What is your favorite e-book format? And why?

[Tazmin]

Mobi, but that's only because of various devices I have.

Never been a fan of pdfs unless it's work related.

[LZA]

I couldn't vote because it's a tie between epub and .pdf. Both are awesome and I enjoy reading from either...

I just love the format epub gives you, and it is the format of my favorite reader (like WC).. but .pdf, is an easy to open, reader for anywhere...

eh, fuck it... I'll vote for epub... Since when I'm reading an actual book, that's what I look for first.. Docs and shit, I'll use .pdf...

[meme42]

.epub and .mobi should be supplied together when possible to support people's proprietary reading apps. I personally generally both prefer and...support...epub rather than mobi; however, I've noticed at times that when I've had multiple versions, sometimes the .mobi retained links that the .epub did not. Not sure why.

Regarding .pdf versus dejavu - there simply isn't broad enough support for favorite readers with dejavu yet; I hope this changes. I like the technology, though often individual pictures suffer a bit depending on settings as dejavu compression is extremely powerful and originally created for massive image documents (maps).

If the pdf wasn't created properly with fonts - I actually prefer the comic book formats. They're extremely easy to create, no skills, no more than very basic software required. They're the easiest to pull out a page or otherwise edit - they're just archives after all. Most comic book readers now also do pdfs, but not all.

.txt for fiction? Can't recommend as it doesn't support italics, bold, table of contents (or other links - yes, you can search, but...meh) and underlines. Text markup formats simply aren't widely supported enough yet. Even for technical documents, unless the author uses dashes and space indents for emphasis, organization and readability, italics and bolds are necessary. In fiction, it differentiates things like internal dialogue.

So...user-created, no fonts or ocr? Comic book. Well-created, layout important - Pdf all the way - layout plus links, searchable, copy-paste, easy to add markups, etc. - broad support even with comic-book readers. (No dejavu due to lack of broad support.) Even something like a parallel language edition can be pretty awful in epub. Poetry - I'd always prefer a format that retains page layout and font over flow (as for searchability - index page, no links, with page numbers good enough) - comic book format or pdf equally, slight personal preference for comic book; for one thing, people often waste space by creating in color when b/w would be fine - matter of taste; comic book very easy to batch process any platform, any set of adjustments (and many included in advanced comic book readers). Txt - only short documents where no formatting is reasonable. Html and variants - no please. No please on Microsoft's proprietary pdf wanna-be. Comic book should be at least 300 dpi if possible as is ideal if someone with the proper software wants to ocr it and move a text-heavy doc to pdf.

Better than nothing? Anything ; )

So:
epub and mobi so compact, include both. Try to keep links. .txt limited, markup better but usually requires conversion for favorite readers, .rtf an option as is .doc, but again, not supported by most favorite readers without conversion.

Textbooks and technical: pdf simply for easy user markup and highlighting. Accurate page numbers ALMOST a must.

Comic book - very easy to create, extract individual pages, edit sharpness, color, size, margins, printing-press-artifact tools available to minimize, more simple creation quality control and testing over pdf for non-technical users, universal platform support with excellent readers. (Perfect Viewer for Android is a gold standard.) Will be readable 200 years from now. Excellent, broadly-available tools for color accuracy (from home-user, came-with-the-scanner to professional). (I've had better luck with user-created comic book format or folders of jpgs than many pdfs for color accuracy.) Yes, can convert a pdf to image, but the creation process seems harder for casual users to get right, and garbage in, garbage out for image quality - so many clogged shadows. But yes, a full-featured, well-made pdf beats it - but they're rare for user-created. So: comic book unless full-featured, well-made pdf (unless textbook).

Sorry this got a little long.

WARNING, LONG RANT:

Mostly - a big thank you, any format, to content providers! Broadly available information matters. And pressure is required on mainstream content providers to make their content more useable, easy to organize, and loan to the same people we'd loan our paperbacks. Books MUST go the way of DRM on music.

And the prices - no printing costs but charging trade paperback versus paperback prices? Sometimes more? They're sabotaging themselves. Authors should accept bitcoin - I'd donate. They certainly deserve payment for their work.

Limited-run textbook printing costs are very high - as are author-per-sale costs, but nowhere near the costs of printing the thing. I hope more textbook authors self-publish electronically rather than go through the corporate maggots. Plus, most textbook authors are associated with universities, and they help with publish or perish. Keep the income coming in by creating consistent new editions with added content. Accept PayPal, bitcoin and publish yourselves. Provide extra content to registered users on the web. Answer questions once in awhile in a live web session. But quit gouging students unnecessarily. Allow and encourage donations post-graduation - the universities certainly do. Get additional support when the students have it. I'd donate. I still appreciate a few of my textbook authors. Is this worse than professors keeping old editions so students can resell them? I'd rather have kept my texts - but most, not at those prices. I provide my students with pdfs I've written. So far, from a larger work in progress. I'm at a private university, and these kids are going in debt so hard some will never get out from under. Yes, I'd like to get paid for my final text when it's widely available and complete - but not at what some of the absurd prices are from my colleagues.

Pay for two paperbacks (loaned one that never came back, read one until it fell apart) and a hardcover of the same book from a fiction author - and now a huge amount for an ebook I can neither share nor organize from a company I don't even trust to stay in business or commit to customer support or development time? Do I feel guilty thinking that's not right? Not even a little. Would I pay the author for a convenient copy I could keep with me and not have to store in yet another box? Absolutely. IF I could organize it and share with a family member or close friend - and read it on any of our many devices. Why make purchased content inferior to pirated content? Somebody in that transaction loop is an idiot. I support authors. But I think Barnes and Noble, for one, are untrustworthy fools with horrible software. Would i BUY copies for family and friends at a reasonable price (paperback) - yes! Double or triple? No. I would often keep 4 to five copies of my current favorite to loan/give out. But I simply lack the storage space now, and many friends are online.

Long live Pirate Bay, and financially support your favorite authors. Grab an epub - but buy it too (or send the guy cash). And if you discover them on TPB - show them the advantage of having fans. Send protests to the mainstream providers you've given up on - and tell them why. Go to a signing, get a hardback signed - and tell the author what you think about (most) eBook distribution - cost and lack of quality software.

If you get this far, thanks for hanging in there. I should only write when sober, lol. But then I'd think it imprudent and not do it.

[beatlesfan5858]

epub because it's compatible with the i devices

[ok_juni]

epub
because i own nook reader

[literaturegrapes]

On a computer, my pdf reader makes highlighting far easier than my epub reader, so I'll go with pdf.
On android, I prefer epub for a more comfortable reading experience.

[AareOnaKakanfo]

PDF, because it's the only thing my devices will accept.

[Hiroven]

I am prefering mobi as it is format of choice for my e-reader. I never used epub (not accepted in kindle). For computer, I love PDF but I don't consider reading on computer optimal.

[OriginalDonDada]

favorate is .pdf format because its universal BY ITS SIMPLICITY. Though i think .epub is the future of e-books.

[ennowd0287]

pdf, hands down. just because pdf reader can be found everywhere.