eBooks in the Cloud: Desirable Features and Current Challenges for a Cloud-based Academic eBook Infrastructure

With the rapid development of the mobile technology, the use of multifarious mobile devices, such as tablet PCs, eReader devices and mobile phones for electronic reading, has become an important part of everyday life. In December 2010, Google launched its Google eBookstore with more than 3 million e-books. The most significant feature of the new Google application is that it stores the book content in the cloud, which enables the reader to access the book content at any time on any mobile device in a seamless manner. A cloud-based eBook infrastructure has the characteristics of providing a vast amount of publication information, storing and processing the data in the cloud and displaying the results on demand on diverse desktops or mobile services. Taking into account the characteristics of a cloud-based eBook infrastructure, the paper examines the current eBook distribution lifecycle consisting of eBook publishing, cloud computing and mobile reading technologies. Potential features necessary for a cloud-based academic eBook infrastructure which will better support publishing, searching and reading on the web, as well as promote communication in the scientific community, are outlined.