Typeflow's new EPUBulator: Easy Readaloud Ebooks for Everyone!

Introducing the EPUBulator,
Typeflow’s new readaloud ebook webservice.

There it is! Go ahead and click on it! Poke around!
Start an account! Use lots of exclamation points!

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Upload your PDF or InDesign file and your MP3s.
Download your readaloud ebook.
$20/page for simple fixed-layout picture books.

More than $20 for more complex books.
Less than $20 if you’re doing three or more.
Discounted rates for small self-publishers, small presses, and nonprofits.
More details at the EPUBulator About page.

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Uh…what exactly are we talking about?

When big children’s publishers convert picture books to ebooks, they often add “readaloud highlighting.” That means there’s a human-narrated MP3 (not AI) in the ebook, and the words on the page light up as the narrator says them.

Small publishers offer these too, sometimes – but the process can be kind of a pain, intimidating, and expensive. (Hint: Not anymore.)

Typeflow has been producing these readaloud “talking ebooks” in the NYC Metro area since 2010, for big publishers like Scholastic and [Huge Computer Company We Can’t Name Because of an NDA], as well as lots of small presses and self-publishers – and now we’re making it easier for publishers of any size.

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Tech note:

Q. When you say “talking ebook” and “readaloud highlighting,” do you mean a validating fixed-layout EPUB3 with word-level media-overlay .smils and <pars>?

A. Yes, but nobody knows what that means.

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Another reason smaller presses don’t always make these kinds of ebooks is the readaloud behavior doesn’t transfer to Amazon’s Kindle yet.

Here’s where it does work today: Apple, Google, Barnes and Noble, Kobo, Overdrive, Thorium, Colibrio, any current, capable EPUB platform.

Worth it without Amazon? If you’re a big publisher and you’re still reading, you know that’s a yes. If you’re a self-publisher, small publisher, or nonprofit, the answer is maybe. After the small-press discount (get in touch about that), it might be worth the money to have a more competitive EPUB on all the other platforms.

Also, EPUBulator price breaks start at just three titles. Bigger batches (entire backlists, for instance) get bigger discounts.

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How it works

• Upload PDF or InDesign files from any platform (Mac, Windows, whatever)

• Upload MP3s of the narration

• Go through a clear, straightforward checklist/info page

• Download a watermarked proof

  • approve it

  • pay for it

  • download your new readaloud EPUB

That’s it. Sell it wherever you want, for however much you want to charge for it.

Read all the interesting stuff that didn’t fit in this short announcement:

EPUBulator About/FAQ page

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Frankfurt Book Fair - first impressions

No sleep on the redeye out of JFK, lucked out on getting into the hotel early, 3-hour nap, 90 minutes at the book fair.

Frankfurter Buchmesse, first impressions:

1. Service providers are trying to be all things to all publishers, so none of them are specific in their claims. There's lots of "entire workflow, from authoring to marketing!" stuff going on, and it gets even more vague from there. It all reminds me of the moment Word made the leap from great word processor to vast noncorporeal bloat (which I can pinpoint exactly: Word 5.1a, we barely knew ye): They want to be able to say "Yes, we do that" to absolutely everything.

So either I simply can't compete with these providers – because I'm not interested in doing absolutely everything – or there's still a place for a service that does one thing really well. (I have some ideas about where that might be an advantage, but I'm not saying what they are yet – because either it would be dumb to tip my hand at this point or the ideas themselves are dumb. Either way, there's dumbness involved and I try not to be dumb about that.)

2. Bring a powerbank tomorrow so my time there isn't limited by my phone charge, which was eaten up more quickly than usual today by Uber, in-show navigation, and sending my kids bakfiets videos. (See below. That's a bakfiets. Now I want to move to Frankfurt.)

3. Not so tight with the final lace on these new Pumas. Ow.

(If you’re at the show and want to connect, I’m in the Matchmaker section on the app!)

That’s a bakfiets. There used to be a video here, but between Squarespace acting wonky, my laptop crossing international borders, and the delights of hotel wi-fi… you get a pic instead, sorry. But aren’t they cool?