing): I forgot to mention that I still think it's really important to include things like photos, video, links, footnotes (that you can jump down to just by clicking on them) etc in our ebook. I just don't know how we'd be able to do this.
I'm glad you brought this point up. I don't know any sort of markup language aside from very basic HTML. It would be very valuable to learn enough coding to e-publish a book.
ReplyDeleteI do have a friend who has published two of his short stories on Amazon already. He says on his blog that it's not too hard, so maybe I'll shoot him a message asking for a brief explanation if there is one. If an explanation will take awhile, I could talk to him sometime next week.
I responded to your thoughts on my blog: http://sammcgrathwritings.blogspot.com/2011/05/e-book-can-be-many-things.html
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