Wattpad! What the...
There's this new cool thing on the net, well new to me anyway...and it's called Wattpad. People have been moving away from doing stuff on desktop PCs to Notebooks...and to PDA/Cellphones. In fact, Nokia N70 even boldly claims it's no longer just a phone, but a multimedia device. I can do lots of things with my phone, the Sony Ericsson W900i. I check my gmail, send MMS, make video calls, upload photos to my Flickr account, read blogs, upload entries to my blog, reserve movie tickets, even watch movies on it...the list goes on.
One of the things I never thought I could do...was actually to read a novel on it. I've always never been comfortable with reading e-books. For one thing, sitting in front of a computer for hours and reading huge chunks of text while scrolling the pages with a mouse...not my idea of a fun reading experience. But then, reading novels on my phone...now there's a thought! I travel quite often from KL to Penang, and over the months have discovered the Snoozer bus. It's always an experience traveling in these luxurious buses, as they are fitted with Personal Entertainment Systems. That's just a fancy way of saying that you get to watch whatever movies you like to while traveling. Believe me, it really helps you pass the time. At times when I don't manage to get the tickets for these buses, then I would have to settle for a normal express bus. Which means about 5 hours of utter boredom. When you travel at night, you can't read. You can't sleep either. The only option is to stare out of the window hopelessly (unless you're stuck on the aisle seat, in which case you can't even do that!)
But now...with Wattpad...I can actually read in the dark, assisted by the phone's back light. Ok, now more about Wattpad. It's actually a small Java application which you can install in your phone, upon which it connects you to a database of downloadable e-books comprising of genres such as Fantasy, Food, Fiction, History, Horror, Mystery etc. Provided you have enough space (shouldn't be a problem with new phones that has GIGS of memories) you can load as many stories as you want. The economic way of going about this would be to download these e-books in .jar formats to your PC and transfer them to your phone via USB or bluetooth - as downloading over the air would incur charges from the line operators.
Last I checked, Harry Potter and The Half Blood Prince was available for download among others, along with the complete works featuring Sherlock Holmes by Arthur Conan Doyle, Agatha Christie's Poirot...and all 12 Wheel Of Time novels by Robert Jordan! It's free for download too, all you need to do is register. I'm not sure if it's legal though...but when has THAT stopped anyone? Noticed this on Wattpad's Terms of Use though:
URL? : http://www.wattpad.com
One of the things I never thought I could do...was actually to read a novel on it. I've always never been comfortable with reading e-books. For one thing, sitting in front of a computer for hours and reading huge chunks of text while scrolling the pages with a mouse...not my idea of a fun reading experience. But then, reading novels on my phone...now there's a thought! I travel quite often from KL to Penang, and over the months have discovered the Snoozer bus. It's always an experience traveling in these luxurious buses, as they are fitted with Personal Entertainment Systems. That's just a fancy way of saying that you get to watch whatever movies you like to while traveling. Believe me, it really helps you pass the time. At times when I don't manage to get the tickets for these buses, then I would have to settle for a normal express bus. Which means about 5 hours of utter boredom. When you travel at night, you can't read. You can't sleep either. The only option is to stare out of the window hopelessly (unless you're stuck on the aisle seat, in which case you can't even do that!)
But now...with Wattpad...I can actually read in the dark, assisted by the phone's back light. Ok, now more about Wattpad. It's actually a small Java application which you can install in your phone, upon which it connects you to a database of downloadable e-books comprising of genres such as Fantasy, Food, Fiction, History, Horror, Mystery etc. Provided you have enough space (shouldn't be a problem with new phones that has GIGS of memories) you can load as many stories as you want. The economic way of going about this would be to download these e-books in .jar formats to your PC and transfer them to your phone via USB or bluetooth - as downloading over the air would incur charges from the line operators.
Last I checked, Harry Potter and The Half Blood Prince was available for download among others, along with the complete works featuring Sherlock Holmes by Arthur Conan Doyle, Agatha Christie's Poirot...and all 12 Wheel Of Time novels by Robert Jordan! It's free for download too, all you need to do is register. I'm not sure if it's legal though...but when has THAT stopped anyone? Noticed this on Wattpad's Terms of Use though:
Copyrighted MaterialSo how come the works of JK Rowling, Robert Jordan and the likes of David Eddings are provided there? Go figure. I just hope this doesn't end up becoming the next Napster.
Do not upload copyrighted material for which you do not own the rights to or have permission from the owner. If you are a copyright holder and believe any user submitted content infringes on your copyright, you may notify us by email at report@wattpad.com. Include a reference to the copyrighted work and contact information of the person authorized to act on behalf of the owner. We will act promptly to investigate such claims.
URL? : http://www.wattpad.com
posted by Maran @ Thursday, September 27, 2007
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