It has been a while.........

Some photos, some farm things, a funny YouTube link (well I think so)
Well, since my last post quite a few things have happened. Lets see if I can recall the main ones:

• Lili turned 7, we had her birthday dinner in Malmö during a European driving holiday,
• Yes, we drove 6,000 kms around Europe,
• We moved house,
• We went to the dark-side a bought a Macbook instead of a windows PC (shock!)
• The Rugby world cup was played and won (but not by us),
• Cigarettes increased in price per packet from an "arm" to an "arm and a leg" in Australia,
• We had visits from Oma and Opa in Stockholm,
• I've been to Algeria, Australia, India and the ice hockey (some of these places more than once),
• We are moving to India next year (well, that is part of the plan).

So, not much really :-)

She take a good photo 'ol Lili does.

Will in Dresden

Our budding model at it again

Did someone say 7 going on 17? At least I'm in this one :-)

again...........

Lili in Dresden.

Lately I've been working pretty hard (no surprises there). As part of my relaxation routine I've been meaning to get onto the next book draft I have sitting here but haven't yet found the urge. Instead of that I have been reading up on things agricultural. I added this picture from John Seymour's "Guide to Self-Sufficiency" book - this is his depiction of how to structure 5 acres into 8 plots of half an acre each on a 6 part rotation (where 3 parts are grassed for 3 years in a row and then cropped etc, you know the drill). 

We found an awesome farm in the Adelaide hills on realestate.com.au, ho hum, maybe we will get a bit serious when it is time to come home to Australia (when ever that is). It always relaxes me to imagine growing potatoes and making home cured bacon.

No matter how many times I read his description on how to organise a small acreage I find myself poring over this picture and imagining my own cow, chooks and pigs improving the fertility of 5 acres near Adelaide or in Tasmania somewhere. Yes, you have it right - I daydream about moo poo.

Five acres should be able to support a family of 6 for almost everything. Really? What about Wii, Xbox, amazon and iTunes downloads? Can you grow those on five acres? Well? Can you!

I've also been reading up on India. One of my favorite books is about a shady entreprenuerial character called Balram Hawai, the book is "White Tiger", completely fictional but well worth a read - highly recommended (especially now that I have read it a few times). Michael Sahlberg, a friend at the Indian office put me on to that one. As well as "White Tiger" I'm told that I should read "Shantaram" but it isn't on kindle books yet so we can wait for that. Any suggestions?

Totally different subject. I've seen some bloody funny YouTube videos lately - here is the all time best (explicit language warning). Deathstar Cafeteria

So, maybe I'll find some time to update the blog more often.

Take it easy.
Pete

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Kindle and Paperback

Little Boys Love Tents

Five Years Old Boys Love Camping - Even in the Backyard.

Will found this tent at a local shop for 99Kronor (which is super cheap). I found out why when I tried to sleep in it - they removed the last 6 inches of room that would make it habitable by adults of average height. That aside, we set up a pretty good bed in there with a blow up mattress, doonas and sleeping bags (really roughing it). I wouldn't say it was the best sleep I have ever had but Will had fun.

Willem preparing to be a beaver. I had not realised that a pack (?) of beavers can take down 400 trees in a year.

After looking at all the beaver trees Will got a bit of a taste for the outdoors. Lili was at a sleep-over so some 'boy time' was called for, we missed out on killing a buffalo with a stick but this was alot of fun. Here is his tent (found at Rusta for 99Kr ~ $15) pitched about 4.31m away from our backdoor next to the deck.

I wonder how many
 trees a pack of
Wills can take down
in a year

Lovely scenery near the beaver area.

Swedish Allottment Houses and Plots.

The tent and the summer weather made me think about all the vegetable gardens you see around Stockholm. In 1895 the Swedes established allottment gardening as a concept in a town in the South of Sweden. This became so popular that there are now around 26,000 allottment gardeners in Sweden - with their own association thank you very much. The Swedish allottment consists of a small area of land (maybe 250 sqm) and a small house (maybe 40sqm) amongst other similar houses and gardens. In hard times it has been common for people to remain in these allottment houses for up to 20 years. The view expressed by a Swedish social democratic leader, Anna Lindhagen was that:

For the family, the plot of land is a uniting bond, where all family members can meet in shared work and leisure. The family father, tired with the cramped space at home, may rejoice in taking care of his family in the open air, and feel responsible if the little plot of earth bestows a very special interest upon life.

I love these allottment houses. Could you imagine how simple life
would be if you could spend all your time in the garden?

I can relate to that - especially when everything is in full bloom around you. I just want to be outside in a garden growing things (except at this rented house - I mow the lawn though).

We Have Proof!

Well actually this is the second proof of my book. We changed some layouts, paper colours and found some errors that have been fixed up. I thought it came out pretty well except some of the internal images so I need to fix that. I also found one line that was missing a bold font so, it looks like we will have proof 3!

Maybe, if I can finish the updates this week it could be available on Amazon before next week or the week after. I was pretty impressed with Amazon - I ordered the proof one day and was signing for it from a UPS delivery guy the next afternoon. 

My favourite picture of Will and I
 on the Ice on the back cover.

Home spun cover design!

Thanks for Reading.

Pete

PS     I changed the font size on this post to make it easier to read - let me know if you prefer it this way.

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Kindle and Paperback

Keep Smiling

Hi All,
         We have had a crap week. I thought I would get some of it out of my system by blogging about it. On an awfulness scale of 1-10 this week rates about a 3 so it wasn't that bad - just annoying. What happened?

• Car overheated and cost $300 to fix
• Flew to Washington and SAS lost my baggage
• Got stuck in traffic for 6 hours on an interstate in the US
• Was late to a meeting without the things I took to show (they were in my bags)
• Got charged $1000 for data on my phone as a backup prop for my meeting
• Got notice that our landlords are returning to Stockholm and would like us to move out a year early
• Lost my phone in a taxi at Dulles airport
• I am now horribly jet-lagged

On the flip side there were/are some good things:

• I got my phone back (for a reward of $160)
• The meeting went well (how did that happen?)
• My car now works
• I met some interesting people
• We have a long weekend back in Sweden
• We got the second proof copy of the print version of 5ITCTW-Issue 1

So you can see that things were pretty annoying but not really THAT bad. It all just happened in a 72 hour period where one thing seemed to pile on top of another. I hope that my little list above make YOU feel better. Things could always be worse, in my case I'm sticking with a 3 out of 10 - nobody was hurt and nothing happened that cannot be fixed.

Thanks for reading.

Pete

Visit the Five Ideas Store

Travel Catch Up - Random Stories

Hi All,

         I went looking for photos of the travelling we have done since we moved to Sweden, I found 2000 odd photos on my iphone so I thought I would post some of the interesting ones.

Walking in the forest
 near our house.

Sweden: Autumn and Winter. Local forests in Swedish Suburbia

Dads end up with snow
 in all the wrong spots.

 There are maybe 15-20km of tracks through this particular forest. In the winter there is a short track that can be used in the dark (the sun goes down at around 1430-1500) for running or cross country skiing and in the summer there are a range of different tracks for mountain bikes, walking, running and horse riding. Around the time this picture was taken we were able to pick wild blueberries from right beside the track - they grow everywhere.   



Snow is fun...for a week or so..... 



Really beautiful, even if the time is 3pm!



secretly we are gritting
our teeth because it is
minus 20 degrees,
not smiling :)



The photo here of us in the snow shows Lili, Will and I at Tomteland (Santaland) about 300km (4hrs) North of Stockholm. It was so cold, just as we arrived the snow really started to fall heavily, it took us about 6 hrs to get home, we used to GPS to predict where the road might be, we couldn't really see it :) The photo to the right shows a sunset (around 3pm) in the local archapelago. We took a ferry tour with our friend Lisa from New Zealand. It was nice to sit in the heated ferry, sip some glogg (spiced wine) and sail through the ice. Now that it is summer again I'm looking forward to getting out and exploring at least a couple fo the 80,000 islands right on my doorstep.

 

Will hanging around in Paris

France: Autumn. Paris was interesting but fairly dodgy......
When we were in Paris we rented a little flat on a market street - it was pretty convenient to everything we wanted to see. We had some highlights like the various parks we went to, hot chocolate at Angelina's etc (make sure you do this if you have kids - they will remember it for life). One thing we did notice though was the number of scam artists and pick pockets around the place. We were prepared for some of this but nothing prepared us for the blatant 'stalking' we had to endure every time we went outside or on the train. In the end we assume it was because Toni wore a red jacket and had a handbag with a sling (which made her an easy target). I learned to pick the 'baddies' pretty quickly after the first day or two. This photo of Willem was taken during a break while walking along the river to Notre Dame, the rest spot was perfect because we had a stone wall behind us and could see people approaching from both left and right (yes, it was that bad).

UK: Easter. So is this a beach?

Willem thought the beaches at Lyme Regis were pretty cool. He had never seen a beach made of rocks, he was in his element until he threw one too many as he got tired and hit himself in the head. We were pretty happy at having travelled to the UK for Easter and finding a week long heatwave (between 25-27 degrees everyday).

So, I have plenty more where those came from. Not right up there in terms of changing the world (at least not for anybody except us). We have seen and done an amazing range of things since we got here. Looking forward to our summer holidays through Germany and Italy.

Thanks for reading.
Pete





Sunny Days and Book Covers......

Hi All,
          Well, the sun is shining here in Stockholm which is a perfect opportunity for a BBQ - we will have some friends around for one this afternoon. We have been lucky with BBQs. The New Zealand embassy moved out of Sweden last year, our kiwi friends Nick and Rachael were kind enough to offer us their gas BBQ. So much easier to use than heating up coals! I'll try to get a picture for next time. It might be a good time to take a photo because I have just mowed the lawn (or rather, tended to my lawn full of weeds).

A while ago I mentioned that we were on holidays in the UK. Toni, the kids and I went to Axminster (Devon) which is about 2 hours further South than Stonhenge. Our original aim was to go and find some sun but also to relax in some green countryside after a long winter in Sweden. Well, we got that, and more. It was 25-27 degrees everyday, beautiful sunny days, not a cloud to be seen.

Stonehenge was pretty amazing. We ended up going twice because on the first day we were so excited that we forgot to put the SD card in the camera. Well, this is a polite way of blame-sharing so that nobody thinks it was Toni who forgot :)

Book Update
So, we have been getting alot of sun which is great. If you are wondering why this is a recurring theme for me then you should spend a winter in Stockholm (and also try to time your visit so that it coincides with the coldest winter in 100 years). It hasn't been all sun here in Stockholm since we got back. I took the opportunity during the last rainy weekend day to have a play with some new cover images for the book.

I like the one in the middle at the top right now. The current image is the bottom left. We need to decide on one before the book goes to print (right now we are only on Amazon for Kindle in electronic format) and then it is easy to change but not that desirable. The proof copy of the manuscript is under review right now, maybe you will see Five Ideas in bookshops in a few months. Tell me what you think of the drawings. We also need to keep in mind that the 5 covers need to be related but slightly different. Here is a working concept:

Things have gone pretty well in the first week, I took a few days off from book stuff but it has still been busy. Still getting things set up like author pages at the various websites and things like this, the $0.99 offer has been very popular so we will just leave it like that for now - the more people who can find and read the book the better!

I had an interview with a magazine last week who want to feature the book. That was a bit of fun - it gets released on Monday so we will see how it looks. We were also fortunate enough to get a review by one of the top 25 reviewers at Amazon "Reviews by Rebecca", she awarded us 5 stars! I was very flaterred by the write-up which you can find on the books sales page at Amazon (just click on the links to the right of the page).

Thanks for reading.

Respectfully,
Pete

PS      Use the buttons below to share this on Twitter, Facebook and others. Leave me a comment if you like.
PPS    Buy my book for $0.99 - use the links on the right of the page to go to Amazon and get it.
PPPS  Don't have a Kindle? Don't worry - look at my last post to find a bunch of ways to get e-books from Amazon.
PPPPS   Go and vote on the poll over to the right, 8 days left!

The Joy of Being Finished - Well, at Least Issue 1

Hi All,
         Well, it has been an excellent week. We got Issue 1 up on Amazon, this proved to be quite a learning experience. Finally, after 3 or 4 revisions we now know how to use the publishing site, update the description and get it priced at $0.99.

ISSUE 1 WILL REMAIN AT $0.99 FOR THE FIRST 100 COPIES. 
Click here to buy it for $0.99.

Alot of people have expressed interest in reading the book but don't know how to get it if they don't have a kindle. Here is how you do it, there are many options. Go and try these things, really, you will be impressed with the kindle software I promise. You will also have access to much cheaper books.








Use this handy guide to set yourself up nicely to take advantage of ebooks on Amazon:

1. Download Kindle for PC, you can then use it to read any kindle book on any PC (or get Kindle for Mac if you are an Apple person),

2. Get Kindle for your phone (iPhone, or other),

3. Get Kindle for your iPad or tablet,

4. Go to http://www.shelfari.com/ you can read the first chapter of most books for free (online),

5. Wait for the iBooks, Kobo, BookNook version to be released via Smashwords (I'm working on it),

6. Wait for the printed version (likely to be around $9.99), I'm working on that too.

One of the great things about kindle is that you can share your 'library' amongst your devices, each of them will know where you are up to in any particular book. My personal favourite methods are to use the Kindle for PC at home and on the iPad on the plane or when travelling.

So - I will take a few days off for now, the sun is shining in Sweden and that is NOT to be wasted. See above for a picture of my local 'beach'. I would really love to hear your ideas after you read the book. I have heard some cracking good ones already (remember rule 2).

Thanks for reading,
Pete

PS   Feel free to post a comment or share this 'post' using the buttons below.

Book Released. Five Ideas Issue 1

http://www.amazon.com/Five-Ideas-Change-World-ebook/dp/B0050Q8C18/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&m=A1NBCVVM1MRWGW&s=digital-text&qid=1305357064&sr=1-1

Find the release of book 1 above.

-----post edit--------------
Update: Surprised to make the best-sellers list, debut at #7 in the small business section :o
http://www.amazon.com/gp/new-releases/digital-text/154999011/ref=zg_bs_tab
Thank you readers!
----------------------------
If you want to read it but don't have a smart phone, kindle or ipad then download kindle for PC here:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/feature.html/ref=kcp_pc_mkt_lnd?docId=1000426311


I hope you like it.

Respectfully,
Pete

Five Ideas: Issue 1 *Kindle release soon*

What are you screaming out for? Creativity? No?
Spoilsport.

Business is. Governments are. Communities will. The digital economy revolution isn't even in full swing yet. Five Ideas: Issue 1 is about getting great ideas through observing simple things.

Fact or Fiction?

• People think alot without knowing how to be think.
• People know how to search but not how to research. 
• First is good, good is better, first and good is best.
• Open-ness is the way the world wants to work.
• In the new economy, we all need to 'polish up' our creativity in order to survive. 

Issue 1 will present a simple and accessible method for getting ideas that anyone can use. To prove it to you we will explore the method together and then use it to find some ideas. You can take any of the ideas in this book and start a business or use them however you like.

The last section will help you analyse your ideas for business and discuss the many different qualities of ideas and how to recognise and use them.


Thinking about launching at $0.99
I'm aiming to have this one ready by the end of May. Five ideas:Issue 1 will be available on Kindle and from Amazon in print form to start with, I'm working on formatting for Smashwords at the moment too. A joy, to be sure.

This ended up at about 50 pages, I don't mind that - I cut alot out and put the things I wanted in. I'm not so worried about the length but I was worried that all 5 issues might take me the term of my natural life (plus a bit). I'm much happier that the result is clearer than it was and we can get the ideas in Issue 1 circulating while I revise 3 and 4.

What about Issue 2?
I need to have a think about 2 - I'm currently avoiding it and working on 3 and 4 :)

The book price is not set yet, I was thinking about $0.99 but some proof readers have suggested a bit more. Let me know what you think, I'm undecided. In any case, we can do some 'tests', there are 4 more to come. I like the idea of the Smashwords vouchers so you can offer free or discounted books from time to time.

So, at last I am finally happy with 99% of it. This is a long way from the re-writes! Let me know what you think.

Extracts....***~~~***

“We're still in the first minutes of the first day of the Internet revolution.” Scott Cook

We now have access to a huge range of information through websites, blogs, documents, e-books and other media at the click of a mouse button or, increasingly, a touch screen.  Do we actually need to ‘know’ anything anymore?  Is it the way of the new economy that the most effective entrepreneurs or the best professionals of the modern world will not be those with the most experience but those who have the best ‘searching’ skills?  This might be true and might even be good enough for basic survival but many futurists agree that the most important commodity in the new economy will be creativity.

“The true sign of intelligence is not knowledge but imagination.” Albert Einstein

Business, government and communities are screaming out for creativity.  By creativity I mean the ability and the competence to have original ideas, re-use existing ideas in new ways, having experience in taking good ideas and analysing them to find something useful.  I don’t think creativity is a skill that can be taught, nor can it be automated in a ‘system’.  I do however, think it is possible to help uncover and nurture the natural talent we all have for being creative.  It might also be a good time to look at educating our children in new ways – teaching them how to learn, research and adapt rather than filling them with facts that are out of date.

More Extracts from the ideas section  ***~~~***

I was just talking to myself about you.  I hate Bluetooth headsets.  This is a bit irrational because they are so useful and my feeling about them has more to do with human behaviour than the benefits they offer – I think you know what I mean.  I would like to help the world by suggesting firstly that people should take them off when not using them but also by suggesting that we opt for a device that fits in the ear and cannot be seen. 

  With the evolution of really good voice translation could we start using these devices for more than just listening? Would people use an earpiece that tells them the time or other information when they ask? The earpiece could reach out to the local network of your watch, phone and PC and go searching for the information you need and then tell you about it.

 I can just imagine the social gatherings of the future: I have my Greentooth™ earpiece in and it is whispering the details of people that pass within 5 metres, I ask for more information about Mrs Smith our hostess for the night, she turns to me and fixes me with a pitying stare and asks the strangest question….I reply “No madam, I’m not mad.  I was just talking to myself about you”.

***~~~***

Put it on my watch.  Who carries money these days anyway? The only places you require cash are in the few stores that hold out against the use of electronic funds transfer, some taxis and in places where adoption of the new economy method of payment hasn’t really started to any degree.  The use of electronic funds transfers is so widespread that one might predict that a cash-less society is just around the corner in some locations. 

So, this idea is in two parts – for those clever people who understand how electronic payments work – keep working on new ways for us to exchange credit.  I would suggest that the most successful method in the future will be the one that is taken up most rapidly forcing retailers to adopt or miss out on income.  For the rest of us – we should consider how this will change the way we relate to customers and each other in terms of transferring credit.  A business will need to think about providing access to these types of payment methods or risk losing revenue.


Extract from Ideas for Business ***~~~***

WHAT MAKES A GOOD IDEA?

This is a little bit like asking ‘what is a good colour?’ I like blue.  What makes a good idea depends on what you want it for.  Maybe the idea is no good for you today but maybe in a year it becomes useful, who knows (only you do).  To start to be able to analyse your ideas you need to follow Rules 1 and 2.  I’ll repeat them here for convenience:

• Rule 1.  An idea in your head can only be used by you while you remember it, and

• Rule 2.  An idea written down can only be used by someone who can understand it.

To know your definition of success is how you can make your initial assessment to decide if the idea is good enough to work with or not.  Try to write the success criteria down too.  

***~~~***

Thanks for reading. Feedback of any kind is always welcome.
Pete

Image attributions:
Cover Image of Five Hands: Idea go / FreeDigitalPhotos.net
All other images designed by: Eight Triangles

OSAMA BIN LADEN - He owed me 10 bucks........

Well, OBL is dead, or so it seems. Mrs Behrendt isn't convinced.

I will say this on the jokes doing the rounds:
World Hide and Seek Champion 2001-2011 is pretty funny, and
OBL - He owed me 10 bucks (is my contribution).


Now if there is cynicism around the assassination then there is a reason behind that. I don't think we need to set up an investigation to find out why - people have yet to rebuild trust in the US government. So what if Obama is going for re-election, the country got their guy - OBL is dead. This isn't about OBL, it isn't about Obama - it is about doing what you say you will do.

Here is the message (no matter who the US president is) - be a terrorist, do nasty things, wreak death and destruction on innocents and then spend your life in fear because some of our guys with guns will come and find you. Your choice, but we will never give up, it might take 10 years but those will be hard years for you if you are a terrorist - you are on 'the list'.

So, regardless of our 'trust' issues, be they valid or not. Congratulations to the teams of people who have worked on this for almost ten years - you did it, thank you. Don't ever forget - when things are hard the group that prevails is often the one that doesn't give up - no matter what.

I give the demise of OBL a 5/10 in terms of changing the world. Apart from needing a new 'bad guy', the reason I wouldn't put this higher is that we all die someday........the death of OBL might be a 10/10 for some people but the rest of us will move on. We would all do well to remember Martin Luther King Jr: "That old law about 'an eye for an eye' leaves everybody blind. The time is always right to do the right thing."

So, OBL owed me 10 bucks - what about you? Do you owe me money?

Watch it sunshine :)

Thanks for reading.
Pete

ADVICE INSIDE: Formatting My Book for Kindle - Which Format?

Hi all,
I played around with formats quite a bit on my little test setup. I reckon I have probably generated my book 1000 times already and will probably do it 1000 times again before I'm happy with it. For info on my 'test rig' see the previous article on where to get your downloads and how to actually do it. If the steps aren't clear then let me know and I will put some more detail in there.

I guess the interest in kindle books is on the increase. Having played around with it a bit I can save you some time if you have a book to format for the kindle.

Formatting
Read on...........

So here are some things I tried and a comment on how well they worked.....

You might be aware that MS word inserts a bunch of additional info in a HTML file when converted. One thing to bear in mind if you are working with an editor like notepad after starting with an MS word file. You will need to 'clean' the HTML tags up quite a bit.

I will assume that most of you know a bit of HTML - if not then go and have a play with some of the language here.

Essentially if you can write a blog or webpage then you probably know as much as you need to know already. If not then concentrate on formatting text, how to use headings and how to italicise or bold your text.

Some things to note about kindle. I am not aware of the extent of the HTML tags supported by the kindle. If anyone knows of a list like this then let me know, this would be very cool. I do have an ambition to provide everyone with a file on this blog that you can download and use as a HTML formatting template, maybe we should have one for word also. This way you will be able to concentrate on getting it the way you want it instead of learning yet another new thing just to move on. Let me know if this would be useful.

Caveat: I'm not sure if some of the things I say below are attributable to mobipocket creator (thanks you guys) or to MS word (I guess thanks to you too). I suspect that mobipocket is 'smart' enough to take things that word does and turn them into appropriate HTML tags that the kindle can handle.

Headings
I almost exclusively used

H1

which is Heading 1 in MS word for the main chapter headings. For all sub-headings I used

H3

which is heading 3 in word.

I found it hard to get spaces between headings and paragraphs even if I inserted a HTML
or break (I think I inserted one on the line above to show what happens - it is just like hitting enter but you have a BR inside your < and > - if I actually do it here I will get a new line), essentially a new line. It seemed that Kindle only recognizes one of them and not 2 or 3 in a row. The way around this is you want to create some separation is to use the word feature of continuous breaks. You can find this under insert, break, continuous. Then you get a dotted line across your page which shows the break. Don't forget to put your word in the mode to view all the spaces and breaks etc so you can see the formatting.

What works? 2 continuous breaks after each paragraph heading, 2 between paragraphs, 1 after each bullet in a list (word bullets work fine). Like I said, mobipocket probably interprets that somehow - don't question the magic, just use it and insert enough to get the format you want.

You will need to decide on left or centre justification of headings. I used a bit of both, just to make the text line up nicely with the headings. Have a play with it. You can also add italics to your headings and see how that goes. Colour is ok too.

General text
The text format is pretty standard. I would just caution a few things. 1.5 line spacing seems to do something, double line spacing has no effect at all. Make sure that you have free flowing text in your paragraphs. You don't really get to control the line length on kindle. An example? The kindle user can set the number of words per line or the text size on their machine. Because we have no control over that the best thing to do it to make sure that whatever they do in terms of sizing - your format can still look appealing and easy to read. The best way to test this is to change the settings while you are testing your document on kindle for PC.

So, remove all line breaks etc - you know, don't press enter or return at the end of a line. Let kindle handle that.

What you can control is the paragraph break. Insert a return, enter or at the end of a paragraph to start a new one. I found that a continuous beak or two looks a bit better for my book but I imagine that a novel will be fine with just the new para immediately after the previous one. Have a play with it.

Bullets
You can use bullets. It took me a while to get it right and have the text 'wrap' properly. The secret was to make sure that the word bullet feature was applied properly. I saw some dots that I thought were bullets after an initial conversion to word. They weren't, they were just dots - these looked ok for a while, until I started to alter the line or page size in the kindle. Advice: if you need to use bullets then just use the word bullet feature.

I did notice that indenting made a bit of a difference on my bullets, also that when using a numbered list that the result of an A, B, C or 1, 2, 3 was a bit random. ie I would put A, B, C and get 1, 2, 3 as the output in kindle (even though word said the opposite - weird). In the end I played with it until I got A, B, C. How this worked was unclear :)

Images
I have had no trouble with images. Just copy them into word the way you usually do. I haven't found any special problems. Just note that some kindles are greyscale in the text, some are in colour. Make sure you consider your whole audience.

Using the Kindle Publishing website
One thing you can do is upload your HTML file to the publishing site and then preview it in a kindle reader (greyscale style). This looks a bit different to the Kindle for PC result you have been working with up until now. The benefit is that this reader is provided by Amazon as well so you know that it is correct (so is Kindle PC but in that version you are checking how your book will look on, well....kindle for PC)

So, without publishing your unfinished book you can go and check out how your book will look on the greyscale version. You even have the option of downloading the file from Amazon that is used to produce that preview - maybe start from there for your next round of editing.

Summary
I hope this was useful, as I learn more I will let you know. I didn't want to repeat the zipping up of files and images for final upload, we can go over that in a different blog. For now - maybe this can help you to use the things you already have on your PC (and a few that you can easily get) to get cracking on formatting your book for kindle.

For me - I will keep going with 'Five Ideas to Change the world' Issue 1 - at least the writing makes my wife laugh even if the formatting still has a few weeks work to go. Anyone want to try their hand at some cover art?

I give kindle, the apps, the business model and Amazon in general an 8/10 for potential to change the world. What next?

Thanks for reading.
Pete

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ADVICE INSIDE: Formatting My Book for Kindle - Get the Tools

Hi all,
It has been a couple of weeks, sorry for that. I had been travelling for work and then managed to take a bit of time off. No mobile, no email just the family - feeling quite refreshed thank you very much.

So I started to format one of my books for Kindle last week. This is a process that makes moving from one country to another seem like applying for a library card.....but after a little bit of research I am happy to report that it isn't that hard.

Read on........

As I found you have 2 options:
Option 1. Pay someone else to do it for you, and
Option 2. Do some research and try to do it yourself.

I have no experience with Option 1, although I will consider it as a comparison with one of the later books, once I do know something I will be sure to post it here. For now - all I know something about is the hard way!

So we will concentrate on Option2 - Do it yourself.

Step 1. Google it
I did and found a range of marginally helpful resources including free e-books (which were a bit more helpful). The best resource is actually the learning curve you enter when you start to have a go. I recommed starting with the google search and see what you can turn up.

Step 2. Your document
I started with a document in MS word format or in PDF format. Most of the anecdotal evidence suggests that PDF documents do not 'translate' very well so I opted to keep working with the word document. The key thing is to pick a format and then learn what you need to do from there. Some suggestions:

- If you understand HTML then perhaps notepad is just as good for you (if you start in notepad),
- If you started in MS word then this is fine as well, or
- If you started in some other format then try to convert it to text and then work with MS word or notepad.

If you are converting from another e-book format then try searching for a conversion tool - this might be easier for you than for those of us preparing a new e-book for the kindle.

Step 3. Using HTML and making the format work for your book
I still haven't found a complete list of the 'tags' in HTML that Kindle will support. In the next topic I will go through what I found with some of the MS word features, this will be a little bit of a mix of HTML advice and things you can use in MS word to get the resul tyou want. The easiest thing for me to do was to set up my workspace like this:

- Kindle for PC (for testing the output)
- mobipocket creator (for converting an MS word or HTML file into kindle files)
- MS Word (for editing an MS word document or HTML document)
- the Kindle digital publishing website (get a login NOW, I will explain why)

There are probably other ways you could do this but let me tell you what I found - it was quite easy after a little while. With this setup you can test different formats and then see how it will look in the kindle for PC. You can also see how things will look on a 'kindle' when you upload your files to the digital publishing site (you also have the option of then taking your converted file back from Amazon to keep working with it).

So - you format your HTML or word doc a bit, upload the latest version in mobipocket (see the link), build a new book in mobipocket creator and then move the 'kindle' files into your 'My Kindle books' directory. This is where your kindle looks on your PC for the book files. You can then open Kindle for PC and look through your book as if it has been downloaded from Amazon.

Lets break this down a little bit for you.
a. Go and download Kindle for PC from here

b. Go and download mobipocket creator from here

c. Go to the folder on your PC called 'My Documents'

d. Create a folder for your work - I call mine publishing, under there I have 'working' folders for each of my books and a folder for published book files. Set up your space so you don't confuse files - do this however you like

e. Mobipocket will create a folder called 'My published book' or similar - this is ok, you can make it call this folder whatever you like, essentially think of it as a temporary folder where you go to get the kindle files once created and move them to the kindle folder.

f. The Kindle for PC application will create a new folder under 'My Documents' called Kindle books or something similar - any kindle files (they look like little books) you put in here will be able to be read using Kindle for PC (which is just like any other kindle).

g. So go the mobipocket folder (the one where you tell mobipocket to send your kindle files when it has made the conversion - copy the files and put them in the 'Kindle files' folder. If you have images in your book then there will also be a folder with the images in it when mobipocket 'builds' your book - that should also be copied into the 'Kindle books' folder.

h. All you need to do now is open Kindle for PC and check the look and feel of your book! I promise that you will do this a thousand times. One method that works well is to build a new version, then open it in the Kindle for PC, then open your word document again and make fixes and adjustments as you go.

Step 4. Troubleshooting.
-If the Kindle for PC application is running when you put the new files in the 'Kindle books' folder then the Kindle for PC application will not see them until you restart it.

-You can't upload a document to mobipocket creator while it is still open in MS Word, so you need to save it and then close it before you import it into mobipocket.

-You will not see any images in your book unless you also copy the image folder to the 'Kindle books' folder as well as the actual book file. This image folder is probably called 'name of your book files' - copy the whole folder into your 'kindle books' folder.

Next article - actual formatting tips.

Thanks for reading.
Pete

IDEAS INSIDE: Some tools for using your ideas

Some tools that might be helpful for you when using ideas

You could go and search for thinking tools or ways of expanding ideas and there you might find some research, some notes, some blogs or whatever on different innovation methods or ways of looking at things - great idea! That is probably how you found this.

Here is a list of some of my thinking tools you could try in order to expand or use my ideas in new ways, just take the idea and...

1. think about it in a totally new industry

2. think about it in space

3. think about it underwater and in other environmental conditions

4. think about it in different vehicles

5. think about it 200 years or 1000 years or 5 years in the future

6. think about it 20, 50 or 100 years ago

7. think about it if there was no money or other form of currency

8. think about it if all the barriers were removed

9. think about new barriers that could be created to stop this idea

10. think about how the idea 'feels' with the different senses

11. how would this idea be presented in a magazine or newspaper article

12. what new laws would this idea generate

13. how would this idea perform in zero gravity

14. how would this idea change if you used completely different materials

15. how would the idea change in different geographical locations

16. how would the idea look if it was made with software

17. how would the idea be evaluated on a personality test

18. would you make friends with this idea on a social networking site

19. what if this idea had children

20. is the idea the same in the dark


So take any idea and just work through the list - you should come up with at least a dozen more.

Thank you for reading.

OPINION: iPad2 or not?

Well I have the original iPad so that is my perspective. The iPad in general is fantastic, very useful, almost un-put-down-able. I had the chance to check out the iPad 2 last week and here is what I think.

The new iPad is fantastically light, fast and attractive but.....

If you have the original: wait for the iPad 3 unless you need the camera

If you don't have an iPad: what are you waiting for? Go and get one.

Will ipad2 change the world? It doesn't need to - the original already has. Therefore the world changing score that I give iPad 2 is 3/10 (it would have been 2 but it is such a good looking machine).

What do you think? Post a comment if you like.

Thanks for reading.

IDEAS INSIDE: Augmented Reality

This is not a tech blog but who can resist Virtual or Augmented Reality?

I have seen some interesting things lately, lets take a look.

I would have bought one of the AR flyers last week but it wouldn't fit in my baggage - you see, in the last 3 weeks I have been to New Delhi, Bangalore, Washington DC, Norfolk VA, Ottawa, Stockholm and Copenhagen. This is a heavy schedule even for me but my bags are full! Got it!

These are some VR goggles from a company called Vizux, I first started looking at their equipment in late 2008. You can find them at www.vizux.com. Nothing really all that special about these except that the price is coming down significantly and the technology is improving. They also make versions for the military that project a style of 'head up' display through one eyepiece.




Then the really exciting part - the AR or Augmented Reality. This is where you impose visualization of information over a real image of the world. In the case of these glasses, the AR version shows you what is in front of you (using a camera or just by being see through) and then projects information on top of it. Here is an augmented reality business card so you can see what I mean.

Here are some examples of people experimenting with the AR. A business card demonstration, a cityscape and a HUD for a vehicle.

Some other interesting things of note. Recently a company called AR Drone Flyers released a UAV (unmanned Aerial Vehicle) that can be controlled from your iPhone or iPad. The drone includes cameras that feed back to your device (AR) - there are a couple of AR games available to purchase on the Apple app store that make use of AR to create a real world/sim world gaming experience.

So what can be done with this? Here are some ideas:

Parent idea:
-Use Augmented Reality

Adjacent Ideas:
-Useful for activities where moving your eyes is unsafe or less safe (like driving)
-Attractive for just about anything

Child Ideas:
1. HUD display for motorbike riders (goggle version)

2. HUD display for all other vehicles

3. Put the now very common GPS display in the AR goggles

4. AR windows for the bridge of a ship

5. Obvious benefits for security services that have a track based information system

6. Ditto for military (who already uses what is called a BMS or Battle Management System or soldier system)

7. Gaming - use existing toys and bring them alive with AR (toy soldiers will never be the same)

8. Tours - historical tours will never be the same, you would be able to make them come alive

9. What about an underwater version that helps you identify the type of fish you are seeing

10. Speaking of animal identification - what about for birds, flowers, trees, people

11. What about feeding the 'reality' back to a central location and then.....
Lets say you are at a sports game and some people around the ground are feeding back the reality - could you then watch the game in 3 dimensions? Could you switch your viewpoint to theirs?

12. Could the AR flyer be used as a cheap security drone? Could the fed be used with AR technology to monitor exclusion areas over an event site (like a concert or tourist attraction)

13. Could we see the rise of virtual offices? That is - your office space is simply white, your customers don a pair of AR goggles and you put up your products or displays for them (in a nice, neat tailored way) - that way your office is a reception and white wall with some seats! I suggest also adding some water and a coffee machine - people will spend some serious time in your office!

14. What about AR gaming on a large scale? Could a city, a forest, a farm become a new AR gaming site where people, events and 'things' pop out of the ground, out of the air or whatever? There might be some safety issues doing this around cars etc but could you imagine the worlds scariest ghost tour with a pair of AR goggle on!

15. What about firefighting? Could you immerse a team of firefighters in a situation and then fully simulate (except for the heat and other effects) the spread of a fire.

Prediction:
The next stage of AR technologies will enhance the display of AR images

After that is perfected we will start to see interactive technologies being developed such as data gloves, joysticks, and other devices that allow you a range of ways to interact with the augmented reality presented to you.

Within 5 to 10 years many common services will include an option for AR or be presented only in AR.

What does this mean for the new economy?
Entry criteria to this virtual or augmented world will be the display technology:
1. AR goggles
2. Or a smartphone or tablet with a camera

If you are a software developer, an entertainer or in the security business this is coming your way fast. For the rest of us this will be a stepping stone towards the way we will work in 5 to 10 years - we need to be familiar with it so we can use the applications that will be common in our homes and workplaces soon.

Those who do not have the entry requirements will not be able to:
1. Access the new entertainment options (except on a rental on per usage basis)
2. Keep abreast of the new technologies stemming from the uptake of AR usage

Do I rush out and buy some AR goggles? No not yet....just be aware of what it is. If your kids ask you for an AR flyer I would consider it a fun thing but also a useful investment as a learning tool.


So, is this one of the five ideas that will change the world? Maybe, but not today. I give it 5/10 for world changing.

Tell me what you think - post a comment.

Thanks for reading.

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