MercadoLibre and the Democratization of Books: A Critical Reading of New Material Affordances and Digital Book History

Book History ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
pp. 177-208
Author(s):  
Nora C. Benedict
Author(s):  
Albert N. Greco

Scholarly book publishing and printing has a long tradition, starting with Oxford University Press (1478) and Cambridge University Press (1584). The American colonies, and later the United States, lived in the shadow of these two great presses. While many of the US presses today are quite large, with global operations, they were, in the late 19th century and the early years of the 20th century, far from the professional operations of today. This chapter gives an introduction to book history in the United Kingdom and the United States with an emphasis on university presses and competition from commercial publishers for authors, readers, and sales. It provides a review of substantive market drivers, revenues, new title output, and production costs. A sample book contract and profit and loss statement (for a hardcover and digital book) are presented and analyzed.


Author(s):  
Karl Berglund

AbstractThis paper investigates consumption patterns in digital subscription-based streaming services for books by means of a large-scale dataset derived from Storytel. The aim is twofold: to empirically discuss how book consumption in the commercial top segment diverges between print books and digital streaming platforms, and to conceptually show the usefulness and considerable possibilities with computational approaches for digital publishing studies and contemporary book history. This is accomplished by introducing the concept of the beststreamer, and the average finishing degree measure. The empirical output shows large differences between print bestsellers and digital beststreamers, both in terms of genre distributions, finished streams, and levels of completion. These results are discussed in relation to factors fostering consumption patterns, such as platform design, pricing models, supply, marketing, customer base, and media-specific features of the audiobook.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
R.A. Diah Resita I. Kuntjoro-Jakti ◽  
Arif Ahmad ◽  
Yusaira Farhia ◽  
Noor Udin

Author(s):  
X. Lin ◽  
X. K. Wang ◽  
V. P. Dravid ◽  
J. B. Ketterson ◽  
R. P. H. Chang

For small curvatures of a graphitic sheet, carbon atoms can maintain their preferred sp2 bonding while allowing the sheet to have various three-dimensional geometries, which may have exotic structural and electronic properties. In addition the fivefold rings will lead to a positive Gaussian curvature in the hexagonal network, and the sevenfold rings cause a negative one. By combining these sevenfold and fivefold rings with sixfold rings, it is possible to construct complicated carbon sp2 networks. Because it is much easier to introduce pentagons and heptagons into the single-layer hexagonal network than into the multilayer network, the complicated morphologies would be more common in the single-layer graphite structures. In this contribution, we report the observation and characterization of a new material of monolayer graphitic structure by electron diffraction, HREM, EELS.The synthesis process used in this study is reported early. We utilized a composite anode of graphite and copper for arc evaporation in helium.


Author(s):  
F. Shaapur ◽  
M.J. Kim ◽  
Seh Kwang Lee ◽  
Soon Gwang Kim

TEM characterization and microanalysis of the recording media is crucial and complementary to new material system development as well as quality control applications. Due to the type of material generally used for supporting the medium, i.e., a polymer, conventional macro- and microthinning procedures for thin foil preparation are not applicable. Ultramicrotorny (UM) is a viable option and has been employed in previous similar studies. In this work UM has been used for preparation of XTEM samples from a magneto-optical (MO) recording medium in its original production format.The as-received material system consisted of a 4-layer, 2100 Å thick medium including a 300 Å TbFeCo layer enveloped by silicon nitride protective layers supported on a 1.2 mm thick × 135 mm (5.25 in.) diameter polycarbonate disk. Recording tracks had an approximate pitch of 1.6 μm separated by 800 Å deep peripheral grooves. Using a Buehler Isomet low-speed diamond saw, 1 mm wide and 20 mm long strips were cut out of the disk along the recording tracks.


Author(s):  
Benoît Verdon

Since the 1950s, the growing interest of clinicians in using projective tests to study normal or pathological aging processes has led to the creation of several thematic tests for older adults. This development reflects their authors’ belief that the TAT is not suitable to the concerns and anxieties of elderly persons. The new material thus refers explicitly to situations related to age; it aims to enable older persons to express needs they cannot verbalize during consultations. The psychodynamic approach to thematic testing is based on the differentiation between the pictures’ manifest and latent content, eliciting responses linked to mental processes and issues the respondent is unaware of. The cards do not necessarily have to show aging characters to elicit identification: The situations shown in the pictures are linked to loss, rivalry, helplessness, and renunciation, all issues elderly respondents can identify with and that lead them to express their mental fragilities and resources. The article first explains the principles underlying four of these thematic tests, then develops several examples of stories told for card 3BM of the TAT, thus showing the effectiveness of this tool for the understanding and differentiation of loss-related issues facing older men and women.


Author(s):  
I. I. Lube ◽  
N. V. Trutnev ◽  
S. V. Tumashev ◽  
A. V. Krasikov ◽  
A. G. Ul’yanov ◽  
...  

At production of pipes of type 13Cr grade steel used at development of oil and gas deposits in areas with aggressive environment, intensive wear of instrument takes place, first of all, piercing mill mandrels. Factors, influencing the resistivity of the piercing mandrels considered, including chemical composition of the material, the mandrel is made of and its design. Based on industrial experience it was shown, that chrome content in the mandrel material practically does not affect on the increase of its resistivity, since the formed thin protective oxides having high melting temperature, are quickly failed and practically are not restored in the process of piercing. To increase the resistivity of piercing mandrels at production of casing tubes of type 13Cr grade steel, a work was accomplished to select a new material for their manufacturing. The chemical composition of steel presented, which was traditionally used for piercing mandrels manufacturing, as well as a steel grade proposed to increase their resistivity. First, molybdenum content was increased, which increases the characteristics of steel strength and ductility at high temperatures and results in grain refining. Second, tungsten content was also increased, which forms carbides in the steel resulting in an increase of its hardness and “red resistivity”, as well as in preventing grains growth during heating. Third, cobalt content was also increased, which increases heat resistivity and shock loads resistivity. The three elements increase enabled to increase the mandrels resistivity by two times. Results of mandrel test of steel 20ХН2МВ3КБ presented, the mandrel having corrugation on the working cone surface, which enabled to reach the resistivity growth to 12 passes without significant change of instrument cost. Microstructure of mandrels made of steels 20Х2Н4МФА and 20ХН2МВ3КБ shown. Application of the centering pin of special design was tested, which provided forming of a rounding edge on the front billet ends, eliminated undercut of mandrel external surface in the process of secondary billet grip and increase the service life of the piercing mill mandrels. At production of seamless pipes of martensite class type 13Cr stainless steels having L80 group of strength, an increase of piercing mandrel resistivity was reached by more than four times, which together with other technical solutions enabled to increase the hourly productivity of the hot rolling section of Volzhsky pipe plant ТПА 159-426 line by more than two times.


Author(s):  
A. S. Christochevskaya ◽  
S. A. Christochevsky

Informatization of education has been going on for 30 years. During this time, a good material and technical base appeared in schools, there are repositories of e-learning resources to which teachers have access. However, it is difficult to use these e-learning resources due to their too large number and not always high level. It is advisable to introduce a system of reviews and recommendations, to conduct a comparative analysis, as well as to make reviews of resources on a particular subject/topic. In addition, the demand for e-learning resources is affected by the fact that education authorities encourage not so much the use of e-learning resources as their development by the teacher himself. In general, the load on teachers has increased instead of the promised saving of time and effort when using the e-learning resources. At the same time, many e-learning resources are not very effective, since they do not meet the requirements of cognitiveness (they contribute not to learning, but to simple memorization of the material). It is necessary to explore the process of learning new material: this will allow you to create cognitive e-learning resources and other resources that would help you with equal probability to successfully acquire new knowledge for students belonging to different psycho-types. At the initial stage of the study of any subject, it is more expedient to use the usual “paper” method, that is, a textbook and not overload the student’s brain with excessive information. Only when he has mastered the basic provisions, we can turn to e-learning resources, bearing in mind that they must be cognitive, that is, they are aimed at logical perception and rapid intuitive learning, only in this case e-learning resources can be considered effective. The conclusion is formulated that cognitiveness is the next stage of informatization of education after the stage of electronization.


Author(s):  
Elena Deener

Digital books are considered as an electronic document type: ‘digital book’ term is defined; structure of digital books is analyzed in accordance with document structure.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document