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Comment by _9xrb | Hacker News Reader

For classics, Standard eBooks is pretty good (and free): https://standardebooks.org/

Anybody know why their copy of 20,000 Leagues Under the Seas is "unavailable for legal reasons"? It's linked from wikipedia, but the link is dead (in America anyway) This book was written and translated into English ~150 years ago. Gutenberg has it.

https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/jules-verne/twenty-thousan...

We produced it using Project Gutenberg's modern F. P. Walter translation. At the time, there was no copyright notice on the text, only PG's public domain boilerplate, so we produced it thinking it had been dedicated to the public domain. Some years later PG added a copyright notice, so we were forced to take our edition down.

There is no acceptable PD translation of 20,000 Leagues; all the classic translations are widely considered to be slapdash, very bad, or severely bowdlerized.

Also some other classics like The Three Musketeers.

Yes, bowdlerization and poor translations were common in those days. We do our best to select a single "best" translation that scholars/readers agree is the most faithful of the public domain options. But in some cases, like 20,000 Leagues, we'd rather not host a book at all than host a bad translation, if that's our only option.

My understanding is that the standard public translations of many books are viewed as inadequate and there are newer and better ones.

These days I try to order from the publisher when possible even if it costs a few extra dollars.

That URL contains "f-p-walter", so it was presumably his translation from 1993: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twenty_Thousand_Leagues_Under_...

Libby is the other one that comes to mind, for non-Classics too! https://www.overdrive.com/apps/libby

Thanks - that is amazing! As a Kindle Oasis owner, which I love in terms of screen size (7 inches) and auto adjusting light, is there any non-Amazon e-reader device alternative that anyone would care recommending?

I absolutely love my B&N Nook. I'm on my sixth Nook, across four generations. Because I don't live in the US, and the Nook is not available locally, I'll sometimes buy two when I'm in the US for redundancy.

The devices are snappy, but not as snappy as the newest Paperwhite or Oasis from what I see on Youtube. Still, I don't even feel the pageturns. It's still faster than turning pages in a dead tree book. The killer feature is the backlight. The backlight level is adjustable to a far lower level than the Amazon devices, which is nice in a completely dark room. And on the Nook one can set the redness level, I keep mine right in the middle usually.

Another nice think about the Nook is that you can install arbitrary Android apps right out of the box - including the Kindle read app from what I've been told (I don't use it). I do install Ankidroid on my Nooks, in fact that is my primary use of the devices. I sync Ankidroid over wifi with Anki on my computer.

> dead tree book

I bet it takes more trees to manufacture a single nook (resources) than 100s books.

Break-even according to one study is 22.5 books over the lifetime of an ereader.[1]

I found a separate source estimating that a paper book (typical) has a CO2 offset of about 2.6 kg CO2. I think that's just production costs, but just considering those, it takes only on the order of 50 books over the lifetime of a device to break even. Once you factor in CO2 output from the supply chain and more dwelling space to accommodate more bookshelves, break-even is probably in the neighborhood of the study's figure.

There are other reasons that's probably not a fair comparison. Ereaders seem to increase people's book consumption. Reading means not doing things like driving around for entertainment, so buying an ereader even to read books you already have might be a net positive on CO2 output.

[1] https://www.cnet.com/culture/study-paints-kindle-e-reader-a-...

I was talking about the materials aspect, not the environmental impact aspect.

Though if you do bring it up, I bet it takes more trees to manufacture my entire book collection if it were on a shelf, than the single Ereader that can store them all )) Truth is my book collection is a mixture of both.

I really like my Kobo Forma. 8" screen, physical page buttons, allegedly waterproof (never tested though). I check out library ebooks then load them to my Kobo with Calibre+Alf the Apprentice.

It looks like the Libra 2 might be the new version that would compete with your Oasis.

I must say 8 inches does sound interesting. Thanks!

I have both a Kobo reader and a Pocketbook reader.

Both are great, both can read CBZ/CBR comic book formats, have custom fonts, get all books via WiFi sync.

Lately I use the Pocketbook more because it synchronizes the book reading page between the reader and the smartphone app. No matter where I got the book from.

I've been using Kobo devices for over 10 years probably, I'd look at them for something equivalent to your Oasis!

Depending on your firmware version (a fairly recent build was found to be exploitable), it might be worth looking into jailbreaking your kindle and installing Koreader to it, instead of buying a new device?

Thanks I’ll check it out!

I bought a Meebook E-Reader P78 Pro and I love it.

https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B09Q37DFJ7

It has easy adjustment of the backlight and can read all kinds of formats.

My one complaint is that it's slow to boot and has shorter battery life than Kindle because it's Android-based. I actually use the built-in reader app for everything instead of Android apps anyhow, but I love knowing that I could write my own app if I wanted to, or just download one from the net.

The resolution on graphic novels is surprisingly good for e-ink IMO.

Do you mind sharing what battery life you get in practice? Like 10 hours screen on? 20? 30?

Thank you!

I just turned it back on and it's at 82% and was last fully charged 5 days ago. It's been on for 2hrs and 44min since then according to the battery screen.

It says it'll last until about 22:45 and that it's currently 05:10. (I apparently haven't set the time!)

I typically read for 30-60 minutes at night, I'd say, so those numbers make sense to me. Seems like about 20 hours.

You can use calibre software or just Windows Explorer to transfer open ebooks with USB. No need for another device.

That is a good point, thanks. It is not that I want to change device only because of lack of support for open ebooks. In general I’d like to start being less reliant on Amazon and I just thought of asking for advice starting from this discussion.

You can set up a kindle email address and email to your device too.

The Tolino Epos / Epos 2 is similar hardware, and at least the former comes about as root-friendly as they get.

I recommend finding something you can install KOReader on:

https://wiki.mobileread.com/wiki/KOReader

kobo aura is good. reads a lot of formats but pdf is a bit slow. has high resolution.

I remember seeing Standard Ebooks when it first launched, it only had a handful of titles. Great to see how much it's grown.

They have RSS feeds for newly released books, among other things:

https://standardebooks.org/feeds

Some things to check out:

https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/philip-k-dick/short-fictio...

https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/edgar-allan-poe/short-fict...

https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/jules-verne/the-mysterious...

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