An  eBook is an electronic book, one you read digitally on your computer, laptop screen or on devices called eBooks readers.

You will find them in various formats and until the industry has a standard accessible in all devices these various formats will exist.

PDF format is a popular format for eBooks. All platforms are able to gain access and read PDF formatting. So regardless if you have a PC or Mac, you are in business! PDF requires the Acrobat Reader but this software comes on many new computers and if not included,  There are still many who prefer printing out the pages of an ebook to read and PDF files have always been good for this purpose. Visit the IRS online and you will see every tax form they have available on PDF to print, fill out and send.

Other popular formats include: HTML (which can be read on your computer screen, laptop or converted to read on the previously manufactured eBook reader)

Microsoft LIT (requires the free Microsoft Reader installed on your computer, laptop or Pocket PC 2002 device)

P2M InfoTech eBook - For the newest eBook reader available. This unit is manufactured in Korea and there is limited distribution in the US and Canada.

So, why would you want an ebook? As you discover this new industry with your surfing over the Internet, you will discover ePublishers and eBookstores gradually growing in numbers. Take a look at what they offer and what they have to say about their authors and titles. Thousands upon thousands of authors write books yearly. Of those, a small percentage has the good fortune of being accepted by a publisher. This is not because they don't make the grade, but because of the vast numbers.

The Internet is a wide open medium. Excellent, talented authors can take their books to the Net, market/promote and sell those books themselves. Others are coming to the growing epublishing houses and taking that route. It is guaranteed as you journey through the epublishing world, you are going to find outstanding, spell-binding, and top-class works, which are well worth the read.

Will ebooks replace printed books? I sure hope not, at least not in my lifetime. Being a writer and avid reader for years, I am one who finds the feel and smell of a book part of the whole experience of reading. Everything I write is still with pen and paper initially and although double the work (almost) to type it into the computer; I can create only with that pen in hand.

Yet I also embrace progress and anticipate the future with excitement. Our children are the ones who will comfortably slide into this world. Already they are at ease working on computers, doing research for homework, writing papers, let alone just surfing the Internet. Imagine a child having just one e-reader to carry to school where all the text books they need are stored within that one unit. No more backpacks or book bags to lug around, be left on the bus or lost somewhere between school and home. Once the e-readers' price drops to $50 and the kids start showing up with them, it will become the cool thing to have. Five years ago you didn't see numerous people with cell phones and now it is common place. In time you will see these from the grade schools all through college.

So, why would you want an eBook? To experience a new wave of the future, to discover new and exciting authors and their stories/subjects, to embrace what lies around the next corner and be a part of it’s unfolding.

Advantages

    * Text can be searched automatically and cross-referenced using hyperlinks.

    * A single e-book reader containing several books is easier to carry around (less mass and volume) than the same books in printed form. Even hundreds or thousands of books may be stored on the same device.

    * E-books can allow non-permanent highlighting and annotation.

    * Font size and font face can be adjusted.

    * E-books may allow animated images or multimedia clips to be embedded.

    * E-books allow for greater fidelity in colour reproduction compared to CMYK colour printing (although some e-book readers have only monochrome displays).

    * Depending on the device an E-book may be readable in low light or even total darkness.

    * An e-book can automatically open at the last read page.

    * While an e-book reader costs more than one book, the electronic texts are generally cheaper.

    * Text-to-speech software can be used to convert e-books to audio books automatically.

    * Also for the supplier e-books require little space, they can therefore be offered indefinitely, with no going out of print date, allowing authors to continue to earn royalties indefinitely.

    * It is easier for authors to self-publish e-books.

    * Ease of distributing e-texts means that they can be used to stimulate higher sales of printed copies of books.

    * Although they require electricity to be read, the production of e-books does not consume the paper, ink, and other resources that are used to produce printed books.

Disadvantages

    * E-book readers are more fragile than paper books and more susceptible to physical damage.

    * If not viewed on computers, e-books require the purchase of an electronic device and/or peripheral software which can display them. If they are to be viewed on a personal computer, it may require additional software.

    * E-book readers require electrical power; in the case of mobile use, the battery can get exhausted.

    * E-book readers can malfunction due to faults in hardware or software, such as hard disk drive failure.

    * E-book readers are more likely to be stolen than paper books.

    * Depending on the device an E-book may be difficult to read in bright sunlight.

    * Most publishers don't produce the e-book equivalent of their printed books. In other cases, e-books are given a lower priority in terms of the publisher's resources, resulting in a disparity in product quality, release dates and the like. This problem is not endemic to every publisher, but has an effect on the quality of the overall pool of merchandise available.

    * E-books can be easily hacked through the use of hardware or software modifications and widely disseminated on the Internet and/or other e-book readers, without approval from the author or publisher.

    * If an e-book device is stolen, lost, or broken beyond repair, all e-books stored on the device may be lost. This can be avoided by backup either on another device or by the e-book provider.

    * There is a loss of tactility and aesthetics of book-bindings. Also lost is the ability to very quickly riffle through the pages to search for a particular section or to get a sense of the book merely by sight.

    * Screen resolution of reading devices may be lower than actual paper, making it difficult to read e-books.

    * Due to the digital rights management reselling or lending out an e-book may have complications.

    * While the written language is universal for printed books, e-books are deliberately prevented from downloading certain formats, which makes it necessary for the owner to buy a different model to read each format.

    * E-book readers like all electronic devices are an environmental hazard because of short lifetime. After a maximum lifetime of ten years at-most, they end up in landfills unlike the Book which can be archived, preserved or passed on through generations.

The greatest disadvantage in an e-book is piracy. Most proprietary software was termed secure but soon pirated copies flooded the underground market. The same could be said of the e-book as well.

Digital rights management

Anti-circumvention techniques may be used to restrict what the user may do with an e-book. For instance, it may not be possible to transfer ownership of an e-book to another person, though such a transaction is common with physical books. Some devices can phone home to track readers and reading habits, restrict printing, or arbitrarily modify reading material. This includes restricting the copying and distribution of works in the public domain through the use of "click-wrap" licensing, effectively limiting the rights of the public to distribute, sell or use texts in the public domain freely.

Most e-book publishers do not warn their customers about the possible implications of the digital rights management tied to their products. Generally they claim that digital rights management is meant to prevent copying of the e-book. However in many cases it is also possible that digital rights management will result in the complete denial of access by the purchaser to the e-book.[citation needed] With some formats of DRM, the e-book is tied to a specific computer or device. In these cases the DRM will usually let the purchaser move the book a limited number of times after which he cannot use it on any additional devices. If the purchaser upgrades or replaces their devices eventually they may lose access to their purchase. Some forms of digital rights management depend on the existence of online services to authenticate the purchasers. When the company that provides the service goes out of business or decides to stop providing the service, the purchaser will no longer be able to access the e-book.

With digital rights management, it is argued by some [who?] to be a more apt use of money for commodity to be a rental or lease rather than a purchase. The restricted book comes with a number of restrictions, and eventually access to the purchase can be removed by a number of different parties involved. These include the publisher of the book, the publisher of the DRM scheme, and the publisher of the reader software. These are all things that are significantly different from the realm of experiences anyone has had with a physical copy of the book.

 Production

Some e-books are produced simultaneously with the production of a printed format, as described in electronic publishing, though in many instances they may not be put on sale until later. Often, e-books are produced from pre-existing hard-copy books, generally by document scanning, sometimes with the use of robotic book scanners, having the technology to quickly scan books without damaging the original print edition. Scanning a book produces a set of image files, which may additionally be converted into text format by an OCR program. Occasionally, as in some e-text projects, a book may be produced by re-entering the text from a keyboard.

As a newer development, sometimes only the electronic version of a book is produced by the publisher. It is also possible to convert electronic book to a printed book by print on demand. However this is an exception as tradition dictates that a book be launched in the print format and later if the author wishes, an electronic version is also produced.

Among the first Internet-only publishers of new e-books were Boson Books, Word Factory and Online Originals, all founded in the mid-1990s. Each pioneered different aspects of what has since become common practice amongst e-book publishers, e.g. the support of multiple formats including PDFs, the payment of much higher royalty rates than conventional publishers, and the online presentation of free samples. Word Factory set the first professional standards for commercial e-books and pioneered author-friendly contracts.

In 2004-2005, many newcomers to e-book publishing have included major print publishers. At the same time, e-publishers have started to offer print versions of many of their titles. Thus the line between the two is fast blurring.

There are some parts of the industry where there are particularly notable leading firms. In the general field of science-fiction and fantasy, an American publishing company established in 1983 by science fiction publishing industry has a well-established position. It is a science fiction and fantasy publishing house that specializes in space opera/military science fiction and fantasy (though it does not restrict itself to these subgenres). It is notable for releasing books without DRM in a variety of formats, before hard-copy publication, and pre-releasing ebooks in parts before the hard-copy release. Many older titles are available for free, especially the first book in a series.

E-books have their own bestseller lists, including those compiled by IDPF, Books Onboard and Fiction wise. There are two yearly awards for excellence in e-books.