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YAY! I just got an email from them stating they are launching digital! I put the email on my blog, but that was basically it. Oh and free book friday for 4 weeks starting october 8.

http://somnicidaltendencies.wordpress.com/2010/10/07/black-library-digital/

Being the broke soul that I am, I'm most excited for the "free" part. I just hope they're not books I've already read!

What timezone is GMT? Cause if it's Britains time zone then I'll have free books to download at 4am my time (or whenever I wake up )

This is really cool. I hope they put some of their anthologies in the free Friday books.

They couldn't put it on different times for different IPs...
Now I have to get up even earlier.

I cannot wait!

So.... their books will be PDFs? or do you need a kindle or iPad toy computer to read them? Would you just download em from the black library website or do you buy em on Apple's app store?

Dunno yet - my guess is probably epub format which is kind of the standard. BTW, there are kindle versions of pretty much every OS so you can read any kindle books on your regular computer. Same with epub

Necros wrote:So.... their books will be PDFs? or do you need a kindle or iPad toy computer to read them? Would you just download em from the black library website or do you buy em on Apple's app store?

http://www.blacklibrary.com/Digital

According to the FAQ at the bottom of the page they'll probably be using at least Mobi and ePub and apart from their website they don't specify any other retailers, but they do mention that you won't be able to get them from Amazon.

Necros wrote:So.... their books will be PDFs? or do you need a kindle or iPad toy computer to read them? Would you just download em from the black library website or do you buy em on Apple's app store?

They're not PDFs, but they're in a format you can read on the PC. You just need to download the right free reader software.

Still, I would have preferred PDFs. Needing 3+ different ebook readers for different ebook formats is a PITA.

Hulksmash wrote:What timezone is GMT? Cause if it's Britains time zone then I'll have free books to download at 4am my time (or whenever I wake up )

GMT is indeed UK time.

For the benefit of our different time zone users : It is,a s I type this, about 9:35 in the morning, so the first one should be up in about 2 and a half hours after this is posted.

The first book is up on the Black Library site for download... It's First and Only and you get both versions (ePub and mobi) in the zip file

No sign of any other digital books yet though.

MOD edit to add link... : http://www.blacklibrary.com/Digital

Sigh, cant download via iphone. It is cool that they hand you both files though.

Just downloaded it and synced with my iPhone 4, epub works like a charm. Smart of BL to do it this way from their site and stop Amazon or Apple gouging them. I just hope their servers can handle it. Good choice of book for me as I've not read any of the Gaunt's Ghosts books.

Seeing this book, I am starting to think that they may go with their big series of books such as Gotrek & Felix, Cain etc

They will from the look of it and good for them to distribute it their selves, which means more money for BL Publishing and thus, more money for more of these exciting "new" things!

I'm also surprised at the mention of unabridged audio books. Oh-hoho, maybe if they do one of Battle of the Abyss I can finally get to the bottom of it without flinging it aside every five pages.

Necros wrote:So.... their books will be PDFs? or do you need a kindle or iPad toy computer to read them? Would you just download em from the black library website or do you buy em on Apple's app store?

It will be iPod iBooks and other ePub readers. And maybe Kindle.

I just noticed the prices... £6.50 for a book? That seems a bit pricey. We'll have to see how things evolve.

£2.50 for Hammer and Bolter is in a price bracket that I'll give a go and see.

I can confirm that I just loaded it on my Kindle, and can read it... no problems. I used the .mobi version, simply dropped it into the documents on the Kindle, while hooked up via USB.

This whole initiative by Black Library is brilliant. I have resisted reading the books, but can't resist a free trial. And once I read one, I have to read them all if they are any good. Excellent marketing BL!

Okay, now on to a quest to find an affordable and pleasant to look at ereader.

How much will an eBook cost?

The prices for eBooks will be £6.50. Audio dramas will be £8.50. Abridged audiobooks £17.00 and unabridged audiobooks £20. Hammer and Bolter £2.50.

Wow that is expensive!

Books won't be available to buy until next month :(

Still the free books are more than welcome. I'm going to sit down with First and Only on my kindle shortly.

I hope they eventually put their books on the kindle store so I can get at them with less fuss, but the current arrangement is no great burden.

MunkeyKungFu wrote:How much will an eBook cost?

The prices for eBooks will be £6.50. Audio dramas will be £8.50. Abridged audiobooks £17.00 and unabridged audiobooks £20. Hammer and Bolter £2.50.

Wow that is expensive!

yeah, thats prtty high up there. i pay 10€ for an audiobook, unabridged, 14 hours long.

When are they releasing the hammer and bolter?

So these are pretty much all just novels right? Didn't they do other books like about chaos gods? liber chaotica or something like that? I always wanted to get those. I don't really have the time to sit and read a book like I used to but it would be cool to have codexes and stuff in a PDF for easy/quick reference. But I think I'd still want the printed copy too just because I'm old fasioned like that

Necros wrote:So these are pretty much all just novels right? Didn't they do other books like about chaos gods? liber chaotica or something like that? I always wanted to get those. I don't really have the time to sit and read a book like I used to but it would be cool to have codexes and stuff in a PDF for easy/quick reference. But I think I'd still want the printed copy too just because I'm old fasioned like that

I doubt the big fancy books will be available as its very fiddly to get art to show well across the formats.

Yeah, in the faq they specifically said they wouldn't be making artbooks into ebooks. I'm not sure what it means for those specialty books though.

But this will probably be the final push that gets me to buy an ereader. I've already started my ebook collection with First & Only. Might as well now.

For the meantime, does anyone know of a good free PC program that reads the ebook files?

Fiend wrote:For the meantime, does anyone know of a good free PC program that reads the ebook files?

Mobipocket Reader reads the Kindle format eBooks.

Here is the link to the amazon kindle page - they have readers for pretty much every platform

http://www.amazon.com/gp/feature.html/ref=sa_menu_karl3?ie=UTF8&docId=1000493771

Granted, you can't view epubs with it, but mobi works fine.