The Future of Documents

After the ODF-OOXML was, here comes another potential Format War – this time for e-Books: “Format War Clouds E-Book Horizon“, titles the Wall Street Journal.

Most major e-book stores have used  proprietary formats, but Sony’s recent move towards ePub might change the game. Although its devices (and others, e.g. the iLiad)  have supported the format for a long time, Sony Store e-books were offered in their proprietary format until now.

However, Sony will still be using DRM – using Adobe’s Content 4 proprietary solution. Which might run against Amazon’s own standard, if it gains traction. So much for a real open “standard”.

Kindle Review has its own interesting view about this article – stating that this format war might be a bit “overhyped”. They cite a survey where format concerns were only a very secondary issue.  format extremely important, and 25% consider it important.

However, I feel their viewpoint might be a bit Kindle-centric this time (maybe because Kindle is not in Europe yet!).   Portability and interchange, as we’ve learnt the hard way for Office Documents, are very important – and need to be established as soon as possible. In fact, their own poll indicates their reader tend to agree – 35% of respondents believe an open format is extremely important, and 25% consider it important.

 The broader question (or problem) might be DRM for e-books – a standard format is worthless if DRM blocks it. Why not abandon them altogether, like the music industry did?

Sony announced a deal with Google to bring over 600,000 classic books to the Sony Digital Book. These books come from the Google Books project, and only cover those books whose copyrights have expired (published before 1923).

Google has scanned around seven million books over the last few years, creating one of the largest digital libraries in the world. These books are, for most of them, searchable, and includes cool features like Google Maps hyperlinking to locations mentioned in the document, or automatic summarization.

These books could previously be downloaded as PDF and viewed on good e-Readers with PDF support; but this partnership is a major step forward for ePub, an open, XML-based standard for e-Books.

 Lots of good content available for free – makes the 250,000 books from the Kindle library look small.

Fujitsu’s FLEPia, the first color ePaper device, is now on sale. Only available in Japan, it sells for a bit over $ 1000, which is quite high. However, the specs are quite impressive: 8 inch screen, 260K colors, Wifi, Bluetooth, SD card and miniUSB support – not to mention a touch-screen. It can go for 40 hours without a recharge (estimated to be around 2400 page turns, as it only requires power for page re-draw). Just like the Kindle, it connects very nicely into the Number 1 Japanese e-book server.

As Wired points out, this device sounds like more of a convergence between e-books and PDAs, since it is powered by Windows CE 5. You will therefore be able to run many applications on this device like email, simple electronic document editing, web browsing etc… this makes the price tag a bit more acceptable.

Anyway, a device that should go a long way into making e-Paper an integral part of the Future of Documents. 2009 might very well be the year for ePaper after all.

My biggest question is, does color (at least the kind of color it can render) really make a difference for e-Readers? I am not sure about the contrast and quality, which has improved by a factor 1.5 from these pictures. Still, I am pretty sure it will be far from its paper competitor- the glossy and shiny magazine. The gap between paper and electronic will be much more noticeable than for Black and White documents.

Maybe the most anticipated announcement in e-Paper and e-Readers this year, the new Kindle 2 was announced yesterday, to be in stores on February 24th. With 16-level e-Ink display, thinner and better than the previous version, much more storage and longer battery life, the only “revolutionary” feature is its “Read-to-Me” Text-to-Speech feature. It will still sale for a solid $359.

Engadget has a first hands-on, including video tests. A wealth of articles cover the launch, although many seem a bit disappointed.

A number of very promising innovations coming from our partner Fuji Xerox (FX) have been listed in this recent article from the Philippine Star.

FX’ ePaper technology uses a different technology from the “standard” electrophotoretic displays. They are Photo-Addressable and should enable color – which means it could, at least in theory, be imaged on “standard” imaging devices, and not require the circuitry which make many current e-Readers so cumbersome. Although it requires electric power during the writing process, that image then remains available and the sheet of paper can be used over 10,000 times.

Security Paper is traditional paper with embedded amorphous magnetic wires around 40 microns in diameter, which work as standard paper for printing in any office device. However, special sensors can detect these coils with low-intensity oscillating magnetic fields up to 1m, thus making it possible to create “detectors” for these secure documents – either at the exit of secure buildings (similar to retail shops) or on scanners / copiers, to prevent the unauthorized duplication of such documents.

Finally, paper fingerprinting uses the pattern of the wood pulp fibers contained in standard paper sheets to store and retrieve a unique fingerprint for each paper document. This fingerprint can be used later on to detect any counterfeit or unauthorized copies, or to trace a document back to its origin.

These technologies and more, can be found under Fuji Xerox’s R&D page (in English!).

Well, maybe not quite 2009, but things are moving.

On the one hand, A few more details on Plastic Logic’s much anticipated e-Reader can be found in this video. It will support most office documents, subscription content, and advertising, with a form factor and a price which should make competitive against current players and “ready for mass adoption”. Unfortunately, its launch is now delayed to early 2010.

On the other hand though, Prime View International (PVI) announced that it would start mass production of flexible electrophotoretic displays (EPDs) in the second quarter of this year, and color EPDs by the end of the year. To be confirmed…

One of the major barriers to the adoption of e-Paper is its weight and “clunkiness” – current e-Readers are rigid, flat, and quite heavy, because they require heavy electronics to address the individual “pixels” on the e-Paper surface. But that might change soon.

Hewlett-Packard and the Flexible Display Centre in Arizona demonstrated recently a new type of “soft”, unbreakable flexible display that could make e-paper displays much more affordable and drive mass adoption.

This new production process called SAIL (Self-Aligned Inprint Lithography) is a low cost process which is very similar to printing on plastic. SAIL allows the low-cost, environmentally-friendly (up to 90% reduction of materials required compared to traditional displays) roll-to-roll printing of Thin-Film Transistor (TFT) arrays on a substrate. The prototype used E-Ink’s e-Paper technology for the actual display.

First applications of this technology might appear in around 3 years, but should be targeted at military or mobile phone applications initially, not e-Readers. Too bad!

A very extensive report for those of you who are interested in e-reader technologies and its market: “E-reader technology and markets 2008-2020″ takes you from the basics of “what is an e-reader?” to the various subtypes and potential market shares: rollable / bendable e-readers, E-book readers, A4-sized bendable e-readers, paper replacement readers, Magazine e-readers, newspaper e-readers, and A4 bendable “convergence” e-Readers. Along the way, interesting findings, like the fact that e-readers actually appeal to older generations because the font sizes can be increased.

It details the technologies, the existing devices, as well as some market projections – 578 million units produced in 2020. It also lists the top applications an e-reader will have to fulfill – Annotation, Clipping, Gathering, Sharing, Notebook and Personal Library management, before discussing the actual content formats which will be key to e-reader publishing.

The most comprehensive guide to e-reader technologies I have seen to date – definitely worth reading if you are interested in the topic. To order it contact AFAICS Research.

The e-Paper market is slowly (but surely) moving.

iRex has annouced its new product, the iRex Digital Reader 1000, a 10.2″ e-Paper reader which weights between 500 and 600g. That is a major step from such current displays which are 6 to 8″. The entry version will come without a pen-driven interface, but the real interesting version will be the ones that come with stylus-based tactile interface (developed through their partnership with Wacom), and or the top-of-the-range model which adds WiFi and Bluetooth capabilities.

Sony has just announced its new PRS-700 e-Reader. It adds LED lighting capabilities, a touch-screen interface, and a zippier interface. On the not so positive side though, it is still only a 6-inch screen, and does not have wireless capabilities.

But a major player to watch is Plastic Logic.  The UK-based company has raised over 200 M$ to build an e-Paper facility in Dresden (Germany) which opened in September. It will be launching its own soft e-Paper reader first half of 2009. Although not quite foldable as real paper yet, their reader looks like a rather rigid cardboard A4 sheet with touch interface. Make sure you check out their cool video.

Both are still Black & White, and based on e-Ink e-Paper technology, which predicts they will have production version of a display that offers newspaper-like color in 2010.

Also promising is Liquavista, a spinout of Philips Research lab, is now investigating how its electrowetting technology (used on mobile phone screens) can be used for e-Paper. Indeed, their technology could bring both color and video capability. They have been funded through a £12m collaborative project from the Technology Strategy Board to develop lightweight, foldable and low-consumption e-Paper displays.